ERIK YABOR | Breaking News ReporterLancaster County tenants who are behind on rent payments could face eviction proceedings beginning this week after a federal moratorium on evictions expired Saturday, though there are still programs to help prevent them being removed from their homes.
Any coming eviction proceedings won’t begin until at least Monday, said Lancaster County District Court administrator Mark Dalton. Evictions would be handled during regular court hours on weekdays.
Neither Dalton nor Lancaster County Sheriff Chris Leppler were aware Friday afternoon of any landlords beginning the eviction process prior to the moratorium’s expiration.
While eviction proceedings won’t begin over the weekend, “once courts are open Monday it’ll be interesting to see if there’s a line of landlords,” Kevin Ressler, president and CEO of United Way of Lancaster County, said Saturday.
A previous lapse in the government’s moratorium saw hundreds of eviction cases filed in Lancaster County over a four-day period, representing millions of dollars in missed rent payments, Ressler noted.
Exactly how many renters could face eviction proceedings in the coming days is unknown. Mike McKenna, CEO of Tenfold, a local affordable housing organization and lead agency for Lancaster County’s eviction prevention network, noted that a recent Census Bureau-commissioned study found that as many as 14% of Lancaster County households are behind on rent.
“That’s obviously a significant number of households,” he said.
Lancaster County was averaging about 300 landlord-tenant court filings a month prior to the beginning of the pandemic, though not all of those were evictions, McKenna said.
A recent United Way of Pennsylvania survey found that more than a quarter of Lancaster County households risk slipping into poverty after the moratorium and other pandemic-era safeguards are lifted.
But even with the moratorium’s expiration, renters still have ways of avoiding eviction.
The Emergency Rental Assistance Program, in which eligible households can receive rental and utility assistance to avoid eviction or loss of utility services, still has millions of dollars in aid available, Ressler noted. The program is administered locally through the Lancaster County Housing and Redevelopment Authority.
“Those programs did not end when the moratorium ended,” he said.
Justin Eby, the Housing and Redevelopment Authority’s executive director, told LNP|LancasterOnline on Thursday that the program will continue to distribute $48 million in rental assistance through 2022. People seeking rental help should contact the authority’s assistance program directly.
Even so, Ressler noted it can be difficult to gauge how many eviction proceedings could begin in the coming days.
While many landlords have worked with tenants through the assistance program to allow them to continue to stay in their homes, others have not wanted to participate in the program for a variety of reasons. When courts reopen Monday, “they’re going to be the first in line,” Ressler said.
“We’re going to try to continue to get those landlords and tenants together so that they can make sure people aren’t out on the street when there’s dollars that can be there to help,” he added.
