Hochul faces first test in eviction moratorium special session
By Stephen Witt
Governor Kathy Hochul will
face her first test Wednesday at
threading the needle between
tenant activists calling for an
extension of the moratorium
for evictions and landlords saying
the moratorium puts them
on the hook to pay millions of
dollars in taxes while not getting
any rent.
Assemblyman Peter Abbate
(D-Brooklyn) confirmed the
State Legislature will hold a
special session at noon on Sept.
1 in a deal to extend the moratorium,
which expired Tuesday,
Aug. 31 to probably January
2022. The deal will include
a way for landlords to have
the ability to still go to court
to evict tenants if the tenants
cannot prove they have not
been paying rent for COVIDrelated
reasons, Abbate said.
Hochul was expected to officially
announce the session at
a press announcement Tuesday
night.
The special session comes
following the U.S. Supreme
Court decision last week effectively
ending the federal eviction
moratorium. It also comes
as New York has received $2.7
billion through the COVID-19
Emergency Rental Assistance
Program (ERAP) funds, but
has only doled out $156 million
to 12,000 applicants since
the program started on June
1, despite having over 160,000
New Yorkers applying.
“Small landlords probably
won’t be happy with this deal,”
said Abbate, adding that a lot of
tenants are refusing to sign the
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ERAP form because it allows
the rent money to go directly
to the landlord.
“This is ridiculous because
it will get tenants off the hook
for more than a year of rent,”
Abbate added.
News of the special session
comes as the leftist organization
Housing Justice for All
led hundreds of tenants on a
March in Manhattan Tuesday
from the City Marshal’s office
at 109 W 38th St. to Hochul’s
Manhattan office at 633 Third
Ave..
The tenants called on
Hochul, Assembly Speaker Carl
Heastie and Senate Majority
Leader Andrea Stewart Cousins
to strengthen and extend the
moratorium to stop evictions
until the ERAP funds are distributed.
“Tenants can’t afford to pay
our rent because we aren’t
working… we don’t have jobs.
We need Albany to stop all
evictions, now. And keep them
stopped. We need rent relief to
come fast, not dragging on. We
need our elected officials to do
their job because housing is a
human right,” said Flatbush
Tenant Coalition tenant leader
Paulette James.
But Joseph Strasburg —
president of the Rent Stabilization
Association, which represents
25,000 landlords that
have over 1 million apartments
— threatened to take legal
action if state lawmakers enact
legislation that disregards and
attempts to circumvent the
Supreme Court decision which
overturned a Centers for Disease
Control eviction moratorium.
“Financially desperate tenants
and landlords don’t need a
special legislative session, they
need Albany to get the billions
of dollars from the federally
funded Emergency Rental
Assistance Program out the
door – yesterday, last week, two
months ago,” said Strasburg.
New Yorkers call for the extension of eviction moratorium. The Flatbush Tenant Coalition
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