As the end of a statewide eviction ban gets closer, activists seek to extend and expand it.

For 17 years, Karla Navarro worked at Fishwife restaurant in Seaside. It was her first and only real job. She was laid off at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, and since then has been able to pick up a few hours here and there at a coffee shop, but not enough for a full income. Meanwhile, her husband also lost his restaurant job. Last year he found intermittent work in the fields, and now washes windows part time.

“Especially having a baby during Covid, and not knowing where we would get necessities, was stressful,” Navarro says in Spanish. “I would have never guessed this would happen.”

The family of five made it work. They got a $500 distribution for eligible undocumented immigrants. They put $400 on a credit card. They canceled cable and a gym membership. They still paid the $1,215/month rent on their Seaside apartment, thanks in part to a loan from a relative.

They made the rent, but to do so, they racked up what is known as “shadow debt” – robbing Peter to pay Paul. It’s something that Mayra Bernabe, an organizer with COPA (Communities Organized for Relational Power in Action) has heard again and again: People pay rent but encumber debt elsewhere to do so. And it means they don’t qualify for SB 91, the state law that prohibits no-fault evictions until June 30, and also provides for rent relief.

“They’re not qualifying because of the way it’s written,” Bernabe says. “They have to owe directly to their landlord. They’re maybe not paying utility bills because they want to ensure they are not evicted.”

COPA organizers are asking state lawmakers to both extend the moratorium to Dec. 31 – and get a new bill that would expand the debt it applies to.