At the beginning of the year, Amy Glover fell behind on rent. After her boyfriend’s employer cut his hours due to the pandemic, he struggled to find another stable job, leaving the couple with just one income for a while. Glover informed the management team at her apartment complex, Spark Charlottesville, of their situation, and was told to apply to the Virginia Rent Relief Program.
“We made it clear the entire time we just wanted to get down to a zero balance so we could re-sign our lease because our lease ran out in March,” explains Glover, who moved into Spark Charlottesville, then known as Granite Park, in Albemarle County in February 2021. “So it ran out during that time while we were waiting for the rental aid, [but] we were led to believe that that was fine.”
After weeks of waiting for rental relief, Glover reached out to Legal Aid Justice Center for assistance. In late March, she finally received a check from the VRRP, and paid the approximately $4,000 she owed in back rent. But the next week, she woke up to a notice on their door from the complex’s management, alerting her that they could not renew her lease, and that they needed her and her boyfriend to leave the apartment by May 1.
“I was floored. During this entire process they never told me they probably would not let me renew. … It would have been nice to know,” she says. “I did so much work, and I tried so hard to even make that money come faster. I did everything right.”
Because Glover decided to fight the non-renewal of her lease in court and did not move out, SEMF Charleston LLC, the owners of Spark Charlottesville, filed an unlawful detainer against her on May 5.
Glover’s situation is not unique—LAJC has taken on similar cases across Virginia, says Glover’s attorney Victoria Horrock. And with July marking the end of eviction protections in the state, housing advocates expect eviction cases to spike in the coming weeks.
Until June 30, landlords were required under state law to give tenants who are behind on rent a written 14-day notice to pay what they owe before proceeding with an eviction, and were prohibited from evicting tenants who applied to the VRRP, unless they were not approved to receive relief within 45 days. Landlords who owned at least four units also had to offer a payment plan of up to six months for past-due rent.
Now, landlords only have to give tenants a five day pay-or-quit notice before filing an unlawful detainer, and do not need to offer a repayment plan or wait for rental relief to arrive. “There are not really any protections,” says Moriah Wilkins, LAJC’s Skadden Legal Fellow. “We weren’t able to secure those protections in the General Assembly like we hoped because of the political climate.”
Between May 1 and July 1, 68 residents in Charlottesville were served eviction notices. In Albemarle County, that number is 208, according to court data compiled by the Charlottesville Democratic Socialists of America’s Housing Justice Committee.
Since the VRRP stopped accepting new applications on May 15, “we have been seeing trends of people being taken to court for much higher dollar amounts in both the city and the county,” says Victoria McCullough of the committee.
Though Glover received VRRP funds before the state’s eviction protections expired, the non-renewal of her lease is an example of “covert eviction,” explains Wilkins. “In Virginia, you don’t have to provide a reason for non-renewal of a lease, so it just makes it easy for people to say, ‘Oh we’re not going to renew your lease because we don’t want to.’”
However, Horrock argues that Spark Charlottesville illegally discriminated against Glover based on her source of income—the VRRP funds—that she used to pay her rent. Thanks to new state housing laws that took effect in 2020, landlords are prohibited from discriminating against a tenant because of their source of funds. Renters can pay landlords using “any source that lawfully provides funds to or on behalf of a [renter], including any assistance, benefit, or subsidy program,” according to the Virginia housing code.
“[Spark Charlottesville] made it very clear that the real reason was that they just didn’t want to rent to people who had gotten the rental help because they couldn’t afford to live here anyways,” says Glover. “I know a lot of people that were pushed out of here.”
According to Albemarle General District Court records, Spark Charlottesville has filed 16 unlawful detainers against tenants this year. While four have been dismissed, the court has ruled in the landlord’s favor in three cases. Nine cases remain pending.
Spark Charlottesville could not be reached for comment on Glover’s case.
As she fights her eviction, Glover continues to live at Spark Charlottesville, and—since receiving the VRRP funds—has been paying her rent every month. She will have her final eviction hearing next month. If she wins her case, she will be allowed to continue to live in her apartment, and could be awarded monetary damages. If she loses, she will be forced to leave.
“This is a totally new issue in Virginia, [since] the law prohibiting this kind of discrimination is pretty new,” says Horrock. “We don’t know if we will win.”
Despite the current lack of eviction protections, rent relief is still available to local residents at risk of losing their homes. Charlottesville and Albemarle renters can apply to the Pathways Fund (833-524-2904) for assistance. The Financial Opportunity Center + Housing Hub—run by the Piedmont Housing Alliance—can also connect tenants in Charlottesville and surrounding counties with emergency financial aid, as well as provide them with employment assistance, financial coaching, housing navigation, and other critical resources. The Monticello Area Community Action Agency has housing resources available for residents in Fluvanna, Louisa, and Greene counties, too.
Wilkins urges those facing eviction to show up to their court dates, keep records of their correspondence with their landlord, and to contact LAJC for legal assistance.
“Giving us a call [and] providing us with the facts or any documents you have can make a difference,” she says, “and might give you a shot of staying in your home.”