Eviction Pandemic: How COVID has increased evictions leading to increase in houseless population

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Photo from Pexels edited by Aliyah Akers

COVID-19 not only has destroyed lives through the disease, but has also taken people's homes away from them. Though in the beginning of the pandemic, Portland was one of the cities that put in place laws to stop landlords from evicting people during these hard times that have but changed in the past year. In 2021, the statewide rental assistance program stopped taking new applications after all federal funds have been requested and committed to renters. With Oregon being a state that experiences higher rates of homelessness than many other states they should make sure evictions don’t happen during a crisis. 


Near the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, a federal review found that 35 people are experiencing homelessness per 10,000. This leaves Oregon only behind three other states that have higher homelessness rates, New York ( 47 per 10,000), Hawaii (46 per 10,000) and California (41 per 10,000). Now as we reach a period of time when people are starting to think the pandemic is over, how has this changed?  Well on the Portland.gov website it states that those who have applied for the emergency rental assistance program have until Jul 1, 2022; a tenant can avoid termination and eviction for nonpayment of monthly rent. But this still doesn’t change the fact that many have already experienced eviction and houselessness from the COVID-19 crisis. 





Sources: Associated Press, 2021. Thousands in Oregon Face Eviction as Lawmakers Scramble. [online] US News.


[online] Portland.gov



 



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