Asheville workers are scrambling to make rent after a Hurricane Helene-induced shutdown
Asheville workers are scrambling to make rent after a Hurricane Helene-induced shutdown
An economic disaster is brewing in Asheville, North Carolina after the city weathered Hurricane Helene two months ago.
The storm knocked out water, power and internet throughout the region for weeks, causing businesses to close and an estimated 12,000 people to file for unemployment. And in the middle of all of this, rent and housing bills are coming due, leaving some residents struggling to make regular payments.
One church in Asheville is stepping up to help renters make ends meet. Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church in North Asheville has helped hundreds pay overdue rent and utility bills.
Every day, people line up at the church seeking rent assistance.
Jefferson Bravo, a handyman, was one of those people. He hasn’t gotten a paycheck since Hurricane Helene devastated the region in late September. In the weeks after the storm, he was focused on basic necessities like food and water for his family of four.
“The storm took away what little savings we had,” Bravo said. “A friend who had already come here told me that [the church] was providing food, clothing and all that, along with help with rent. So I had to come.”
After a short wait, Bravo picked up a check for $1,100 — enough to cover the month of rent he missed.
Church pastor Marcia Mount Shoop said her small team of staff and volunteers has done their best to respond to the economic crisis facing many Asheville residents who lost work due to the storm.
“A lot of our folks are service economy workers and they have not worked,” she said. “So we are trying to take housing insecurity off the stress list.”
Mount Shoop’s church is using private donations to get people rent relief as fast as possible. The church has given out more than $1 million in rent aid. Other groups are helping too, but Mount Shoop said nobody can keep up.
“We’re on a razor’s edge every day,” she said. “We have a stack this tall that we’re working through. You know, we’re behind, because the amount is a lot.”
There is some relief coming from the local government — but red tape has slowed down the process, according to Patricia Caddell, a real estate attorney at Pisgah Legal Services.
“It takes a lot of time to get the government funds, and there’s a lot more paperwork involved, rather than when you are asking for resources from a local organization or a church,” she said.
Evictions can happen fast, Caddell added.
“A lot of landlords are depending on their rental income as part of their income. They have mortgages to pay too. And if the landlord isn’t able to pay the mortgage on the property, it could go into foreclosure.”
And an eviction doesn’t necessarily mean a landlord will get paid, she explained.
“These landlords, they could file an eviction and remove the tenants from the property, but the likelihood of them getting that money back is little to none because the tenants just don’t have it to pay.”
This dilemma isn’t new; during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper signed an eviction moratorium. As part of the measure, both landlords and renters got hundreds of millions of dollars to help keep everyone housed.
But that hasn’t happened in response to the hurricane. State representative Lindsey Prather said that North Carolina desperately needs more rental assistance.
Prather is not alone. In an open letter to state leadership, more than 400 elected officials, faith leaders, business representatives and community organizers pleaded for an eviction moratorium and more rental assistance from the state.
So far, the state has dedicated $1 million in rent assistance for the region — but that’s split across 39 counties and is not yet available.
“The community has been asking for an eviction moratorium. I do think that that would be good but if we can’t do that at the very least we have to put in more for rental assistance,” Prather said.
In Asheville, there’s a lot of talk and frustration about a lack of resources for rental assistance, including at Grace Covenant church.
Pastor Mount Shoop emphasized that the entire community has been hurt by this disaster and that there are a lot of people from all walks of life who need help.
“There’s nobody here that wants to not pay landlords. We want everybody to be able to stay in business and get our economy back going,” she said.
And, she said, if workers are pushed out of the community, that’s only going to make the economy worse.
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