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Los Angeles

L.A. County to end pandemic tenant protections – for good

Supervisors vote “to begin moving forward” on Dec. 31

Pandemic-related protections for Los Angeles County tenants will expire for good by the end of the year.

The L.A. County Board of Supervisors voted to end the protections, meaning many renters could be evicted if they can’t pay rent because of an economic hardship related to Covid-19, LAist reported.

“Given the resources we put into play — the financial resources to help both tenants and landlords to collect back rent — it’s time for us to begin moving forward,” Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who presented the plan for a Dec. 31 phase-out, said.

Under the current rules passed in January, Covid-19 tenant protections are only scheduled to last through Dec. 31. But the county has repeatedly extended the protections as previous deadlines approached.

This week’s vote is the first to explicitly set Dec. 31 as the “defined end date.” Supervisors Sheila Kuehl and Hilda Solis cast the two dissenting votes, saying it was too soon to commit to ending all pandemic tenant protections.

“I think the headline will be: This board must love homeless people. They are going to make so many more of them,” Kuehl said.

The tenant protection sunset applies to unincorporated parts of L.A. County, as well as any cities within the county that do not have their own stronger tenant protections in place.

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The vote will not apply to the city of Los Angeles, which has rules that continue to limit evictions and ban rent hikes due to Covid-19. The city’s rules currently have no end date, but city leaders are mulling proposals to begin phasing out protections starting on Dec. 31.

Many homelessness policy experts credit local eviction protections and bans on rent increases with reducing the number of Angelenos falling into homelessness during the pandemic.

Last week, the region’s latest homeless count found a 4.1 percent rise in homelessness across L.A. County, to 69,144 residents over the last two years. That number was significantly lower than the 26 percent increase observed between 2018 and 2020, before Covid-19 tenant protections were enacted.

The tenant protections that will end don’t just apply to evictions. They include protection against rent hikes in rent-controlled housing and provisions to allow tenants to add more people and pets to their households without fear of eviction.

Tenant advocates worry that thousands of low-income renters who suffered job loss or the death of a family breadwinner will be vulnerable to losing their housing at the start of the new year.

But landlords for months have called for the cancellation of local tenant protections, saying that while the economy has recovered, Covid-19 vaccines are available and most other pandemic restrictions have relaxed, rules against evictions and raising rents persist.

— Dana Bartholomew

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EvictionsPandemicTenant Protections