Legislation to Reform Emergency Rental Assistance Program Passes House Committee

From the National Low Income Housing Coalition (http://www.nlihc.org):

The House Financial Services Committee voted 28 to 22 to approve the “Expediting Assistance to Renters and Landlords Act,” introduced by Chair Maxine Waters (D-CA) to address and correct many of the root causes of slow ERA spending and provide tenant protections. NLIHC President and CEO Diane Yentel testified before the committee at its September 10 hearing on needed reforms to ERA programs.

The ERA reform legislation addresses the root causes of slow ERA spending and includes many of NLIHC’s recommendations, including:

• Requiring all programs to use self-attestation for all eligibility criteria without the need for further documentation;
• Requiring programs to provide direct-to-tenant assistance when landlords refuse to participate;
• Expanding eligibility for ERA1 to renters who experienced a hardship “during” – and not just “due to” – the COVID-19 pandemic;
• Prohibiting programs from requiring written leases;
• Creating a presumption that people experiencing homelessness meet all eligibility criteria;
• Extending the maximum length of assistance from 15 months to 24 months, and increasing the availability of future rent from 3 months to 4 months before renters must reapply;
• Requiring programs to make applications available in the three most spoken languages in the jurisdiction and to provide translation services;
• Creating a safe harbor for program administrators that streamline applications, use self-attestation and direct-to-tenant assistance, and reduce burdensome documentation requirements;
• Requiring poor-performing programs to submit a performance improvement plan, outlining how the program will expedite the delivery of assistance;
• Requiring the Department of Treasury, when reallocating recaptured funds, to consider the percentage of renters in the area, the percentage of low-income renters, and the percentage of severely housing cost-burdened renters;
• Allowing courts and community-based nonprofit organizations that administer housing services to administer recaptured and reallocated and unrequested ERA funds; and
• Directing Treasury and state and local governments to conduct outreach to renters and landlords to increase awareness of ERA, and to provide technical assistance.

While NLIHC has reservations about the bill’s proposal to allow landlords to apply for ERA without the consent or involvement of tenants, the bill now includes strong safeguards – as recommended by NLIHC – to help prevent landlord fraud and protect renters. These protections include:

• Prohibiting landlords receiving such assistance from evicting tenants for 120-days after receiving the ERA;
• Requiring landlords and courts to set aside and vacate any eviction judgement, rescind any eviction notice, and seal any eviction filing in these cases;
• Directing state and local ERA programs to notify local courts that rent is no longer due, that eviction proceedings should be halted, and that any pending eviction should be sealed; and
• Limiting the ability of landlords to apply for assistance only on homes where the renter left before September 7, and only in cases when the landlord did not file an eviction notice, cut off utilities, change locks, or take any other action to pressure a renter to leave.

NLIHC is closely monitoring the ERA reform bill as it moves forward in Congress, and we will continue to urge additional renter protections and improvements.