Well it is the first of the month

How is that eviction moratorium coming along?

In a move that mirrors the state's latest coronavirus shutdown order, New Orleans judges on Thursday extended a temporary ban on evictions to May 18, but didn't say whether they will impose a longer moratorium.

Housing advocates last week asked the judges to extend a moratorium to Aug. 24 to match a federal law that effectively bans many evictions until then.

The city court judges have yet to answer to the request, according to Veronica Reed, the executive director of the Jane's Place Neighborhood Sustainability Initiative.

August 24 is probably too soon, actually. But May 18 is extremely too soon and it would be much worse if the judges really do leave it that way.  My understanding is the city court judges are waiting to see if they get some guidance from the state supreme court so... we'll wait another couple weeks to see where that goes. 

Someone is going to have to step in.  The mayor seems to be wavering.  Earlier in the week, Mayor Cantrell spoke with Washington Post reporter Bob Costa about a number of things related to COVID recovery. The video also includes an interview with Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance-Bottoms. Cantrell's is in the second half. There is a transcript here and the Advocate pulls this same quote.

When asked about evictions, Cantrell says she's working with the judges but immediately launches into a bit about how "we need to find balance" with the landlords.

MR. COSTA: Just in the final few minutes here, Mayor, I would appreciate your perspective on the economy, to follow up on your thoughts. There's an order about evictions in your city--suspending evictions. It's set to expire, as you know, at the end of this month. Should city courts or your office take action to extend that eviction freeze?

MAYOR CANTRELL: Well, we're actually--we're doing that right now. We are working with the courts on this. We do want to prevent evictions. And at the same time, there needs to be balance there, making sure that we're working with our landlords, even our smalltime landlords, so that they are made whole as well. So, it is a win-win, and there's a balance of the people who need the housing--and we definitely do not want to push them out of housing--but also the landowner who needs some subsidy as well. So, we have activated rental assistance in the city, utilizing public money as well as private, again, wanting to strike that balance to help both, because it does touch--it touches both the economy as well as the tenant who needs the housing.

Notice how she qualifies that they are looking out for, "even our smalltime landlords," implying that the independent mom and pop type landlords we might actually sympathize with are actually an afterthought to her. But apparently the landlords "that we're working with" are more big time than that.

Which is curious since it's really the independents who need attention.  There's a danger here going forward that smaller property owners could fall victim to foreclosure leaving only mega-corporate landlords in control of more and more rental property. This in turn exposes renters to further abuse and much greater chance of being evicted by an uncaring land management companies based thousands of miles away.

It's much easier to bring the interests of small time landlords into "balance" with renters. All that takes is a freeze on mortgage payments to match the freeze on rent. I wonder if Mayor "Not Talking About Taking From The Rich And Giving To The Poor And All That Kind Of Crap" actually cares about any of that.