Lamont says he’ll extend CT pause on evictions despite federal ruling
Gov. Ned Lamont said Thursday he plans to extend Connecticut’s eviction moratorium for at least another month to allow more time to get rental relief to people who need it, a day after a federal judge invalidated the national ban on evictions.
The decision to extend Connecticut’s moratorium, which Lamont issued separately from the national one as part of his emergency powers tied to the pandemic, will be up to the governor and General Assembly. The governor said he planned to consult with legislative leaders Thursday about how to make it happen.
Talks are ongoing between Lamont and legislative leaders as to whether Lamont’s emergency powers should extend past May 20. That would continue the governor’s remaining executive orders, including the eviction moratorium, which has been in place since last spring.
Speaker of the House Matt Ritter predicted Thursday that
Lamont’s powers would be extended but could not say for how long.
“I think you are going to have to extend beyond May 20, but the legislature will be voting to do that. How long? We’re still negotiating,” Ritter, D-Hartford, said from the House floor.
Lamont said the main reason he wants to extend the eviction moratorium — which has several exemptions allowing landlords to seek tenant removal — is the slow rollout of the
$235 million in emergency housing assistance to Connecticut residents financially hurt by the pandemic.
“I want to give us a little more time to get that right,” the governor said to Hearst Connecticut Media after an event in New Haven Thursday morning.
As of last week, UniteCT, the program set up in mid-March to distribute the federal rental assistance money to renters and landlords, had approved just under 200 applications, totaling $1.2 million in relief. Many more people are expected to be hired to help speed up the process of reviewing applications.
Housing advocates in Connecticut are warning of a tsunami of people who could face eviction if the moratorium goes away before rental relief reaches them or they have time to get back on their feet after suffering economic hardships from the pandemic — such as losing their jobs or working reduced hours.
“We are very concerned if the eviction moratorium goes away, there’s going to be a dramatic increase in the number of people losing homes,” said Erin Kemple, executive director of the Connecticut Fair Housing Center. “Already, we’re seeing between 400 and 500 eviction cases filed every month. That’s half of what it was in
2019, but probably only a quarter of what we expect to see when the moratorium ends.”
Kemple said this is also a racial justice issue as many of the tenants who face eviction are people of color.
Where the laws stand
U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich, of Washington, D.C., ruled Wednesday that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has overstepped its authority in ordering a nationwide eviction moratorium. At the request of the U.S. Justice Department, she then agreed to put a temporary hold on her order vacating the ban.
The CDC ban began last September and was scheduled to lapse on June
30. States are free to order their own bans under their own housing laws.
Connecticut’s eviction ban, which applies to most new cases, is set to expire May 20. Currently, a landlord can file an eviction for one of the following reasons.
⏩ A tenant owes six or more months of rent that was due on or after March
1, 2020
⏩ A tenant owes rent that was due on or before Feb. 29, 2020
⏩ A tenant has committed a “serious nuisance” such as physically harming another tenant or the landlord
⏩ A tenant’s lease has ended, and the landlord wants to use the property as his or her main residence
Amy Eppler-Epstein, a staff attorney with New Haven Legal Assistance Association, said it would be a “travesty” if instead of using the hundreds of millions of dollars available to keep people housed, officials allowed the “tsunami of evictions to come forward.”
‘Forced to give away housing’
Paul Januszewski, president of the Greater Enfield Landlord Association, said many landlords have made efforts to work with tenants who are unable to pay their rent or pay the full rent due to financial hardship caused by the pandemic.
But landlords still have to pay their mortgages, taxes on the buildings, and maintain general upkeep. In many cases, utilities are included in rent, so landlords have to cover those costs as well, he said.
“Landlords by and large have been asked to give away their services and have no legal recourse to recover any damages,” he said. “We’ve been forced to give away housing. We’ve given people the impression they don’t need to pay rent, especially the way Gov. Lamont publicized the eviction moratorium.”
Tenants will still owe the full amount of rent they missed whenever the moratorium ends, although Januszewski said landlords understand they might not be able to recover all of the money, at least not right away.
The moratorium is “what’s keeping the pressure” on both the judicial branch and on the landlords, said Yoni Zamir, another staff attorney with NHLAA.
What comes next
Once the moratorium is lifted, many tenants will be in“uncertain” housing situations, Zamir said.
“People are going to be doubled up, homeless, living in cars… People are just getting back to work and the ability to earn income so the moratorium is really holding everything in place,” he said.
In Hartford on Thursday, House Majority Leader Jason Rojas said legislative leaders are discussing what kinds of executive orders should continue after Lamont’s emergency powers expire on May 19.
Rojas, D-East Hartford, said he had not read about the federal court ruling until earlier on Thursday.
“It’s such a fresh thing,” Rojas said. “I think we need to understand exactly what the ramifications of it are.”
“Obviously, they could be particularly dire if you’re a state that’s not in the position we are, at least for the next 14 days. So, it’s something we’re actually talking about the executiveorder issue as it is, and it will be part of those conversations.”