By Liz Doyle
Baltimore Watchdog Staff Writer
The state will provide $11.7 million to help pay for legal services to those facing eviction and homelessness in Maryland, Gov. Larry Hogan and Maryland Attorney General Brian E. Frosh announced Thursday.
The funding will be allocated to the Maryland Legal Services Corporation, a state-created non-profit that distributes grants to some 36 non-profit organizations in Maryland that serve low-income individuals with legal needs.
“One of the most urgent issues facing our state is the wave of evictions that so many residents face as a result of the pandemic,” Frosh stated in a press release Thursday. “We need to keep families in their homes and off the streets. I’m pleased we are able to dedicate this money, recovered through the hard work of our lawyers, for this vital purpose.”
Those who earn 50% or less of the Maryland medium income are eligible for services in Maryland with MLSC funds, Susan Erlichman, the executive director of MLSC, said in an interview.
Both of MLSC’s main revenue sources suffered major hits because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Erlichman said. She said MLSC’s first source of revenue is the surcharge on court filing fees. When the courts closed during the pandemic, she said, MLSC lost that source of income. MLSC also lost 70% of the income they got from interest on lawyer trust accounts.
MLSC is anticipating revenue for the fiscal year to be $9.8 million lower than the prior year as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“These funds could not have come at a more critical time for the preservation of Maryland’s civil legal aid safety net,” Erlichman said. “The action taken today translates into literally tens of thousands of Marylanders facing evictions and other matters who otherwise would have had no place to turn, now able to get the legal help they desperately need.”
About 40% of renters, approximately 300,000 households, in Maryland are at risk of eviction, Erlichman said.
In August alone, over 100 households in Baltimore City were evicted, Baltimore Renters United said in a statement on Facebook.
“Maryland was one of the first states in the nation to implement a moratorium on evictions for tenants affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and we continue to provide targeted relief to help those in need,” Hogan said in a statement Thursday. “These additional resources are yet another way that we are following through on our commitment to do everything we can to help Marylanders weather this storm, get back on their feet, and recover.”