Our latest #GOPCThread is available on Twitter, this week focusing on recently approved funding the state is providing for COVID Relief programs, including rent, mortgage, and utilities relief.

Not on Twitter, the thread is available online , as well as below.

Greater Ohio Policy Center Read on Twitter

This week’s #GOPCThread takes a look at the recently approved funding from the state of #Ohio for a number of #COVID relief programs, including rent, mortgage, and utilities relief.

In late October, the Ohio Controlling Board approved a slate of relief packages @GovMikeDeWine and legislative leaders proposed for Ohio residents and businesses. #GOPCThread

GOPC was pleased to see $50M for #rentrelief, #mortgagerelief, and assistance for sewer/water bills included in the $419.5M package. #GOPCThread

If you are seeking rent assistance, you must apply through your local member of the @OACAA #GOPCThread

More information, including eligibility and application guidelines for providers and applicants, can be found through @OhioDevelopment #GOPCThread

GOPC has also compiled answers to Frequently Asked Questions about the new #Ohio #rentassistance program #GOPCThread

GOPC has been working on behalf of members of the Ohio Affordable Housing Learning Exchange to advocate for emergency rental assistance since May 2020. Exchange members predicted in mid-April that the need for #rentassistance would be unprecedented #GOPCThread

And dozens of our nonprofit colleagues like @AffordHouse_OH, @OhioEnterprise, @COHHIO, @OhioPovertyLaw, @OhioRebuild, @FinanceFund @CHNHousing among many others have been raising the alarm on #rentreliefnow #GOPCThread

The business community, like @OhioRealtors & others, have also consistently called for rent and mortgage assistance. The broad multi-sector effort to protect families & communities is laudable and illustrates to the urgency of the issue #GOPCThread

GOPC did a #GOPCThread about the growing number of housing insecure Ohioans in August 2020. The situation has only become more dire since then.

$50M from the state of #Ohio is a good start. But the need is unfathomably high. @uscensusbureau reports 354K households in Ohio lack confidence in their ability to pay Nov’s rent. That’s 21% of all renter households. #GOPCThread

The @CDCgov #EvictionMoratorium protects renters from being removed from their homes until the end of December, but by itself, does not provide any assistance to either renters or landlords. Eventually the debts will come due #GOPCThread

And according to a report issued by @NCSHAhome, Ohio could experience a $554M-$792M rent shortfall in January, 2021 #GOPCThread

Ohio will need more infusions of assistance in the future to mitigate spiking rates of eviction and homelessness, not to mention #COVID case increases. Given the scale of projected need, we’ll need local, state, and fed resources. #GOPCThread

As @NCSHAhome point out, that rent shortfall hurts all Ohioans—reduced rent means layoffs in the housing management industry, fewer property taxes for our schools, and deferred maintenance, which can threaten the quality of our neighborhoods #GOPCThread

GOPC stands with thousands of other organizations that are calling for federal, state, and local solutions to the #rentassistance crisis. The housing crisis impacts us all. #GOPCThread