Cook County Diverts Predicted COVID-19 Eviction Avalanche

by Wendy Rosen

The predicted “avalanche” of 21,000 pandemic-driven evictions didn’t happen when the Illinois moratorium was lifted Oct. 3, 2021 and the reasons, advocates suggest, are an infusion of rental assistance cash and a new court diversion program. Cook County has awarded nearly $90 million in emergency rental assistance to residents impacted by CO- VID-19, according to the Cook County Bureau of Economic Development.

Efforts to stave off the housing crisis began early in the pandemic, when Cook County leaders grew increasingly concerned that the region’s ongoing affordable housing crisis, together with a looming eviction crisis, would force low-income renters to move from homes to homelessness.

The Early Resolution Program (ERP) was started by the Circuit Court of Cook County, The Chicago Bar Foundation (CBF), government agencies, elected officials, and community partners to provide tenants and landlords who suffered pandemic hardships with equal access to free legal assistance, mediation, and resources like rental assistance. The program extends negotiation time for landlords and tenants while they attempt to settle out of court.

Cook County Board President Tony Preckwinkle unveiled the ERP in a November 2020 virtual press conference as part of the broader Cook County Legal Aid for Housing and Debt (CCLAHD) initiative for residents dealing with eviction and consumer debt. Cook County’s ERP was initially funded with a $1 million allocation from the federal CARES (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security) Act.

“The most vulnerable among us -- Black and Brown residents -- have been left to bear the brunt of the burden. This is unacceptable,” said Preckwinkle. “We understood that we needed to step in and provide solutions.”

Cook County launched the Cook County Legal Aid for Housing and Debt (CCLAHD) initiative at a Nov. 23, 2020 virtual press conference. From top left: Chicago Department of Housing Commissioner Marisa Novara, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, Chief Judge Timothy Evans, Cook County Commissioner Scott Britton, Chicago Bar Foundation Executive Director Bob Glaves, Cook County Commissioner Alma Anaya, ASL Interpreter Elizabeth Treger.

Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing (LCBH) Staff Attorney Sam Barth works with the ERP to provide free legal services to tenants facing eviction. He recalled an older gentleman who lived alone in the same apartment for more than 10 years. After the gentleman lost his job in the food industry early in the pandemic, his rent piled up for a year and he received an eviction summons. He certainly couldn’t afford a lawyer, considering his ballooning debt.

Prior to the pandemic, the gentleman would have likely arrived at his first court date without an attorney and possibly had a trial that resulted in an eviction order. According to Chicago eviction data compiled by LCBH, only 12% of tenants have attorneys, compared to 81% of landlords. Data also show that eviction trials for unrepresented tenants often last three minutes or less.

CARPLS Supervising Attorney Melissa Wemstrom, who works with the ERP, said that sometimes the first time somebody might have known legal aid existed was after the court issued the order of eviction. “And they’re already facing, ‘OK, in seven days the sheriff is going to come out to do the eviction.’ And then unfortunately, at that point it’s pretty limited what we can do as attorneys.”

Unlike criminal proceedings, where the right to an attorney is guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, eviction is a civil proceeding. Defendants facing eviction -- and possibly homelessness -- are not guaranteed the right to an attorney.

But that wasn’t the case for Barth’s client. When the gentleman logged into Cook County’s virtual court on Zoom, the judge referred his case to an ERP case manager who completed his intake and sent him to another Zoom room. There he met with an ERP staff member who consulted with him to determine whether to refer him to rental assistance, mediation, legal aid, or all three.

The gentleman then met Barth in a private breakout room where they worked to determine a way to negotiate a good outcome. Then, in separate Zoom rooms, the gentleman attended mediation with his landlord, and also met with social service providers who helped him apply for rental assistance.

Activists staged an encampment outside the Richard J. Daley Center on Aug. 21, 2020 to pressure Gov. Pritzker to extend the eviction moratorium and lift the ban on rent control. Pritzker extended the eviction ban until Oct. 3, 2021. The Rent Control Preemption Act (HB 116) is pending in the Illinois legislature (Wendy Rosen photo).

Following ERP interventions, the landlord received the entire back balance, and the court dismissed the case. The gentleman is now stably housed, has found a new job, and is paying his rent.

“And that’s like the perfect outcome, where the resources of the city and the state and the federal stimulus all work to keep this person from becoming homeless and keeping him in his apartment,” said Barth.

Connecting tenants with attorneys early in the process helps them realistically understand their circumstances, their rights, and their options for negotiation, which makes a big difference, said Bob Glaves, executive director of CBF. “There’s almost always going to be a better alternative than eviction.”

The ERP process often begins with a call to the CCLAHD hotline. The hotline number appears on a flyer attached to every eviction summons and encourages Cook County landlords and tenants to call for free assistance with eviction and debt problems. Hotline staff have handled approximately 16,800 eviction calls, Glaves said.

CARPLS attorneys and paralegals staff the CCLAHD hotline and assist tenants and landlords with a variety of concerns before or after they receive an eviction summons. “And that ranges from helping people get connected to rental assistance, to helping them figure out when and how to go to court, referring them to programs, helping them understand the legal paperwork that they have in their hand, and ... what possible defenses they have,” Wemstrom said.

The new virtual court process is more accessible as well. Instead of having to commute to the courthouse, renters now log into Zoom court. A tenant currently using the ERP said that aside from waiting on Zoom for three hours before her case was called, she likes virtual court, “it beats travelling,” she said.

Before the ERP, some evictions could be over in minutes. Now, the first court appearance is a case management conference scheduled at least 30 days after the initial filing, with the second court date set 2 or 4 weeks later. Judges typically divert cases to the ERP when unrepresented landlords and tenants have nonpayment of rent issues (cases involving property damage or threats to other tenants are generally not eligible).

“Our whole goal for this stage is for all the clients to feel supported and to have a moment to kind of relax in a situation that’s really nerve-wracking,” said Cassie Lively, executive director at The Center for Conflict Resolution (CCR), the partner agency that staffs the ERP case manager and mediator roles.

After the intake process, a case manager may move clients to private Zoom rooms where attorneys help them negotiate more time for rental assistance to arrive, a payment plan, or a move out date. Other cases are triaged to mediation, where CCR staff guide landlord and tenant discussions.

“There is a chance to create a human connection ... for the parties to understand each other better and to be more creative in thinking about solutions that might work for them,” said Lively. “We find that when a mediator is helping that conversation happen people can be a lot more honest and vulnerable and have a dialogue in a way that’s hard for people to have directly with each other.”

Judges have referred more than 3,185 eviction case to the ERP since April 2021, according to data provided by CBF. So far, about 25% of the eviction cases have reached out-ofcourt settlements, and partners expect that percentage to rise as many more cases are still pending.

Landlords diverted to the ERP are typically those who can’t afford or have never consulted an attorney before. They are grateful for help understanding legalese and changes to Cook County’s landlord-tenant laws, according to Martin Cozzola, supervising attorney at Chicago Volunteer Legal Services. Cozzola leads a small ERP legal team that has counseled close to 600 landlords who typically own 2- or 3- flats and typically live in the same building or neighborhood as their tenants.

“Working to empower people on both sides of the conflict in eviction court helps people feel better equipped to continue to act as landlords to their neighbors and continue to rent to them at rates that are much more affordable than perhaps a big company that is headquartered out of New York City,” Cozzola said. “It’s going to go a long way towards keeping people from selling properties off, and I think that’s going to be really valuable for the long-term survival of Cook County’s naturally affordable housing.”

Some landlords, however, express concerns with court delays that often drag out for three months or more. Michael Zink, partner at Starr Bejgiert, Zink & Rowells, has represented mom and pop landlords for nearly two decades. He said the slow ERP process is forcing some property owners who own five units or less to file eviction cases more quickly than they had prior to the pandemic.

In the past, small landlords typically worked with tenants to agree to payment plans or move out dates before they filed eviction cases, said Zink. But when tenants don’t comply with these handshake agreements, landlords who are depleting savings to pay bills are forced to spend several more months in the ERP before they can reach enforceable agreements and move forward.

“I’ve had landlords almost in tears on the phone saying, ‘How am I going to pay these property taxes, how am I going to pay this mortgage bill,’” Zink said. “One of the most frustrating things for them that I hear all the time is, ‘I wasn’t given any of this. I’ve taken all these risks and I’ve put all this money in this, and it feels like it’s being almost taken away.’”

Zink said that it’s important to understand that landlords and tenants are in this together and if one is struggling, then the other is struggling. In the past year he’s seen small landlords sell their properties after slogging through the court eviction process. Nationally, mom and pop landlords own more than 75% of the small rental properties that are home to most unsubsidized low-income families, particularly families with children, according to a recent University of California at Berkeley Terner Center for Housing Innovation report.

Zink is concerned when stressed out small landlords sell out. “These properties then are going to wind up getting sold potentially to somebody who doesn’t care as much. They might even get sold to some conglomerate who truly doesn’t care, who truly just treats everybody as a number.”

Though Zink said the ERP process needs improvements to speed things up, he does see benefits when the program helps landlords and tenants communicate and reach agreements.

Glaves said ERP partners are working together to make the process more efficient. He believes a modest investment in a program like the ERP will help reduce the long-term social and economic costs of eviction.

“There’s been more attention to eviction in the last year than in my previous 30 years as a legal aid attorney,” said Michelle Gilbert, LCBH legal and policy director. “We realize that prevention is better than treatment. That’s true for COVID and that’s true for homelessness. Preventing someone from becoming homeless is actually cost effective as opposed to trying to get them rehoused.”

Wendy Rosen is a multimedia reporter covering a range of issues from immigration to housing. She is a winner of the National Federation of Press Women 2019 National Communications Contest for her photo story in StreetWise on Chicago’s Rohinga refugee community.