Renters Facing Eviction Can Seek Help From Anne Arundel County

ANNE ARUNDEL COUNTY, MD — The county's eviction protection process designed to help tenants remain in their homes while providing funding to landlords has been adjusted as federal and state eviction moratoriums end.

“COVID created tremendous stress on our economy, and left many in our community struggling to pay rent,” Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman said. “From the first days of the pandemic, our ACDS team took swift action to keep people in their homes while finding ways to help provide landlords with resources. The moratoriums coming to an end presents a new challenge, one I know Kathy Koch and the team at ACDS will meet.”

The CDC’s federal eviction moratorium ended on July 31, while the state’s moratorium is slated to expire Aug. 15. As these protections lapsed, ACDS Executive Director Kathleen Koch and her team worked to adjust processes to increase the number of interventions in place to prevent evictions. Among other steps, ACDS:

• Step 1: Increased coordination and outreach to landlords to ensure they were fully aware of the program and how its works;
• Step 2: Provided funding to more than double the staff at Community Legal Services to ensure attorneys were available to provide in court same day assistance;
• Step 3: Added office space adjacent to the courts for the increased staff at Community Legal Services so judges can easily refer tenants;
• Step 4: Added ACDS staff adjacent to the courts and adjacent to Community Legal Services to improve the coordination between clients in eviction court and the ACDS Eviction Prevention Program so applications can be prioritized and rents quickly paid;
• Step 5: Set up a system with the sheriff’s office so that ACDS staff can perform a daily cross reference of their list for evictions with those who have applied for assistance in an effort to prioritize these cases so rents can be paid and evictions stopped;
• Step 6: Working closely with the district court chief administrative judge to ensure all judges are aware of our program and how it works and to see if we can get voluntary postponement allowing us to process the application.

“The eviction moratoriums helped provide us the time needed to make contact with tenants and landlords and resolve issues before evictions took place,” Koch said. “We have moved quickly to let tenants and landlords know that while the moratoriums are ending, we still have money and resources available - to help tenants remain in their homes, and to help ease some of the financial burdens taken on by landlords.”

For more information on the ACDS eviction protection efforts, including more information on resources for tenants and landlords, click here.