National Housing Publication Credits City for Rapid, Direct Delivery of COVID-Relief Funds

The City’s COVID-relief efforts of last fall are singled out in a recently-published article titled “How Santa Fe Prevented Evictions with Easy Access to Rent Relief.” The piece appears in Shelterforce, which covers community development, affordable housing, and neighborhood stabilization nationally.

In a nutshell, the article details how “... Santa Fe and its robust network of community organizers and grassroots advocacy groups got millions to struggling families—allowing them to buy food, keep the power on, and temporarily stave off eviction—in just a few weeks last year.”

• "By January, 12,462 Santa Fe households had received CARES Act money through CONNECT."
• “ … the combination of the moratorium and government rent relief halved the total number of evictions filed last year, dropping from an average rate of 558 per year to just 280 in 2020."
• “Cities like Santa Fe ... may see fewer of their most vulnerable residents on the streets and in homeless shelters.” 

The article emphasizes the City's collaborations with grassroots partner organizations to provide direct aid as a key to the success of the mobilization:

• “Through the CONNECT program, the city partnered with Chainbreaker Collective, immigrant justice advocacy organization Somos un Pueblo Unido, and anti-poverty community investment platform UpTogetherto distribute easy-access, one-time payments of $750 to Santa Feans who were skipped over by stimulus money due to their tax status and weren’t eligible for unemployment benefits, and as much as $3,000 in rent-specific, low-barrier assistance to folks suffering economic setbacks due to the pandemic."
• “Chainbreakers and Somos and other groups who really are on the ground know how to get the money into the pockets where it does the most good the most quickly,” says Mayor Webber. With direct cash assistance, he notes, “Folks who need help not only get money but have that opportunity to deploy that money in ways that make their lives and their families’ lives better.”
• Acting Director of Community Health and Safety Kyra Ochoa is quoted extensively in the article.

Read the entire article by Shelby R. King by clicking this link.