U.S. Tenants Await Financial Help As Evictions Resume

Six months after Congress approved spending tens of billions of dollars to bail out renters facing eviction, South Carolina was just reaching its first tenants. All nine of them, Michael Casey and Michelle Liu reported for the Associated Press (AP).

Photo Insert: The Supreme Court having blocked the Biden administration's moratorium has resulted in the resumption of evictions.

Like most states, it had plenty of money to distribute — $272 million. But it had handed out just over $36,000 by June. The pace has since intensified, but South Carolina still has only distributed $15.5 million in rent and utility payments as of Aug. 20, or about 6% of its funds.

“People are strangling on the red tape,” said Sandy Gillis, executive director of the Hilton Head Deep Well Project, which stopped referring tenants to the program and started paying overdue rent through its own private funds instead.

The struggles in South Carolina are emblematic of a program launched at the beginning of the year with the promise of solving the pandemic eviction crisis, only to fall victim in many states to bureaucratic hurdles, political inertia, and unclear guidance at the federal level.

The concerns about the slow pace intensified Thursday after the Supreme Court (SC) blocked the Biden administration from enforcing a temporary ban that was put in place because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Some 3.5 million people in the US as of Aug. 16 said they face eviction in the next two months, according to the US Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey.

“The Supreme Court decision undermines historic efforts by Congress and the White House to ensure housing stability during the pandemic,” Diane Yentel, CEO of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, said in a statement.

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