As CARES Act expires, SC prepares for an ‘avalanche of eviction filings’
The federal CARES Act provided protections for tenants across the country who took a financial hit from the coronavirus pandemic. But with those safeguards set to expire, advocates for low-income South Carolinians fear that hundreds of thousands of people may lose their housing.
Eviction filings in South Carolina have been on the rise since the end of May, when a statewide moratorium on evictions expired. But up until July 24, the CARES Act prohibited landlords from evicting tenants living in buildings with federally backed mortgages.
Though landlords will have to wait until the end of August to actually remove tenants, “We’re going to see an avalanche of eviction filings start to pour in,” said Sue Berkowitz, director of the South Carolina Appleseed Legal Justice Center. “I think there’s no question that African American and Latinx communities will be disproportionately impacted.”
U.S. Consulting firm Stout and The National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel analyzed pulse survey data from the U.S. Census Bureau and found that 53.5% of renters in South Carolina may be at risk of eviction. The survey data also showed that Black and Hispanic renters displayed less confidence in their ability to pay rent than their white counterparts.
Congress is working to pass a second version of the CARES Act, but the most recent version released by Senate Republicans did not include a moratorium on evictions.
The CARES Act also provided a weekly $600 federal unemployment benefit which will run out at the end of this week. Though the new GOP bill pledges to replace 70% of a person’s income, Bryan Grady, chief research officer at the South Carolina Housing Finance and Development Authority, said that might not be enough for some residents to cover the cost of rent.
“Job losses were most concentrated in low-wage service sectors,” he said. “These were people who were already living on the margins and trying to support a family on very little money.”
Organizations combating homelessness have begun to prepare for the worst.
“It’s forcing us to think outside the box because we know we cannot rely on our existing services and our existing shelter capacities,” said Lila Anna Sauls, president and CEO of Columbia-based nonprofit Homeless No More.
As more families get evicted, they may double or triple up into smaller apartments in order to avoid homelessness. “That’s putting more people into a confined space which increases the possibility of spreading the virus,” Sauls said. “We’re trying to come up with temporary solutions like putting up families in hotels to prevent that.”
State Rep. Marvin Pendarvis, D-North Charleston, said he wants the legislature step in and create a new statewide ban on evictions but “sadly there is no appetite in the General Assembly to take up that kind of action. Even the initial moratorium that ended in May was the result of our Supreme Court stepping in.”
Lynette Bland, president of the South Carolina Apartment Association, said that another eviction moratorium would hurt both tenants and landlords.
“It will only cause people to fall further and further behind on their rent,” she said. “And if rents are not paid then landlords won’t have money to cover their mortgages or fix problems in their properties.”
One solution that has proven more politically viable are rental relief programs.
At the end of May, the South Carolina Housing Finance and Development Authority partnered with the nonprofit SC Thrive to offer $5 million to help families that have fallen behind on rent. Pendarvis said he plans to ask the legislature to allocate more funds toward that program when the General Assembly meets in September.
Bland said her group has also been lobbying Congress to start a federal rental relief program.
“We all want our residents to be able to stay which is why we really need federal funding to help us get through this.”
