We’re excited to announce that Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) will join our next national call on Tuesday, June 2, 3:30-5pm ET! This is our opportunity to thank Speaker Pelosi for her powerful commitment to ensuring housing stability during and after the pandemic and learn about what more we need to do to ensure that critical housing resources and protections are included in the final spending package! Register for the call here:https://tinyurl.com/ru73qan
There are lots of ways for you to advocate for housing investments and protections in the next coronavirus relief package:
Join us in a tweetstorm on Monday, June 1 at 1pm ET to call for robust housing resources and other provisions in the next coronavirus relief package. Sample tweets can be found here. As you prepare your tweets, you can use images from the media toolkit: https://tinyurl.com/yb8ncge.
A letter urging Congress to include the “Emergency Rental Assistance and Rental market Stabilization Act” in any comprehensive coronavirus relief package.
A letter urging the Senate to immediately enact the critical housing investments and protections included in the “HEROES Act.”
Additional updates below.
Coronavirus Update, Wednesday, May 27, 2020
NLIHC is maintaining a COVID-19/Housing and Homelessness News and Resource page here.
NLIHC President and CEO Diane Yentel participated on May 22 in a virtual roundtable hosted by the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing, Community Development, and Insurance on “Reviewing the Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on U.S. Housing Markets.” Read more in Memo. Read Diane Yentel’s opening statement and watch the recording.
Many thanks to everyone who joined yesterday’s National Call on Coronavirus and Homelessness/Housing! Dr. Megan Sandel of Children’s HealthWatch spoke about the intersection of housing and health, and Oregon State Representative Alissa Keny-Guyer spoke about advocacy efforts to ensure that federal and state Coronavirus Relief Funds are spent on emergency rental assistance. We heard field updates from Tara Rollins of the Utah Housing Coalition, Gavin Thornton of the Hawaii Appleseed Center for Law and Economic Justice, and Randy Shaw of San Francisco’s Tenderloin Housing Clinic. Becca Davis of the ReFrame Association spoke about the challenges facing volunteer efforts, and Renee Williams of the National Housing Law Project discussed the needs of survivors of domestic violence. Jos Linn of RESULTS explained how advocates can leverage the media to ensure that critical housing resources are included in the next federal relief package. NLIHC’s Vice President of Public Policy Sarah Saadian and Field Director Joey Lindstrom provided Hill updates and outlined needed advocacy actions. You can find a recording of the call and the presentation slides on NLIHC’s website.
Resources discussed on yesterday’s national call include:
Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) wrote to HUD Secretary Ben Carson on May 22, urging the department to quickly distribute more than $9 billion in housing and homelessness assistance appropriated by Congress through the CARES Act.
Advocacy
The NLIHC-led Disaster Housing Recovery Coalition will continue to push for a broad array of resources and protections, including emergency rental assistance and eviction prevention assistance, a national moratorium on evictions and foreclosures, and emergency funds for homelessness service providers, housing authorities, and housing providers, among other recommendations. For more information, see DHRC’s full list of recommendations.
Reporting
The New York Times discusses how the economic fallout as a result of COVID-19 will be particularly devastating for renters, who are more likely to have lower incomes and work hourly jobs that were cut during the pandemic. The United States is facing a surge of evictions as eviction moratoriums and federal relief payments expire.
A Health Affairs article outlines the steps that the government must take to stop the spread of the coronavirus and establish a safe and accessible network of short-term housing options for people experiencing homelessness. The authors discuss the role of housing and overcrowding in driving the pandemic globally.
A piece in the New York Times Magazine examines the pandemic’s devastating impact on Black Americans, particularly families who were already stretched to the limit.
An op-ed in the Miami Herald examines the devastating impact of the coronavirus on people experiencing homelessness and contends that criminalizing homelessness violates fundamental human rights, is ineffective, and has dire public health consequences. The authors urge that we must provide immediate housing in hotels for people experiencing homelessness in the short-term and use state and federal stimulus funding to close the housing gap.
State and Local News
A list of state and local emergency rental assistance programs is available here from NLIHC.
Alaska
Alaska’s eviction moratorium will last until June 30 or until the governor ends the state of emergency, but lawyers are concerned about the hundreds of renters who will have to pay back their rent or face eviction when the moratoriums expire. Alaska Legal Services Corporation may be able to assist people facing eviction, but Public Interest Attorney James Davis worries that evictions will be widespread without interventions from the government and landlords.
California
The interim director of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority told county officials that they hope to place all individuals in COVID-19-related programs into permanent housing by April 2022. Service providers plan to increase their capacity to identify housing units and fill the rooms within seven days of acquiring them.
San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer announced that a recently renovated Super 8 motel will serve as temporary housing for families experiencing homelessness who have been impacted by the pandemic. The motel is making available 42 units, a fitness room, laundry facilities, and a shared kitchen and communal spaces.
Governor Gavin Newsom is proposing that state environmental regulations should be waived for cities and counties that want to convert hotels into housing for people experiencing homelessness using federal funding.
The heatwave sweeping across the Bay Area during the middle of the coronavirus pandemic places seniors and people experiencing homelessness at higher risk of illness. Advocates are urging the city and county to use vacant hotel rooms to shelter seniors and people experiencing homelessness.
Florida
Even with Florida’s eviction moratorium in place, landlords have tried to evict tenants. Eighty eviction cases have been filed and are pending in Orange County alone.
Governor Eric Holcomb extended Indiana’s eviction and foreclosure moratorium to June 30, but the Hoosier Housing Coalition is concerned about the thousands of Indiana renters who will need rental assistance. According to NLIHC, an estimated 258,782 Indiana renters will need rent assistance from May through September.
An editorial in the Journal Gazette argues that Indiana must take urgent action to protect low-income renters as the state’s eviction moratorium is set to expire on June 30.
Maryland
The Johns Hopkins Go Team, a unit of clinicians that was formed years ago to respond to natural disasters, has conducted nearly 700 COVID-19 tests at Health Care for the Homeless and four other shelters in Baltimore. Johns Hopkins has provided funding for groups and businesses to acquire personal protective equipment. The institution is also collaborating with the local chapter of the NAACP on public health messaging to spread accurate information about the coronavirus.
Massachusetts
Rachel Heller, CEO of Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association, an NLIHC state partner, wrote an op-ed examining the urgent need for emergency rental assistance to help renters and landlords who have been impacted by the pandemic. Heller discussed the need for a $50 million emergency appropriation for Residential Assistance for Families in Transition in the Massachusetts state budget and large-scale federal rent relief.
Michigan
Kalamazoo Mayor David Anderson emphasized the need for additional resources to address the uptick in homelessness as a result of the pandemic. The city is temporarily housing people experiencing homelessness in a motel and has opened day shelters where individuals can receive hot meals. These solutions cost Kalamazoo an average of $60,000 per week, and the city needs significant resources to continue providing these essential services.
Missouri
Kansas City will fund a third attorney to provide legal aid to low-income renters facing eviction. The Kansas City Council funded two attorneys from Legal Aid of Western Missouri last month. The third attorney is from the Heartland Center for Jobs and Freedom.
New York
Approximately 30 protesters laid out mock “bodybags” outside of New York City Hall on May 26 to protest the city’s treatment of people experiencing homelessness. VOCAL-NY, an organization that advocates for low-income New Yorkers, organized the protest. The protesters demanded that the city pay for 30,000 hotel rooms and stop the NYPD and Department of Homeless Services sweeps.
North Carolina
Homeless shelter providers in Charlotte, including Jerard Collins, are working hard to protect residents and educate them about the pandemic.
Oregon
Portland city officials are considering entering into 12- to 18-month agreements with motels to house people experiencing homelessness, but they have expressed concerns about the high cost of this project. If the city uses its current model, the cost of housing people in motels would increase an estimated 500 percent.
According to the Oregonian, there is growing support among city officials and housing advocates for Portland to buy motels to use as short-term shelters initially and then as long-term affordable housing.
Pennsylvania
City officials moved approximately 50 individuals experiencing homelessness from the Philadelphia International Airport on May 26, offering to test any individuals who requested to be transported to a shelter.
Texas
Houston is now the largest city in the United States where evictions can resume. The Texas Supreme Court ordered that evictions and debt collection proceedings could resume on May 19, and the number of evictions is expected to skyrocket.
Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner identified homeless shelters as a major hotspot for the coronavirus in his city, and Austin Mayor Steve Adler mentioned that the city plans to vote on acquiring another motel to house people experiencing homelessness during the pandemic.
West Virginia
The West Virginia Community Action Partnership (WVCAP) received an additional $1,118,403 from the U.S. Department of Veterans’ Affairs to spend on housing services for veterans. The funding will help WVCAP address the needs of veterans experiencing homelessness and help them to obtain permanent housing.
Wisconsin
The Wisconsin Coalition Against Homelessness is urging the state to address the surge of homelessness that is expected to occur when the eviction moratorium is lifted. The coalition offered a three-pronged strategy that includes new funding, housing, and jobs.
The National Low Income Housing Coalition is dedicated solely to achieving socially just public policy that ensures people with the lowest incomes in the United States have affordable and decent homes.
DISASTER HOUSING RECOVERY COALITION, C/O NATIONAL LOW INCOME HOUSING COALITION
1000 Vermont Avenue, NW | Suite 500 | Washington, DC 20005 | 202-662-1530 | www.nlihc.org
