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Doug Quattrochi
On Aug. 31 at 5:30 p.m., acting Boston Mayor Kim Janey tweeted out an eviction moratorium covering the city of Boston. Tragically, I was emailing her with a politically juicier alternative just as she announced it. I understand why elected officials steer toward to the siren song of eviction moratoria. But they don’t provide long-term protection, don’t sustain our limited rental housing supply, and are not legal.
Two studies, one late last year from the American Journal of Epidemiology, the other from early this year in the National Bureau of Economic Research indicate that eviction moratoria have been correlated with a positive health impact when COVID-19 first hit. After correcting for regional differences in mask adoption, shutdowns and testing, the Journal of Epidemiology showed COVID incidence was roughly twice as bad in places with no moratorium compared to those with a moratorium lasting at least 16 weeks.
The CDC eviction moratorium version 2, enacted Aug. 3 after briefly lapsing July 31, was likewise chock full of medical evidence indicating that eviction moratoria reduced COVID illnesses. I’m convinced!
All this is not surprising to me. Studies prior to the pandemic showed that stable housing has always been a key driver of health outcomes across the board. When we know where we’re sleeping tonight, tomorrow and four months from now, we sleep better, eat better, make and keep preventative medicine and dental appointments and react promptly and correctly to injury and signs of illness. What then is society to do – keep eviction moratoriums forever?
They Kick the Can Down the Road
Landlords exist to resell housing to renters. Usually, the price we pay for the housing is fixed and never-ending in the form of debt, real estate taxes, insurance, repairs and utilities. If an eviction moratorium protects a renter who can’t pay rent, but the landlord is obligated to keep buying all of that housing, then either the business eventually ends or the landlord finds non-court alternatives.
The preferred non-court alternative is rental assistance. The city of Boston has a Rental Relief Fund, also called the RRF. Sadly, the RRF is available only to households at or below 80 percent of the area median income. The RRF is federally funded so income eligibility is above Boston’s control. The Boston moratorium does not line up with this income limit, covering more renters than RRF can help. And I don’t know for a fact, but I’m guessing city leaders could not afford to make up the difference even if they wanted to.
A less preferred, non-court alternative is “cash-for-keys,” or when a landlord pays a renter (or forgives debt, or both) to free up their unit. This is surely happening.
Somerville recently boasted that their moratorium has stopped all five Somerville executions issued by the courts since the pandemic began. MassLandlords eviction data collected for the year 2019 indicates that Somerville ought to have had at least 150 executions since the pandemic began. Where did the other 145 go? Rental assistance (not the moratorium) or off-the-record cash for keys.
Worse yet, regardless of the money, the idea of the moratorium pisses off landlords. It intends to cover renters who can pay but are just breaking the rules: destroying the premises, subletting to strangers, irritating the neighbors with loud music until 4 a.m. The moratorium covers all except “serious violations of the terms of the tenancy that impair the health and safety of other building residents or immediately adjacent neighbors.” Under this idiotically specific wording, a renter could murder a non-adjacent neighbor down the street and still be entitled to remain. Lest you think this is empty polemic, murder of a non-adjacent neighbor is one of the few cases I heard of actually getting through the state moratorium last year. No more in Boston.
Landlords whose renters are not eligible for rental assistance, or who abuse the moratorium and humankind, are broadly and foolishly protected in the same act. Condominium conversion never looked so good.
Why Boston’s Moratorium is Illegal
There are only two classes of people who get to tell a sheriff or constable what to do when it comes to evictions. The courts, who issue executions (“YOU ARE HEREBY COMMANDED” etc.) and the legislature, who draft the law (“No lessor shall”). The Boston moratorium was issued by the interim executive director of the Boston Public Health Commission as agent of the Board of Health. Sounds like a bogus order to me.
Even if the legislature had enacted a moratorium like Boston’s, it would still likely fall under the same withering fire to which the CDC moratorium succumbed. Moratoria are being held to a higher standard in a world with widespread, freely available vaccines. Yes, a moratorium certainly is helpful from a health point of view! But how is it internally consistent if we still allow people to move for any other reason? And how is it necessary, when rental assistance shows us a better way out?
Doug Quattrochi is executive director of MassLandlords Inc.
