Renters relieved eviction moratorium still stands, landlords still fighting

Renters breathed a sigh of relief after the Judicial Council's vote to end statewide emergency eviction protections was postponed, and landlords filed a lawsuit Thursday against Los Angeles in an attempt to end an eviction moratorium at the city level.

As governments and courts scramble to reconcile the crisis facing unemployed tenants and unpaid landlords, it has become increasingly apparent their predicament will be one of the hardest Covid-related legal crises to address.

The Judicial Council, in attempt to protect struggling tenants, voted in April to include a provision in its Emergency Rule 1 that suspended all court summons,and judgments related to evictions and foreclosures until 90 days after Gov. Gavin Newsom's state of emergency is lifted.

Tenant advocates including Elena Popp of the Eviction Defense Network, who say a tsunami of up to 600,000 evictions will be filed in LA County if rent moratoriums and cancellations are not put into place, was a bit panicked after hearing the Judicial Council was voting on whether to end the eviction moratorium Aug. 3.

"Rule 1 is the closest thing to an actual eviction moratorium," Popp said in an email after the vote was postponed. "Rule 1 stopped an eviction tsunami that should have hit LA County the first few weeks of April."

After the Western Center on Law & Poverty led a letter-writing campaign, Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye announced Wednesday she was suspending the vote.

Attorney Matthew Warren of the Western Center on Law & Poverty said if the emergency rules did not remain in place, thousands -- perhaps millions -- of Californians would become homeless.

"We're so excited they are not ending these emergency rules yet, because clearly we are still in a state of emergency," Warren said in a phone interview Thursday. "Even though counties are opening up on a case-by-case basis, a lot of businesses remain closed. A lot of people are out of work and it is very difficult for people to find counsel in the midst of all of this. So we're really glad the emergency rules are staying in place now, especially as the Legislature is looking for a fix."

However landlord advocates from the Apartment Association of Los Angeles filed suit Thursday, claiming Mayor Eric Garcetti's city ordinance protecting nonpaying tenants from eviction -- which is separate but similar to the Judicial Council's order in that it puts a moratorium on evictions -- violates, among other things, landlords' Fifth Amendment rights against government taking of their property. Apartment Association of Los Angeles Inc. v. City of Los Angeles; Eric Garcetti, 20-CV05193 (C.D. Cal., filed June 11, 2020).

"If allowed to stand, the ordinances will not only continue to violate plaintiff's members' rights under both the California and United States Constitutions, but will continue to inflict massive and widespread economic damage on property owners and landlords throughout the city," read the lawsuit filed in the Central District of California.

Neither counsel for the association nor Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer were immediately available for comment Thursday .

Other landlord advocates from the California Apartment Association have also voiced their opposition to a proposed bill to extend the a statewide eviction moratorium for 15 months after the state of emergency is lifted.

AB 1436, introduced by Assemblyman David Chiu, D-San Francisco, would prohibit renters from being evicted for non-payment of rent for 90 days after the state of emergency is lifted and then gives renters an additional 12 months from that period before a landlord can seek a civil action to collect rent owed. But those civil remedies would not include eviction, according to Chiu.

Debra Carlton, the California Apartment Association's executive vice president for state public affairs, said the bill will make the housing crisis worse.

"We know that in many cases local governments don't lift their emergency orders for years," Carlton said in statement. "That means an owner may have to wait years to collect rent that went unpaid during the pandemic."

In addition to collecting no rent, landlords would receive no funding under AB 1436 to help pay their taxes, mortgages, utilities or staff, the association says.

"AB 1436 will make our housing crisis worse," Carlton said. "It will put hundreds of rental owners into default, leading to mass foreclosures on rental housing."