Evictions decreased by 18 percent last year in New York City, which is their lowest level in a decade. Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration was focused on ramping up efforts to prevent increases in the numbers of New Yorkers becoming homeless.
The numbers of evictions dropped significantly within a year from 26,857 to 21,988 from the period of 2014 to 2015. According to court and city marshals figures, this drop occurred even as the number of cases filed by landlords for nonpayment of rent declined by only 2 percent.
The 2015 decrease in evictions was the lowest number of evictions in the past 10 years. According to Housing Court Answers, a tenant advocacy group that runs the information tables at Housing Court and compiles annual eviction totals, 21,945 heads of household lost their homes in 2005.
Although evictions dropped in 2014 by a meager 6.9 percent, the number had climbed every year since 2005, reaching a high in 2013, when 28,849 evictions were carried out.
One causative factor in the decrease in evictions could be the city allocating close to $46 million for legal services for tenants in the last two years, and the money performing well to its intended effect.
Tenant lawyers, landlord groups, and even Justice Fern A. Fisher, who oversees Housing Court as the deputy chief administrative judge for the New York City courts, believe that efforts by the Human Resources Administration to accelerate emergency rental assistance to people who are in danger of becoming homeless have helped lower the eviction rate.
On Monday, Mayor de Blasio and members of his administration held a news conference that heralded the drop in evictions. He also acclaimed an effort started last year by the Human Resources Administration to support tenants who are facing illegal eviction.
“Some combination of things is working,” Mr. de Blasio said.
The mayor stated that one of the reasons that evictions are down could be due to the freeze of rent-stabilized units last year. He expounded on the new and aggressive efforts by the city to fight illegal evictions and to represent tenants in court.
Some of the current challenges include low-income tenants in New York have to face their landlords’ lawyers without having their own representation. To combat this disadvantage, it would cost over $100 million to put in place programs that elected officials, legal scholars and tenant groups have pushed to establish a right to counsel in civic actions that affect basic needs like housing.