Missouri law prevents cities and counties from eviction delays
(Missourinet) — A new law has begun that prevents Missouri cities and counties from enforcing eviction delays unless authorized by state law. It would also prevent people from illegally occupying homes and other residential properties.
The bill was sponsored by Rep. Chris Brown, R-Kansas City, who told Missourinet that this was a byproduct of the “COVID era.”
“You had government, whether it be federal, state or local, come in and basically tell landlords, for a time period, you cannot evict people, specifically for nonpayment of rent,” he explained. “So, there was about a year, year and a half…where landlords could not evict someone.”
Brown said that it was a “disastrous situation” for housing providers who lost money, but still had to pay mortgage, insurance, taxes and maintenance.
Rep. Jamie Johnson, D-Platte County, supports the law but is torn because she does not want to contribute to an already existing homeless problem in urbanized areas.
“If we don’t allow cities to enact a moratorium on evictions, we are going to see a number of people get evicted and have nowhere to go and, in this situation like we had with COVID, what do we do? What are we giving the municipalities the resources to do about that problem,” Johnson questioned.
Johnson said that there needs to be a multilayered solution to solve a multilayered problem. She added that she understands the need for an eviction delay but is torn about how the state government went about it.
“It was conflicting for me just because of the situation that we were in in the middle of COVID when people were unable to retain work or to continue working,” Johnson said.
Rep. Brown called that unconstitutional.
“An arbitrary seizure of private property where you have government coming in and telling you you must rent to this individual for an extended period of time,” he concluded.
It began with a federal eviction freeze imposed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during the COVID-19 pandemic, but after it was invalidated by the U.S. Supreme Court, St. Louis and St. Louis County implemented local delays.
Click here for more information.