State also moves closer to approving $12 billion in new funding to address homelessness
Earlier this week, Governor Newsom signed AB 832, extending statewide eviction protections until September 30th. The action comes just days before the current protections were set to expire, and is critical to ensuring that our lowest-income and most vulnerable residents remain housed as our community begins to recover from this pandemic.
THANK YOU to all of the advocates, partners and elected officials who joined us over the past few weeks in advocating for this desperately-needed state action.
The provisions of this new legislation are similar as before, prohibiting eviction of tenants who’ve been financially impacted by the pandemic as long as they have paid 25% of their cumulative rent by September 30th. Read more about the State’s updated eviction protections, including all the things tenants need to know about this new law.
These provisions are now in effect and will supersede the patchwork of local actions taken in the preceding weeks. We’d like to extend our thanks to all of the local officials who activated to prepare local eviction moratoriums when it was unclear if the State would act.
The legislation also authorizes several key changes to the Statewide rent relief program – such as now covering 100% of accrued back rent, regardless of whether a landlord participates (these changes conform with how our local Homelessness Prevention System is already operating).
While this new legislation is welcome news, much more work remains to deploy the nearly $5 billion in rental assistance before the Sep 30 deadline.
Destination: Home and our Rent Relief partners remain committed to assisting as many families as quickly as we can – and we will continue advocating for any additional changes that may be needed in months ahead to ensure we’re adequately protecting our community’s most vulnerable neighbors.
We encourage any resident who needs help paying rent to submit an application ASAP. Please visit SCCRentHelp.org or call 2-1-1 for specific eligibility criteria, information on how to apply, and to be connected to community partners who are available to help residents fill out applications for rent relief.
State Budget Update
In other state news this week, the Governor and Legislature inched closer to adopting a final state budget that’s poised to include a historic level of investment to address homelessness.
While the details are still being finalized, the latest framework released by the Legislature late last week included an allocation of $12 billion to address homelessness in California. Of particular note, is the inclusion of $1 billion/year, for the next two years, for cities and counties to implement local solutions to homelessness. This type of flexible funding has been critical to scaling several successful efforts in Santa Clara County, including expanding our countywide Homelessness Prevention System and developing more interim housing developments.
Securing this type of State investment has been a major priority for Destination: Home and our partners, and we’d like to thank both the Bring CA Home coalition, the Big City Mayors, and our legislative allies for their advocacy over the past several months.
We’ll share more as additional details on the State budget, and what it means for our local efforts to end homelessness in Santa Clara County, become available.
Stay Involved!
Your engagement and advocacy remain key to our efforts to move these important policy discussions forward – and we know there will be many more important debates to-come in the months ahead.
Join our Housing Ready Communities Action Network to stay up-to-speed on the latest advocacy opportunities in support of both new deeply affordable housing developments and other key policy proposals at the state and local levels.
