Some residents have been unable to pay rent during the coronavirus pandemic because of job loss, and housing advocates are concerned that these outstanding bills will be too expensive to pay off when evictions resume sometime next year. John Sullivan is President of the Mississippi Association of Affordable Housing Providers. He says the relief bill signed by the President on Sunday could provide Mississippi with around $200 million dollars for rental assistance programs. "There will be a lot of money coming into the state to make sure landlords can keep people housed during the pandemic. And the law that the Congress has passed is very simple, it doesn't have a whole lot of restrictions. And it provides a program that is really run very efficiently, and get money out quickly to landlords who need it."
One program that has helped property owners is the Mississippi Rental Assistance Grant Program, which received $20 million dollars of CARES Act funds from the state legislature to pay off rental debt to landlords. But James Burwell, President-Elect of the Mississippi Apartment Association, says the program wasn't fully utilized by property owners. He says future relief packages need better promotion to boost participation. "We've lobbied for rental assistance for months, and I applaud out state legislators for bringing that to the table, but we need to make good on it. We need to do what we need to do to get it applied for, submit for it, and help our renters."
Experts say it is unclear how the anticipated coronavirus relief money will be distributed. Until then, they are encouraging both renters and property owners to work together to help ease the financial strain.
