Over 400 people are facing eviction in Bibb County. Here’s what’s happening in court

The process moved quickly. The judge ruled in favor of landlords over and over again, evicting single moms, families and the most vulnerable people in Bibb County.

After the CDC’s eviction moratorium ended July 31, Monday was the first day hundreds of Bibb County residents could face eviction. By Tuesday afternoon, a new moratorium was in affect.

“We try to offer as much assistance and directions as they can take, but I have to do what the law says,” said Pamela White-Colbert, Chief Judge of the Bibb County Civil and Magistrate Court, which oversees eviction cases. “It’s a very humbling experience because you know, [[but for] the grace of God, it could be you.”

The new CDC eviction moratorium extends through Oct. 3 and covers communities that are “experiencing substantial and high levels of community transmission levels of SARS-CoV-2 as defined by CDC,” according to the order. Bibb County and all of the surrounding counties have a high level of community coronavirus transmission, according to the CDC’s COVID-19 tracker.

To qualify for the protections of the eviction moratorium, a tenant must fill out an eviction protection declaration form and submit it to their landlord or anyone who has the right to evict them or remove them from the property, such as the judge at eviction court. Advocates suggest keeping a copy of the filled out form.

Although the eviction moratorium delays an eviction, it does not excuse tenants from paying their rent. Tenants have to pay rent during the moratorium, or they could face eviction when it is lifted.

Eviction court takes place on Monday in Bibb County. White-Colbert said they would set aside a few weeks to revisit the 400 eviction cases that were stalled during the eviction moratorium, but a new moratorium was enacted.

Before the pandemic, White-Colbert said they were able to handle around 80 cases a day. Now, they handle about 48 cases a day in order to maintain social distancing and follow CDC guidelines.

In addition to seeing many people and families face evictions, White-Colbert said she has seen an influx of smaller landlords losing their homes.

“Landlords are getting frustrated because they have properties that they’re not collecting any monies on, and that puts them in a hardship. So, we are seeing more foreclosures on houses being sold because the landlord could not hang on to it,” she said.

Who are these people?

Shannon Mills, a staff attorney at the Georgia Legal Services Program, said he is working with teachers, restaurant workers and mostly single moms to represent them in eviction court and help them find assistance. Georgia Legal Services offers free legal services to people outside of Atlanta with low incomes.

“They had a job before COVID came. They were working, and then unfortunately, the wide scale impact of COVID came, and unfortunately, they experienced being laid off. They’ve experienced financial instability,” he said. “They’ve had to make those tough decisions: do I put food on the table or pay for the rent?... I’ve just heard it so many times, they’ve never been in this situation before.”

Nequana Stevens, community services manager at the Macon-Bibb Economic Opportunity Council, said she helps people upload documents and fill out the form for the Georgia Rental Assistance program.

“Most of the people I’ve seen is hard working people that has been laid off due to the pandemic. they started receiving unemployment. they was getting the pandemic unemployment, doing well, and then when that stopped, they couldn’t maintain with that,” she said.

Georgia received $552 million in stimulus funds from the U.S. Treasury Department through the federal Emergency Rental Assistance Program. The Georgia Rental Assistance Program has distributed $14,118,327 to tenants and landlords as of July 28, which is 2.6% of the total amount of funds, according to the Georgia Department of Community Affairs, the state agency responsible for distributing the money to most Georgia counties.

An eviction causes devastating effects in a home from not being able to find affordable housing in the future to impacting children’s ability to do well in school, Mills said.

“Preserving the housing and getting them to stay there, whether that’s finding a creative legal argument or getting them the assistance that gets the landlord to dismiss the eviction, is just so critical, just because of the impact housing stability has on a person’s life,” he said.

Although Mills said he loves his job, it’s distressing to watch people lose their homes.

“Those moments where there’s unfortunately nothing we can do legally on the side of things, it’s just heartbreaking because you experience right there with your clients that pain, that fear… I never want to get to that point,” he said. “I feel definitely more ups than downs, but it’s still disheartening coming face to face with the reality that, unfortunately, someone’s going to be evicted, and they’re gonna have to move.”

This story was originally published August 8, 2021 at 8:00 AM.