The following column is the opinion and analysis of the writers:
During Gov. Doug Ducey’s Dec. 2 press conference, he covered a wide range of topics — from support for hospitals, to prioritizing vaccinations for teachers, to extending the National Guard deployment. Glaring in its omission was any discussion of renewing the statewide eviction moratorium or allocating CARES funds still held by the governor’s office for rental assistance. In closing remarks, the governor told Arizonans to “stay home,” in blatant disregard of the fact that his current policies are destined to result in many thousands of Arizonans facing homelessness in January.
During the pandemic, the University of Arizona’s Southwest Institute for Research on Women has been issuing regular eviction and homelessness reports based on analysis of data reported by the U.S. Census Bureau’s Pulse Survey, as well as statewide economic indicators. Researchers found that 35% of renters have slight to no confidence they’ll be able to pay December rent. Of these respondents, 46% said it was very or somewhat likely they would be evicted.
SIROW maintains that Pima County evictions will soar beginning in January 2021 when the CDC eviction moratorium expires. Up to 15,000 potential eviction filings impacting up to 11,250 households are estimated to occur. The economic and emotional ripple effect of this looming housing crisis is virtually untraceable.
If the governor truly wants to mitigate the spread of the virus, ensuring that renters will remain housed during a period of high transmission by reissuing a statewide eviction moratorium is a no-brainer. This is not charity; this is simply facing and dealing with a public health crisis.
What happens when the moratorium is finally lifted as the spread of COVID-19 slows under the protection of vaccinations? That depends on many things, but there are two actions the governor could take which would proactively ease this future threat: extend the moratorium on evictions while increasing rental assistance funding. The first would slow the immediate impact of evictions, while the second would help the many small landlords who control only a handful of rental units.
These landlords were effectively excluded from the Paycheck Protection Program despite being small businesspeople. The governor’s office still holds hundreds of millions of dollars of undistributed CARES funds. Pima County Interfaith and faith leaders in Pima County call on the governor to immediately designate a minimum of $20 million for a rental assistance fund available to small business landlords in exchange for their commitment not to evict their tenants.
From a purely economic view, it is hard to understand why investing $85 million in increased hospital staff to treat increasing cases of COVID-19 is feasible, while investing $20 million to keep citizens housed to prevent virus spread and instituting an eviction moratorium are not. From a moral standpoint, we are obligated to do what we can to ensure that thousands of Arizonans are not kicked to the curb in the middle of the greatest public health and economic crises of our lifetimes.
