Community Legal Aid launches eviction-help project berkshireeagle.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from berkshireeagle.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
BOSTON â A legal assistance program started by the Baker administration as a moratorium on evictions and foreclosures was set to end is looking to ramp up services and bring on a host of new attorneys as eviction cases for failure to pay rent are on the rise in the state.
The program, run by a group of regional legal aid organizations, provides assistance to both tenants and landlords facing pandemic-related eviction issues. Since the week beginning on Nov. 2 through the week starting on Dec. 14, over 4,000 new residential eviction cases for non-payment of rent have been filed in the Massachusetts Trial Court, according to court data.
Community Content
Struggling with housing costs?
The economic fallout from the pandemic is creating tremendous pressures on some of us to pay the rent or mortgage. Here are some ways to find help or, if you are a landlord, to provide help.
Emergency Housing Assistance extended
I’m so pleased that two nights ago, the Newton Community Preservation Committee agreed to extend the City’s COVID-19 Emergency Housing Relief Program for a longer period. This program assists Newton households who continue to face a loss of income due to COVID-19 and are struggling to pay housing costs. The CPC approved our Planning Department’s request to extend that assistance for up to eight months for qualified households.
An eviction crisis: Making the case for more help
Housing activists gather in front of Gov. Charlie Baker s house, Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2020, in Swampscott, Mass. Renters are still being evicted during the coronavirus pandemic despite a federal order that is supposed to keep them in their homes. The nationwide eviction ban went into effect Sept. 4 and was supposed to replace many state and local bans that had expired. But tenant advocates said there are still people unaware of the directive implemented by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that broadly prevents evictions for nonpayment of rent through the end of 2020. ( AP
Published: 12/11/2020 3:06:21 PM
Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part series on the state of evictions as a federal moratorium is set to expire at the end of the year. Part 2 will run Monday.
CHICOPEE All they want is a clean slate.
After nine-plus months of dealing with the tumultuous life upheaval caused by the pandemic on-again, off-again jobs, opening and closing of public schools, and the overall anxiety posed by COVID-19 Paige Spaulding and her husband, Jordan Jones, are now facing an even scarier prospect: eviction.
Spaulding, 23, first lost her job as a barista at Elms College when the pandemic hit in March. She returned part-time in August, but then found herself out of work again at the end of November when the college went all remote with COVID-19 cases rising. That left Spaulding, Jones, and three young children (ages 2, 3 and 6), without her income.