Facing eviction? This $15M in rental assistance is available for Idahoans amid pandemic - bigcountrynewsconnection.com

BOISE — For state Rep. Melissa Wintrow, D-Boise, the $15 million dollars Idaho allocated in CARES Act funding to at-risk tenants is nothing short of “a miracle.”

Amid a shortage of affordable housing throughout the state, Wintrow has tried repeatedly to advocate for protecting and assisting Idaho renters — but her efforts have floundered in the state Legislature.

So when given the chance to direct a portion of Idaho’s $1.25 billion federal CARES Act funding to tenants through a financial advisory committee, Wintrow jumped at the opportunity. Gov. Brad Little approved an initial allocation on June 9 of $5 million dollars, with two more possible installments, to the Idaho Housing and Finance Association June 9.

Eligible renters can apply to the housing association for assistance with rent and utilities for an initial three month period, though this may be extended to six months. Payments go directly to landlords and utilities.

To be eligible, tenants must make under 80% of area median income and face eviction or utility shutoff within 30 days due explicitly to COVID-19. They must provide information on each household member, a copy of state-issued ID, proof of income, lease agreement, and their utility bill if applying for utility assistance.

While advocates say the allocation is crucial to protecting tenants from potential homelessness caused by rising unemployment as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, they worry barriers still exist for tenants trying to access the funding.

And though the allocation is specifically earmarked for tenants at risk of homelessness from COVID-19, advocates say that mitigating the housing crisis that existed in Idaho before the pandemic began is also crucial to protecting public health. Idaho had an estimated 2,315 people experiencing homelessness — 0.41% of the population — on any given day in 2019, up from 2,012 — or 0.36% — in 2018. A report conducted by the housing association found that at least 9,255 Idahoans sought homeless services in 2019.

“Housing is health care. If you can keep up people’s housing, that’s the No. 1 way to care for their health, especially in a pandemic,” Wintrow said.

‘No one should fall through the cracks’

While housing advocates laud the allocation, many say that getting the word out to at-risk renters that they are able to apply for assistance has proven challenging.

Statistics from the housing association — the organization tasked with distributing the initial $5 million allocation — show that between June 9, when assistance applications were opened, and July 6, only $535,547 of the initial allocation was distributed to renters. About 67% of the distributed funding has gone to renters in the Treasure Valley and Boise, while 13% has gone to North Idaho and 7% to South Central and Southeast Idaho apiece.

Kendra Knighten, a policy associate at Idaho Voices for Children, is worried that vulnerable tenants may not be aware of the rental assistance available to them.

“The announcement of the program within Idaho has been somewhat muted,” she said, “so we are concerned that the families who are most impacted by pandemic-related jobs or income loss may not hear about the program until after they’ve been evicted. No one should fall through the cracks.”

As of July 6, of the 759 applications received, 426 payments have been made, supporting 235 households, according to the housing association’s data.

The allocation bolstered a preexisting program the housing association had set up to distribute $250,000 to renters across Idaho. IHFA began advertising the program with a press release June 15.

“We’re still in the phase of trying to get the word out and let people know that they are eligible that this resource exists so that we can help them if needed,” said Brady Ellis, vice president of housing support programs at the housing association.

Ellis said the housing association has seen applications increase to approximately 50 a day since the press release June 15.

If the initial $5 million allocation dips below $250,000, two additional installments of $5 million will be triggered. The agency can thus receive up to $15 million total in funds, but the funds must be used before Dec. 30, when unused CARES Act funding returns to the federal government.

At this point, it is hard to project if the housing association will disburse enough of its first $5 million allocation to receive a second and third installment, Ellis said — it depends on how many eligible renters apply for the funding between now and the end of the year.

Eligibility, other obstacles remain for Idaho tentants

According to data from the housing association, 182, or roughly 25% of applications for rental assistance have been denied. About half the denials resulted from lack of follow-up from applicants, a housing association spokesperson said.

Ellis said that he believes a lot of the non-responsiveness stems from the fact that many at-risk tenants need additional supportive services to help them get the documentation — an official lease and ID — necessary to get through the application process. The housing association is encouraging applicants to make sure they are providing an accurate phone number and email and to be checking their email and answering incoming calls.

Housing advocate Natalie Sandoval, who works as a homeless education liaison in the Nampa School District and is on the board of directors of Jesse Tree, a nonprofit based in Boise that works to combat homelessness, said her experience has shown that accessibility issues can prevent tenants from even applying for rental assistance. Not having internet access or access to a working phone can pose significant barriers to those in need, she said.

Another barrier to accessing rental assistance, according to Ali Rabe, executive director of Jesse Tree, is the time it takes to access the funding.

Under newly passed Idaho law, tenants must move out within three days of being evicted. But a housing association spokesperson said most applications for assistance are being processed within 10-14 days.

The application process can be daunting, Rabe said, for tenants who are likely to be evicted and need to find new housing quickly.

“If you’re preventing an imminent eviction, sometimes you have to cut a check by the same day or the next day or the following week, and we don’t have a clear picture what the IHFA funding timeline is,” Rabe said.

Rabe added that accessing documents necessary for the application can be difficult for those in crisis. Case managers from Jesse Tree are working with clients to complete the housing association’s application forms while tenants manage other stressors of rental insecurity.

Jesse Tree has also provided clients who do not qualify for housing association funding with rental assistance. The nonprofit paid rent for 41 households in May and 36 in June, and has seen its call volume triple through the pandemic months.

Ellis said he hopes the new allocation will allow some funds usually used for direct rental assistance to go instead toward supportive services, like those provided by Jesse Tree, to see tenants through the application process.

Sandoval agreed that supportive services were crucial to help eligible tenants access the funding.

“You need social workers like myself to help families go through this process. IHFA’s process for Canyon County has been pretty fluid, as fluid as I think they can make it, but many tenants need that added support,” she said.

Wintrow, Sandoval and Rabe also identified restrictions stipulating that renters must be able to link their situations directly to the COVID-19 pandemic as a potential barrier to applicants. Applicants must demonstrate that the circumstances leading to them being “at risk of homelessness” must have occurred between March 1 and Dec. 30.

Ellis said the vast majority of applications the housing association has received can easily be linked to COVID-19. According to Rabe and Wintrow, some renters may not be applying because they cannot explicitly tie their plight to COVID-19.

This has to do, Sandoval said, with a shortage of affordable housing in Idaho that existed prior to the pandemic.

“A bulk of my clients were in a precarious situation prior to COVID-19, and that makes that funding inaccessible to them because it’s not technically a COVID-related issue … isn’t there something to be said about providing some stability to those families who may not specifically have lost their housing due to COVID but could certainly be at risk?” she asked.

The CARES rental assistance allocation is specifically earmarked for tenants “at risk of homelessness,” but Sandoval also wishes some of the funding could go to homeless people as well as current tenants.

“Housing preservation absolutely is important, but there are also health ramifications of people that are doubled up, are moving from place to place, or in their vehicles literally on the street or living communally,” she said.

PREEXISTING HOUSING CRISIS IN THE TREASURE VALLEY

In January 2020, the median home sale prices in Ada and Canyon County hit record highs — $363,00 and $255,000, respectively — according to data in a May 22 letter the Saint Alphonsus Health System sent to the committee charged with allocating Idaho’s CARES funding. In Boise, the average rent has increased 23.4% over the last three years.

Rising home prices have been coupled by low vacancy rates across Ada and Canyon counties. The overall vacancy rate for all rental units in Boise was 1.55% as of December 2019, and 2.12%in Canyon County as of December 2017, the letter said. It identified “affordable housing, precarious and/or unsafe housing conditions, and homelessness” as the top significant health needs across the state.

Advocates have pointed out that rising rents and home prices have not been matched with an increased minimum wage. Idaho’s minimum wage — $7.25 an hour — is one of the lowest in the country.

“Rents have steadily increased while family incomes have remained stagnant. Meanwhile,we haven’t been building the homes that our community needs. So over time, it’s become virtually harder and harder to be an average Idahoan and be able to access a home that’s affordable to you,” Knighten said.

Since beginning work for the Nampa School District, Sandoval has come across an increasing number of families evicted because of rising rents. She mentioned that many of the families she works with have begun living in their cars, or in rentals with three or four families to one home. About 7,800 students in Idaho were homeless in 2019, according to a 2020 report from the United Way of Treasure Valley organization. Half of those students live in the Treasure Valley, the report said.

“Now, we are all so wrapped up in COVID, and rightfully so. However, folks in Idaho have been burdened for many, many years,” she said.

‘A long road ahead’

CARES rental assistance expires Dec. 30, so housing advocates are pushing to have extended protection for renters in the next federal subsidy and asking that the state enact measures that would help all at-risk renters, rather than those explicitly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Idaho can’t hope to effectively combat this pandemic if our neighbors are not stable and safely housed. But in the long term, our leaders need to also look at solutions that actually start to address the shortage of affordable homes ... that’s where we really have to start looking toward our federal congressional delegation,” Knighten said.

Knighten, along with Idaho Voices for Children, is calling on the state’s federal delegation to allow funds from the next federal subsidy to be used for emergency and long-term rental assistance.

Sandoval is also calling for a nationwide ban on evictions and foreclosures for all tenants. A temporary nationwide ban on evictions and foreclosures for those with government-backed mortgages is in place and will remain until Aug. 31. In Idaho, eviction proceedings for tenants without government-backed mortgages have proceeded since a temporary moratorium on eviction proceedings was lifted.

“Moving forward in de-housing people, when we know housing is a matter of public health and safety, just seems very counterproductive to me … dehousing people, given our current state, just does not seem like it’s going to do any good at this point,” she said.

Little’s office did not immediately respond to request for comment.

Sandoval, like Rabe, also sees a need for construction of more affordable housing for Idahoans — even after the pandemic.

“Dec. 30 is not that far away,” Rabe said. “I’m just a little worried about what’s going to happen Jan. 1. And especially in our community where we were already in a housing crisis before this happened. This is just another crisis on top of the housing crisis.”

Wintrow, who also supports a temporary ban on evictions and foreclosures, is not hopeful about the prospect of heightened assistance for struggling Idahoan renters once the CARES allocation has been expended.

“I wish I could have more hope about that,” she said. “But my sense is the political landscape of this state does not support that. There are many of my colleagues on the very conservative side that probably do not align with helping people this way.”

She stressed that rental assistance can mitigate costs in the long run.

“We can make a small investment upfront to keep people in their homes to make sure they can pay other bills —food and so forth. And that is one of the best things we can do,” she said.

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