While 100-percent rent relief would be huge, it’s far from a complete solution to a looming housing crisis.

Sara Rubin here, writing on the eve of what is shaping up to be a big housing victory for many Californians—but a victory that leaves a lot of unanswered questions on the precipice of what has been called an “eviction cliff.” 

Like many states, California lawmakers put an eviction moratorium in place early in the pandemic, concerned about a presumed short-term shutdown to our economy. Then the pandemic continued and they extended the eviction moratorium, and then they extended it again. The current end date is June 30, and there’s no decision as of this writing as to whether it will be extended again beyond that date. 

I tuned in to a virtual event on June 3 hosted by the advocacy group COPA (Communities Organized for Relational Power in Action) that included remarks by lawmakers who supported COPA’s ask to extend the moratorium. “With the deadline looming, we could make the mistake of turning on the spigot of evictions in California,” said Assemblymember David Chiu, D-San Francisco. “I am anxious. This needs to happen—we cannot drop the ball on this.” 

Despite that sense of urgency, Assemblymember Miguel Santiago, D-Los Angeles, told COPA members this extension, at this stage of the pandemic, would be a heavy lift in Sacramento: “This time it is more of a challenge,” he said. 

Negotiations on an extension are still underway in the Capitol, but the goal posts have moved. According to multiple news reports, decision-makers are now looking to use a chunk of federal stimulus money, some $5.2 billion, to pay unpaid rent for lower-income Californians (plus $2 billion for a similar utility bill program). Under existing law, tenants are eligible to receive 80 percent toward rent relief—and this plan would pay for 100 percent.

While 100-percent rent relief is huge—and the idea behind this plan is to make both tenants and landlords whole, a better outcome for all—it’s far from a complete solution to a looming housing crisis. 

The thing about the pandemic recession that was repeated again and again, and bears repeating now, is that it did not harm everyone equally. COPA represents a lot of the people who bore the brunt of it. And they’ve been advocating not just to extend the eviction moratorium, but to expand the forms of debt it covers. 

I wrote a story in the current print edition of the Weekly about that proposal. It would apply to people like Karla Navarro, my neighbor in Seaside. Navarro and her husband both lost their restaurant jobs at the outset of the pandemic, and have yet to return to full-time work. They had a new baby during the pandemic, and struggled to support their growing family (their kids are now 12, 5 and 1). But they continued to pay the $1,215/month rent despite it all, in order to stay current, by cutting elsewhere and taking out a loan from a family member—accumulating what’s called “shadow debt.” 

Because they paid the rent, the Navarros aren’t eligible for rent relief. But they deserve to get in on whatever assistance the state comes up with. The latest I am hearing is that shadow debt is still in contention.