In the pre-coronavirus days, hundreds of landlords and tenants would pack into courtrooms to settle disputes that often carried the threat of eviction.
Before the judge would begin the proceeding, a video would be shown in English and Spanish informing everyone of their rights. Some tenants and landlords would work out settlements in the hallway, while others would go to trial. If a landlord didn’t show up, the case was dismissed.
That ended in mid-March, when COVID-19 arrived in New Jersey, forcing a shutdown of just about everything, courts included. All trials in landlord-tenant court are suspended indefinitely, and Gov. Phil Murphy signed an executive order banning lockouts until 60 days after the public health emergency ends.
But landlords have still been allowed to file eviction actions over the last four months against some of the thousands of out-of-work New Jerseyans who could not pay their rent, contributing to the backlog that already existed.
Now, two county courthouses are beginning settlement hearings over Zoom to chop through the avalanche of filings — and housing and racial justice advocates are worried this will make it much harder for tenants to know their rights.
In letter to the administrator of the state court system, 29 community leaders, advocates and lawyers are demanding the courts take more steps to protect tenants by ensuring due process and that eviction complaints follow guidelines set by the federal CARES Act, which is designed to help residents cope with the economic fallout from the pandemic.
“If the pandemic, or this wave, is followed by waves of evictions and displaces thousands of low-income people, and it happens in a way that doesn’t serve due process, we’ll have done an incredible injustice to our neighbors,” said Catherine Weiss, chair of the Lowenstein Center for Public Interest. “It’s important for courts to take a role in ensuring fairness, because otherwise, tenants have no shot.”
Weiss said without due process, mass evictions will begin amid the public health and economic crisis, leading to greater instances of displaced families and homelessness, particularly affecting communities of color and low-income residents.
“When we say flatten the curve, it’s not just coronavirus. It’s mass eviction, and we’re going to have another wave of mass eviction and that has not been adequately discussed. The government has to play a role in making sure people don’t lose their homes because they got sick or lose their job,” she said in a phone interview with NJ Advance Media. “That’s not an acceptable consequence of the pandemic.”
The advocates say in the Zoom proceedings, there are dozens of people on and off mute in the “lobby” while the judge reads the docket. Settlements are worked out in a “breakout room” — but those without access to a camera have to hang up and re-enter the large video conference. Many can’t hear their rights being read, or understand that the conference is voluntary.
Weiss noted some glaring issues in landlord-tenant court — lack of legal representation for tenants, chaos swirling around hundreds of cases each day, tenants who aren’t familiar with their rights — will be exacerbated once the deluge of evictions need to be heard.
Burlington and Mercer county courthouses have already begun limited settlement conferences, in an effort to speed up the process.
A spokesman for the state court system, Peter McAleer, said the courts will work to respond to the advocates’ issues.
“We met with the authors of the letter on Wednesday and are exploring different measures to address some of their concerns,” said McAleer. “It is important to note that evictions are not occurring at this time.”
But some of these cases are being filed illegally or do not protect the tenants’ due process, the advocates said in their letter.
Under the CARES Act, landlords in federally subsidized housing, Section 8 housing or housing programs for at-risk groups like seniors and veterans, or who hold federally backed mortgages are barred from filing evictions.
In New Jersey, there are no requirements that landlords verify an eviction complies with the CARES Act. And the tenant is unlikely to know what type of mortgage their landlord has or what other properties they own. Fourteen other states require landlords to certify that they are within the federal guidelines to file eviction.
It’s unknown how many of the “thousands of eviction actions pending throughout the state were filed in violation of federal law,” the letter states. “This serious problem is compounded by the initiation of settlement hearings throughout the state.”
And tenants might not be familiar with every executive order the governor has signed and how it could affect them, Weiss added. Some residents didn’t know they still had to pay rent during an eviction moratorium, or that a landlord cannot add certain fees as additional rent.
“Many, many tenants don’t know there’s a moratorium on being removed. They often don’t know that landlord-tenant trials are suspended. They don’t know these settlements they’re entering are voluntary. These things have to be said before the tenant agrees to anything,” she stressed.
The advocates say courts should only hold the conference if both parties have lawyers and access to video. Those without a screen face a severe disadvantage and further confusion, especially during stressful negotiations, the letter says.
Allison Nolan, staff attorney with Volunteer Lawyers for Justice in Newark, said there’s been an imbalance when landlords are represented and tenants are not.
“It’s an extraordinary time,” said Nolan. “We’re all facing a lot of challenges, so these protections are more important now than ever.”
“What’s at stake in these cases is a tenant’s home,” Nolan added. “That’s why it matters so much that the court get these cases right and that tenants voices are heard.”
The state Department of Community Affairs created a $100 million rental assistance program for low-income residents or those who became unemployed due to the coronavirus pandemic in May. Applications for the lottery begin Monday.
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Sophie Nieto-Munoz may be reached at snietomunoz@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her at @snietomunoz.
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