Kimberly Perry and Tazra Mitchell: Mayor Bowser has warned about an eviction crisis. It’s up to her to act.

While the omicron wave appears to have peaked in the District, residents are still staring in the face of calamity unless Mayor Muriel Bowser and the DC Council act to head off an eviction crisis. Tens of thousands of households could be forced out of their homes if the District does not use our growing revenues to step up and fully fund eviction prevention and rental assistance efforts. 

Without a funding infusion soon, programs like STAY DC and the Emergency Rental Assistance Program will lack the resources they need this spring. An eviction crisis would deepen racial, economic and housing oppression in the District and stifle our ability to rebuild a prosperous economy. Averting this crisis is the right call, and dozens of organizations, including ours, are urging DC officials to act now.

While the U.S. Treasury offered some additional relief at the end of last year, the $17.7 million allocation fell far short of the $238.7 million the mayor had requested to avert evictions for the next few months. The mayor correctly sounded the alarm, but without any certainty of additional help from the federal government, we need her — as well as the DC Council — to respond to her very own call. Thankfully, because the District had a surplus of $697 million in fiscal year 2021 and is getting new revenue from a stronger-than-expected economy, DC officials have the rare opportunity to easily and quickly solve this problem. Putting these local resources toward keeping families in their homes during a pandemic is the morally and fiscally responsible thing to do. If residents lose their homes, we as a society will pay more in the long run for the disruption this causes to their lives and the strain it puts on our communities and economic recovery efforts. 

The time is now for authorities to take concrete steps to avoid a preventable housing disaster.

One viable option to approve adequate funding quickly is for the mayor to speed up the submission of her revised fiscal year 2022 budget — or at least a slice of it — in order to deal specifically with evictions and forthcoming terminations for the 365 families with children in the District’s Rapid Rehousing program. That would accelerate discussions of these urgent issues by months; enable the temporary suspension of local rules that automatically stipulate where the surplus goes without regard to current needs; and allow the mayor to tap higher revenues that officials are now projecting for the current fiscal year. Bowser could get money out the door more quickly to avert evictions — an immediate need — without rushing the entire budget process. An action like this would require the DC Council to fast-track this legislation as well.

If the District stands by its decision to enforce a time limit for the Department of Human Services’ Rapid Rehousing program during the pandemic, hundreds of families with children would have to leave their homes in March, without anywhere to go — and without continued access to the supports and services that helped them improve their economic stability. To avoid this tragic outcome, the District must rescind termination notices for households who have reached the program’s time limit and are not enrolled in another housing program. It’s essential to protect these families by enabling their continued participation in the Rapid Rehousing program.

Mayor Bowser and the DC Council can use the budget surplus and other available resources to keep District residents in their homes — though dollars should not be diverted from other programs that provide affordable housing, such as the Housing Production Trust Fund, or other critical economic supports. Extending Rapid Rehousing deadlines and preventing evictions are necessary steps right now, but they are not long-term substitutes for systemic affordable housing solutions. That is why we must marshal the abundant resources we have at hand to head off this crisis, while continuing to make bolder investments in truly affordable housing. 

This strategy would ensure tens of thousands of families will have access to greater economic stability and the opportunities that come with it — steady, living-wage jobs and education, as well as better physical and mental health. Doing so will promote a racially equitable recovery in DC, given that Black and brown people have faced a dramatically higher risk of coronavirus infection, unemployment and eviction during the pandemic. 

The District’s lawmakers have the chance right now to mitigate some of the harm from COVID-19. We implore Mayor Bowser and DC Council members to exercise the political and moral will to act. Many of our neighbors are in a fight for their lives — and they cannot afford the alternative.  

Kimberly Perry is the executive director at DC Action, and Tazra Mitchell is the policy director at DC Fiscal Policy Institute.

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