Gov. Charlie Baker addresses reporters in this 2020 file photo. Photo by Stuart Cahill | Boston Herald/Pool
The Biden administration on Monday called on states without bans, such as Massachusetts, to put in place evictions moratoria for at the least August and September.
The state law blocking evictions during the pandemic expired last October and the federal moratorium came down over the weekend. Almost a third of the nation will be spared of evictions for the rest of August due to state eviction moratoria, the White House said.
Biden’s team also called on state and local courts to “heed the call of the Justice Department to pause eviction proceedings until tenants and landlords can first seek to access Emergency Rental Assistance – making evictions a last, not first – resort.”
In a statement, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Biden on Sunday cited the “rising urgency of containing the spread of the Delta variant” in asking the Centers for Disease Control to again consider the possibility of taking executive action to extension its eviction moratorium. Psaki noted the U.S. Supreme Court declared June 29 that the CDC could not grant such an extension without new Congressional authorization.
“He raised the prospect of a new, 30-day eviction moratorium – focused on counties with High or Substantial case rates – to protect renters,” Psaki said. “This temporary measure would spur States and localities to ramp up Emergency Rental Assistance programs to full speed this month, giving every landlord the opportunity to collect the rent they are owed and ensuring no eligible family gets evicted. To date, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky and her team have been unable to find legal authority for a new, targeted eviction moratorium. Our team is redoubling efforts to identify all available legal authorities to provide necessary protections.”
Gov. Charlie Baker and the legislature appear comfortable deploying extensive federal and state resources to prevent evictions, instead of launching a new eviction moratorium despite the slow distribution of rental aid.
“We had a big meeting actually yesterday to talk about the end of the moratorium and to make sure all our folks on the ground were properly prepared to deal with this if it turns out to be an issue that we need to work quickly to solve for folks,” Baker said at a Friday press conference. “The bottom line is, we did put a pretty significant diversion program in place and it’s worked very well and I think in some respects, we were ahead of the game among most states because we had a state program.”
The legislature embarked on its summer recess, a time when major legislating is put on hold, late last week. The pause will last until some time after Labor Day.
The Massachusetts Law Reform Institute and other housing advocates gathered at the State House Friday morning to press the lawmakers put a temporary pause on evictions and foreclosures for the 12 months following the end of the state of emergency.
That bill, filed by Sen. Pat Jehlen and Reps. Frank Moran and Kevin Honan, would also prevent landlords or property owners from evicting a tenant who missed payments during the state of emergency unless both parties have exhausted all opportunities to obtain short-term rental assistance.
The state has provided only about $280 million in rental assistance so far, via state and federal dollars, out of nearly $1 billion available, in part because many renters and landlords are submitting incomplete aid applications. Landlord group MassLandlords has attacked the application process as cumbersome and discriminatory against poorer tenants and tenants of color.
The Department of Housing and Community Development processed over 18,000 applications for rental or mortgage assistance between the end of May and mid-July, according to data shared with the News Service. Of those applications, 48 percent were approved, 45 percent timed out because an applicant did not complete the application, and 7 percent were denied.
A spokesperson for the Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development said the department estimates about 80 percent of applications are submitted incomplete, and that the majority of “true denials” are cases where tenants are over the income eligibility or are not at risk of homelessness or housing instability.
Many towns and cities also offer rental assistance, sometimes with fewer strings attached or less complicated applications than the state. Boston alone has awarded more than $17 million to over 3,200 households in every neighborhood in Boston since its fund was created by former Mayor Marty Walsh in April 2020, acting Mayor Kim Janey’s office announced Monday.
