Wave of evictions a looming crisis

With stayhome mandates piled on top of business shutdowns, the pandemic is driving the economy ever downward. One facet is especially troubling: A monthsold limit on evictions is running out. The Legislature must renew it.

Come the end of January, the state’s ban on tossing out tenants behind on rent will end. Prospects for a bailout from the Trump administration are highly unlikely and chances that a Biden team will step in are uncertain. A stimulus bill that would extend jobless benefits and business aid is teetering in a divided Congress. That leaves Sacramento saddled with the issue that once again pits tenant groups against landlords and involves tens of thousands of residents facing eviction.

Assemblyman David Chiu, a San Francisco Democrat, fashioned the earlier answer and is urging an extension of the state’s makeshift solution. Since September, tenants can stay housed by paying 25% of their rent with the rest bundled into a legal debt due later. It wasn’t the perfect answer, with tenant representatives wanting a bigger break and property owners seeking quicker repayment.

But it’s gotten California past a disastrous wave of displacements that would’ve worsened homelessness, disrupted families and likely deepened the surging pandemic via more crowded living conditions as evicted tenants swarmed together. The delayed financial bill is posing a future peril with a Federal Reserve study pegging the back rent at $ 1.7 billion statewide.

That solution was only a temporary fix and is due to end Jan. 31. It’s up to Chiu’s legislative colleagues, Gov. Gavin Newsom and the involved interest groups to fashion a solution, not ignore the cliffdive implications of doing nothing. Time is short, with the Legislature back in session at the start of January.

Chiu is pursuing a plan to extend the moratorium through the end of 2021. Ideally, that would give time for an expected vaccine to take hold, the economy to recover and renters to get back to paying jobs. But that timetable may be too long without state or federal financial help. Landlord groups aren’t sold: The stretchedout timetable would mean nearly a twoyear wait for regular rent payments. Utility bills, insurance and mortgages aren’t on hold.

There should be room for deal making in this standoff. California is scraping by at a perilous moment as infection rates tick upward and businesses contract. Residents are told to stay home, a requirement that won’t work if tenants are ousted. It’s not the time to let the eviction moratorium, limited as it is, to expire. That would send a wave of tenants into a pandemiccaused abyss.

“There’s a lot we don’t know right now. What we do know for sure is that the pandemic is not over,” Chiu said. “No one I’ve spoken to has said this crisis is over and we shouldn’t do anything.”

There are signs of a solution or at least the climate to produce one. Chiu’s measure is a generalized proposal that is open to negotiation and detailed specifics. A major landlord group, the California Apartment Association, signaled a willingness to allow the moratorium to continue for several months while talks continue. Newsom played a role in approving the current moratorium and is indicating through an aide that he’ll be involved again. The deal making should begin now, not later.

The pressure of the COVID19 pandemic on top of California’s costly housing market is producing a human crisis that can’t be dodged. Protecting tenants in a way that balances fairness for property owners is a goal that Sacramento must achieve. Wholesale evictions can’t be allowed.