Donald Megginson faced an eviction case after he fell behind on rent by $678, according to a court filing. He lives with his partner and two children, ages 8 and 2. He later caught up on the rent, and the case was withdrawn. (Photo by Jay Manning/PublicSource)
by Rich Lord
The human and economic costs of eviction far outweigh the price tag of helping people stay housed, according to a report released by The Pittsburgh Foundation*, which lays out a potential path to fewer landlord-tenant cases.
The foundation’s report comes at a time when federal and local curbs on evictions have pushed landlord filings against tenants well below pre-pandemic norms. Foundation officials contend that the heightened attention to the effects of eviction spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic creates an opportunity to change a system that upends the lives of thousands of Allegheny County families each year.
“We have increased knowledge and awareness,” said Michael Yonas, the foundation’s vice president for public health, research and learning. “We’ve had political and legislative action that has helped to protect people during COVID.” He added that the respite in filings creates a window of opportunity to improve the system before any return to normal levels of eviction filings.
Landlords now control around 37% of the housing market countywide. COVID-19 is testing the health of this market, bringing eviction curbs, rent relief and a revived tenants’ rights movement. PublicSource and WESA are exploring these changes and examining the governmental and civic responses to the emergence of Tenant Cities.
The pre-pandemic average in Allegheny County was around 13,000 eviction cases filed per year, most driven by failure to pay rent. A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention order gives many tenants affected by the pandemic a reprieve from ejection, but case filings continue, albeit at lower levels.
The downs and ups of the eviction moratoriums
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