‘Stressful.’ Coast residents laid off during COVID-19 are fighting evictions in court
A former waitress and a casino dealer in Biloxi, and a dog groomer in Ridgeland, are among three of the many tenants who find themselves facing eviction after losing work during the COVID-19 pandemic.
But the Biloxi residents had experiences much different from the Ridgeland dog groomer when all three wound up in eviction court last week.
Harrison County Justice Court Judge Nick Patano gave the two tenants of Palm Isle Apartment Homes in Biloxi reprieves under a CDC moratorium on evictions that runs from Sept. 4-Dec. 31.
The Ridgeland dog groomer, Sherrie Buccola, thought the same declaration would protect her but it did not. She was given only 30 days to catch up on back rent and pay current rent.
Both the Ridgeland and Biloxi apartment complexes are owned by corporations with properties in more than one state. The owners moved to evict the three tenants during the gap between a limited CARES Act ban on evictions, which expired July 24, and the CDC moratorium in effect Sept. 4-Dec. 31.
The unprecedented CDC action is designed to reduce the spread of COVID-19 because evicted tenants might be forced onto the streets or into crowded living situations. To qualify for the moratorium, tenants must sign CDC declarations, under penalty of perjury, that say they lost their jobs because of the pandemic, have limited or no income and would be without a suitable place to live if they were evicted.
All three tenants say they were aware of the moratorium and signed the declaration, but were nonetheless hauled into justice courts, where evictions are handled, by their landlords Sept. 23.
The Biloxi and Ridgeland cases indicate not all 198 justice court judges are following the CDC moratorium, although the Mississippi Judicial College offered a well-attended online Zoom session and summarizes the CDC order on its website. Only a high school diploma is required to run for the office of justice court judge in Mississippi.
“At the Mississippi Center for Justice, since April, we’ve seen a 10-fold increase in the number of calls from people either facing eviction or fearful that they will face eviction because their employment has been interrupted by Covid or for a Covid-related reason,” said John Jopling, housing law director for the nonprofit organization.
Like eviction moratoriums, unemployment assistance has been spotty, too. Higher unemployment benefits under the CARES Act allowed tenants to pay higher amounts of partial rent. With benefits now pared back, tenants are falling further and further behind.
While the state has received $18 million in Emergency Solutions Grant funds, Gov. Tate Reeves has just decided to dedicate an additional $38 million in federal funds for that purpose, but the program must still be set up.
“While we’re happy to see the CDC moratorium issued, there are two necessary conditions that must be met in order to avoid a crisis among Mississippi renters,” Jopling said. “First, the judiciary must ensure that all our Justice Courts are accepting and honoring the eviction moratorium by refusing to accept and issue orders of evictions.
“And, two, Mississippi policymakers must appropriate sufficient money for rental assistance in order to protect tenants and prevent them from failing further and further behind on rent through the course of the moratorium. If these two conditions are not met, we could face an avalanche of evictions in January 2021.”
Biloxi tenants head to eviction court
Palm Isle management notified Shea Mills and the casino dealer, who asked to remain anonymous, at the end of July that they would be evicted.
The casino dealer was furloughed in March and officially laid off at the end of August.
Mills, a recovering addict with a year of sobriety who is also trying to get back on her feet after a divorce, lost her job waiting tables in January and was unable to find another during the pandemic.
Both tenants sought and received unemployment and tried to pay what they could in rent.
The casino dealer gave the Sun Herald documents he had received from RREAF Residential, property manager for the complex and a subsidiary of owner Dallas-based RREAF Holdings LLC. RREAF Holdings lists Palm Isle as one of its seven apartment complexes in Mississippi. Palm Isle and RREAF management failed to respond to telephone calls from the Sun Herald.
One undated notice from RREAF said in large letters across the top: “COVID-19: Cares Act Ending — Balance Due.”
Mills said she received the notice in late July. Until then, she said, Palm Isle had been accepting partial payments on her monthly rent of $710.
“I have to say, they’ve been very kind throughout this whole process until July or August,” she said. She offered management another payment July 28.
“What surprised me was when I tried to make a payment and I was told that I couldn’t make anymore partial payments,” she said. “To me, it wasn’t a partial payment. It was $1,000.”
“I guess by then they knew they could roll ahead with the eviction process,” she said.
The casino dealer received a notice July 27 saying that, under the CARES Act, he was receiving 30-day notice that unless he paid full arrears of $2,100 for rent from May-July, he would either have to move or Palm Isle would pursue eviction.
He was particularly upset because he secured records, reviewed by the Sun Herald, that showed RREAF Holdings had set up a task force to “coordinate all efforts to find, analyze and deploy financial assistance programs for RREAF Holdings, our investors, properties, tenants and guests during the COVID-19 crisis.”
The RREAF task-force documents included information on forbearance for borrowers with federally backed, multifamily mortgages and other relief available, but it is unclear whether RREAF received relief under these programs.
RREAF did secure bank approval for $2-5 million in Paycheck Protection Program loans designed to retain all employees, with loan forgiveness available to businesses that met stated goals.
The casino dealer said in eviction court that he had signed and delivered a CDC eviction declaration to Palm Isle management on September 5, but two representatives of the complex told Judge Patano that they did not receive it.
When the casino dealer gave the declaration to the judge, the case was continued until after Dec. 31.
The dealer expects to be called back to work and said he will be able to catch up on his rent, but he did not understand why Palm Isle would not give him a payment plan for the back rent due, which he said is now around $1,500. His monthly rent is $700 for a one-bedroom.
Shea Mills has already gone back to work in technical support for a computer services company. When she went to court and got her eviction reprieve, she faced a rental balance of $3,511.
‘From what I’ve heard, they don’t want to make a payment plan with me,” said Mills, who has not talked to Palm Isle management since they refused to accept the partial payment in late July. “They just want the full amount.”
30 days to catch up on rent
While the moratorium gave Biloxi residents three months’ breathing, Buccola said the Madison County judge, whose name she did not remember, refused to accept the CDC declaration or records of the rent she had paid.
Buccola lives in Sunchase Apartments Ridgeland, where Case & Associates owns a total of four properties. She said that she has always paid her rent on time for the apartment she shares with her teenage daughter. She continued to pay rent as long as she could after her job as a dog groomer went from six days a week to none, then back to two days a week when the business was allowed to reopen.
While she was out of work, Buccola went through her savings and then, when she finally received unemployment, paid what she could.
“There was never a time when I didn’t pay them something,” she said.
When she went to pay August rent of about $600, she said, apartment management instead applied the money toward back rent. Buccola said the previous understanding had been that she could pay the monthly rent and catch up on the late balance over time.
But she talked to the management Sept. 3, she said, and was told she would need to come up with the entire balance or lose the apartment.
“I said, well the eviction ban is coming out tomorrow anyway, so knock yourself out,” Buccola said.
Buccola tried to shield her daughter from the distressing news. But her daughter arrived home from school Sept. 4, the same day the CDC moratorium went into effect, to find a notice that apartment management intended to proceed with eviction.
In court, Buccola was told she would need to come up with $1,400, plus her October rent, by Oct. 23 or be evicted.
She has tried to find help from churches, but they say that they are tapped out. She was going to check Thursday with a nonprofit organization that has some funds to help renters
“It’s so stressful,” she said. “It’s very stressful. I don’t have anybody to count on. I don’t have any family living.”
Who to call
Tenants facing eviction because of a COVID-related inability to pay rent can call the Mississippi Center for Justice at 228-702-9983.
Find answers to questions about the CDC eviction moratorium here.
The state has received a total of $18 million in Emergency Solutions Grant funds from the federal government, said Scott Spivey, executive director of the Mississippi Home Corp.
Those funds are being distributed through nonprofit agencies, including Open Doors Homeless Coalition on the Coast. For assistance, tenants can call 228-604-2048 and leave a message if there is no answer. The call should be returned within two business days.
The additional $38 million in CARES Act funding that Gov. Reeves is budgeting to assist renters will be disbursed through partner agencies by the Mississippi Home Corp. Spivey said a website for applications will be set up.
The state Legislature decided this week to assist owners of residential and commercial rental properties, Spivey said, with $20 million in CARES Act funding. The Mississippi Development Authority will administer the legislative funding.
