CDC ' s Declaration - Public Health Crisis and Mass Evictions
The CDC Issues Moratorium to Limit Public Health Crisis Caused by Mass Evictions .
LINDSEY SIEGEL Atlanta Legal Aid , Inc . lmsiegel @ atlantalegalaid . org
12 October / November 2020
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention declared a temporary national moratorium on certain residential evictions to protect the public health . Published in the Federal Register on September 4 , 2020 , the CDC ’ s Order allowed tenants who met certain criteria to provide a sworn declaration to their landlords to invoke the moratorium ’ s protections . Unlike the eviction protections under the federal CARES Act , the CDC ’ s moratorium applies to virtually all residential rental properties ( private and government-subsidized ). Tenants covered under the Order are protected from eviction until December 31 , 2020 . See 85 Fed . Reg . 55292 ( Sept . 4 , 2020 ).
The CDC Justified its Order with Statistics about Evictions and Spread of Covid-19 An Aspen Institute study conducted this summer — cited in the CDC order — predicted that in the absence of a moratorium , between 19-23 million U . S . households were threatened with eviction by September 30 , 2020 — roughly 20 times the normal annual rate . 1 See id . at 55295 . As the CDC noted , “[ a ] wave of evictions on that scale would be unprecedented in modern times .” Id . In late