Key MA COVID-19 Eviction Protection Ending, Advocates Seek Extension

MASSACHUSETTS — Renters across Massachusetts could lose a key pandemic-era eviction protection Friday, and housing advocates want state officials to extend the provision for another year.

The Chapter 257 law went into effect in March 2020 and gives renters the opportunity to stay in their homes during eviction proceedings. Under the law, renters can ask a judge to postpone the physical eviction while they seek financial assistance to pay owed rent.

Lawmakers have extended the protection twice since 2020, although the state is now preparing to wind down many pandemic-era programs with the public health emergency set to end in May.

The Massachusetts Law Reform Institute and the Massachusetts Coalition for the Homeless in a letter this month asked the state Legislature, the House and Senate leaders, and the chief judges of the state Supreme Court and Housing Court to extend Chapter 257 until July 2024.

"Allowing this critical tool to expire now could result in evictions where tenancies could have been resolved with rental assistance, pushing many families and individuals into homelessness," the joint March 17 letter said.

The Residential Assistance for Families in Transition (RAFT) program — which has been providing financial help to low-income residents to either preserve or attain housing since 2005 — got a funding boost during the pandemic as a way to prevent homelessness during the crisis. Applicants can still receive the pandemic-boosted $10,000 per 12-month period, an increase over the $4,000 available before.

But RAFT applications often take too long to process, according to housing advocates and landlords. Removing Chapter 257 protections could expose renters waiting on money to homelessness.

"The unfortunate reality is that many landlords are simply unwilling to wait for RAFT funds — even if the result could be receiving money they are owed and preventing families and individuals from experiencing homelessness," the letter said.

MassLandlords, the state landlord advocacy group, sued the state Department of Housing and Community Development — which oversees RAFT applications — in 2021 over the RAFT application process. In February 2022, the group reported that out of 151,000 RAFT applications received after November 2020, only 60,000 had been approved. Applications sometimes "time out" due to a lack of documentation and get pushed back further, the group said.

State Reps. Samantha Montano (D-Boston) and Peter Capano (D-Lynn) have filed a bill during this session to allow judges to grant continuances if there's an active rental assistance application in process. That bill has been referred to the joint Judiciary Committee, but has not yet been scheduled for a hearing.

"There is broad agreement among policymakers that residents across Massachusetts are experiencing a housing crisis. Chapter 257 is a key homelessness prevention tool that we know is working, at a time when housing instability is on the rise and the state is struggling to provide adequate shelter to families and individuals who are unhoused," the two housing groups' letter said.