Eviction filings are rising throughout Hamilton County, intensifying the need for more support to keep vulnerable families in their homes, according to representatives from the Community Foundation of Greater Chattanooga.
Maeghan Jones, president and CEO of CFGC, presented to the Chattanooga City Council’s Affordable Housing Committee about the Eviction Prevention Initiative, a program which provides access to legal counsel and social workers for local families facing eviction. EPI was launched at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in April 2020 in response to the rising wave of evictions, but has sustained through ongoing investment by the City Council, other funding partners, and CFGC itself.
Today, EPI is supported by local attorney Emily O’Donnell, its co-founder and strategic advisor, as well as host of partner organizations including Legal Aid of East Tennessee, Habitat for Humanity, and the Chattanooga Regional Homeless Coalition.
"In 2021, the area median home sales price was $265,000 – more than double the 2010 price of $130,000,” Ms. Jones told the Council members. “Despite rising home prices, many working families have not seen an increase in wages.”
As a result of this wage stagnation and the end of federal eviction moratoria and rent relief programs, Hamilton County’s eviction filings in 2022 increased by 34 percent over 2021. CFGC anticipates that eviction filings will return to their pre-pandemic levels by the end of this year.
Sixty-five percent of EPI clients are severely burdened by housing costs, which means that they spend more than 50 percent of their monthly income on expenses like rent and utilities. While affordability is an issue throughout the greater Chattanooga region, the crisis of eviction is not felt equally in all parts of the community: court data from 2016-2022 indicates that more eviction cases are filed in neighborhoods composed of majority-Black census tracts, as well as tracts with higher rates of poverty, said officials.
While eviction may be occurring more acutely in some neighborhoods of Chattanooga than others, their negative impact is felt citywide, said officials.
For instance, evidence suggests that eviction is not merely a symptom of poverty but a cause of it. People who experience eviction are at greater risk of homelessness, job loss, and adverse health conditions including depression. Once an eviction judgment is on their record, they will have a more difficult time securing safe and affordable housing.
Eviction is also particularly harmful to children whose lives are upended when they lose their home and whose education may be interrupted if they are forced to change schools.
Landlords will also lose rental income in the event of an eviction, and must incur additional costs to relist the property. Abandoned properties may become attractive nuisances degrading property values and rents in neighborhoods where eviction proceedings are prevalent.
“This is a poverty crisis masquerading as a housing crisis,” says Ms. O’Donnell. “We have a moral and economic imperative to address both, but helping people obtain safe, secure housing is the foundation on which we have to build everything else.”
Still, EPI offers hope to those who are struggling and potentially facing eviction.
"Since inception, we have helped more than 400 households prevent eviction,” says Ms. O’Donnell. “In addition to preventing evictions, our lawyers and case workers have helped landlords secure hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent relief to help them mitigate the impacts of the pandemic and the current economic environment.”
Access to legal representation appears to be a significant determinant of success for tenants who are facing eviction. For the period of Oct. 21, 2021 through Sept. 22, 2022, for example, EPI clients received a dismissal in 67 percent of the cases, as opposed to 27 percent for people who did not have access to an attorney. EPI clients were also 50 percent less likely to receive a money judgment against them compared to tenants who were not represented. In addition, regardless of whether they were evicted, 42 households that received case management remained housed..
EPI was cited by Mayor Tim Kelly as a significant contributor to the city of Chattanooga’s recent announcement that unsheltered homelessness in the city had decreased 40 percent in the past year – a reversal from the 200 percent increase from the previous two years.
Quantifying EPI’s material benefit to taxpayers is the next major step for this work. With the support of the Maclellan Foundation, CFGC has contracted with Stout Analytics and Southern Adventist University to conduct a rigorous cost-benefit analysis that will define the program’s impact with respect to the amount of public resources it saves. Initial findings from this analysis are expected to be available in early 2024.
In the meantime, EPI’s work helping vulnerable families and landlords reach resolutions will continue. In the words of Ms. Jones: “While EPI started as a crisis response, its results show that in many ways, it is even more relevant today.”