By Tom Scanlon | The Mesa Tribune
Last month, the Supreme Court struck down a national ban on evictions and the Washington Post last week observed, “The feared eviction ‘tsunami’ has not yet happened.”
And while Mesa may not be seeing a tsunami, a growing wave of evictions is menacing renters in all parts of the city.
The West Mesa, East Mesa and North Mesa Maricopa County Justice Court calendars were filled with eviction cases this week.
Meanwhile, the city of Mesa’s Emergency Rental and Utility Assistance Program is struggling to keep up with a sharp increase in applications since the eviction moratorium ended last month.
Mesa Community Services Director Ruth Giese said 1,216 applications were received in August, nearly double the 757 received in July. Another 561 applications were received in the first two weeks of September.
“The turnaround time to process applications has increased due to the increase of applications received,” Brandon said.
