(Radio Iowa) – There’s a spike in eviction filings in Iowa linked to the pandemic, even though the C-D-C has halted some evictions since the extra 600-dollar unemployment payments expired. Iowa Legal Aid and Polk County housing officials have been at the Polk County Courthouse in Des Moines to provide legal and rental assistance to people facing eviction. Nick Smithberg is executive director of Iowa Legal Aid.

“It is of vital importance that tenants engage in this process, deliver the CDC notices to their landlords, and show up for their court cases,” Smithberg says. “They will not win if they don’t show up.” The new eviction prevention program has allowed about 250 Polk County residents to stay in their homes. That number includes about 130 children. Smithberg says they connect tenants to rental assistance, because the moratorium doesn’t suspend rent payments.

He says, “The landlords get income that they would have lost and don’t have vacancies, the tenants keep a roof over their house, and the public gets the benefit of avoiding the adverse health crisis of having people become homeless during the middle of a pandemic.” Smithberg says they’ve been able to stop almost all evictions of renters who showed up for their hearings. He says he hopes to expand the program to other parts of the state.

(reporting by Katarina Sostaric, Iowa Public Radio)