Miami Beach’s overwhelmed COVID-19 rent relief program adds $336,000 in new funding
After Miami Beach was overwhelmed with requests for rental assistance last month, the city has pledged $336,000 in additional federal money to help more residents pay their overdue rent.
The city, which has already budgeted about $550,000 for rent relief, stopped taking applications on May 18 after receiving more requests for help than the money could cover.
Unlike the first round of funding, which will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis, the order of appointments for the second round of funding will be based on a lottery. The program is funded mainly from two federal sources: the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act and the HOME Investment Partnership Program.
The city began accepting applications Monday. Interested residents can apply on the city’s website. The city will only accept applications until midnight Friday, due to the high demand for assistance and limited funding.
On June 8, the city will hold a lottery of applications received online, which will establish the order in which applicants will meet with staff.
More than 500 appointments were made for the first round of funding, of which 42 households have qualified for $79,191 in assistance. The city estimates that the first batch of money can cover rent for about 100 households.
Johnnie Suarez, 27, a South Beach renter who has been threatened with eviction, was unable to apply for rental assistance the first time around. He has applied for the second round of funding and said the new system is better organized and more fair.
“I’m really happy about it man,” he said.
More help may be coming. Next week, at the urging of Commissioner David Richardson, the city’s Finance and Economic Resiliency Committee will vote on whether to budget $700,000 in general fund money to the rent relief program. That would match a $700,000 pledge for walk-up food distributions in the city, which Richardson said has helped about 400 families per week.
Richardson, who has organized food distributions over the last two months, said the economic damage of the coronavirus is evidenced by the lines of residents he sees every week waiting for volunteers to put food in their trunks.
He estimates his food drives, organized with the help of Feeding South Florida, Farmshare and South Florida Seniors in Action, has fed about 2,500 people per week.
“We see the need in the community for food and housing,” he said.
Rent assistance will be paid directly to the landlords, who must first consent to receiving late rent through the program.
To qualify for aid, applicants must be Miami Beach residents with legal immigration status. They must also provide a notice from an employer stating that they lost their jobs or had their hours cut due to the coronavirus.
Eligible applicants must earn no more than 80 percent of area median income, which was $47,450 in 2019 for a single-person household in Miami-Dade County.
The coronavirus pandemic has been contained enough, city officials say, to allow dine-in service to resume at restaurants and salons to open back up. But the economic impact that two months of government-mandated closures caused to working-class residents continues to be felt, as demonstrated by weekly breadlines.
A line of cars, some with their trunks open, spanned five blocks of Collins Avenue in Miami Beach on Wednesday. Toward the back, 31-year-old Nicole Moretti wondered if there would be enough food left for her.
Moretti, whose income from ride-share gigs has dried up during the pandemic, has dipped into her savings to buy groceries and pay rent. She was one of dozens of residents who lined up Wednesday afternoon for free food.
She said she heard of the city’s rental relief fund but did not apply because she wrongly thought only renters who have received eviction notices could sign up.
“I feel like the whole city should cut everybody slack,” Moretti said. “There needs to be more assistance available.”
This story was originally published June 3, 2020 at 7:12 PM.
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