A projected tsunami of evictions never materialized after federal and state moratori-um tenants who faced Covid-related financial setbacks ended, statistics show.

Statewide, there were 26,911 evictions filed in 2021, constituting 59% of the 45,668 evictions filed in 2019, according to the Colorado Apartment Association

“When the moratoriums ex-pired, claims of impending eviction waves were baseless,”

Drew Hanrick, senior vice president of government affairs and general counsel for the Colorado Apartment Association, said in a statement.

The organization has

“months of data demonstrating a below-average eviction rate, both in metro Denver and statewide,” he said.

Requests for rental assistance in Colorado Springs remain steady, six months after moratoriums stopped, say local organizations that provide services for homeless and low-income people.

Help with paying rent is the top request to Pikes Peak United Way’s 2-11 hotline for social-service referrals, followed by pleas for assistance with past-due utilities’ bills, said Elizabeth Quevedo, director of community impact.

Catholic Charities of Central Colorado is seeing slight decreases in requests for eviction prevention, said president and CEO Andy Barton.

However, “that doesn’t mean the housing crisis and vulnerability is going to end,” he said.

His organization budgeted $1.6 million to help prevent evictions this fiscal year and has distributed $2.4 million in the first seven months of the current fiscal year, which ends June 30.

“Our concern is that the focus on keeping people in apartments that was elevated during the pandemic will drop off and fail to take into consideration that the cost of living is going really high,” he said.

Hamrick said the gradual increase of eviction rates to a pre-pandemic levels “indicates the return of our housing markets to normal.”

Residents continue to make monthly lease payments at high rates, he said. The National Multifamily Housing Council reported in November that rent payments in Colorado remained about 96%.

Relief funds remain available for struggling renters.

Pikes Peak United Way staff has helped residents obtain more than $1 million in rental assistance from the state’s Colorado Emergency Rental Assistance Program since May 2021, Quevedo said.

The program pays rent in arrears as far back as April 2020, and can include past-due charges as well as two additional months of rent up to a maximum of 15 months of assistance, for people who can prove financial hardship due to COVID-19.

The wait time is long, Quevedo said, from four to six or eight weeks to hear back after filing an application, which requires paperwork from the tenant and the landlord.

“The goal is to keep families housed, to allow students to go to their same schools and prevent an eviction,” she said. “Because once an eviction is on your record, it’s even more difficult to find affordable housing, which is a true crisis in our community.”

The pandemic aimed a glaring spotlight on one of Colorado Springs’ most challenging issues: housing instability.

Even in the affordable housing sector, most rents in Colorado Springs are priced at more than $1,000 a month for clients who seek assistance, said Kristy Milligan, CEO of Westside CARES, an interfaith nonprofit of 23 religious congregations that provides food and services such as rental assistance for homeless and working poor people.

And that underscores the mantra that Barton of Catholic Charities repeatedly drives home to community leaders: “Homelessness is so much easier to prevent than it is to solve.”

“With the housing market where it is, if we have folks evicted and are homeless, to get them back into a house is almost impossible,” he said.

Median asking rent for the Colorado Springs market increased by 46% from January to December of 2021 — from $1,395 to $2,040 a month, according to a rent price analysis by Dwellsy, an online residential rental listing service.

Even in the affordable housing sector, most rents in Colorado Springs are priced at more than $1,000 a month for clients who seek assistance, said Kristy Milligan, CEO of Westside CARES, an interfaith nonprofit of 23 religious congregations that provides food and services such as rental assistance for homeless and working poor people.

When she took over as the organization’s leader in 2017, Milligan said the maximum rental assistance a client could receive at a time was $300. The amount increased to $500 a few years ago, she said, and at the beginning of the pandemic in the spring of 2020, the organization raised it to $1,000.

At a meeting Monday, Westside CARES’ governing board voted unanimously to increase rental assistance by $120,000 this year for a budget of $360,000, the same amount as last year.

“It’s rent, rent, rent, for the most part of what clients need the most,” Milligan told board members. Rental assistance ranks “far out in front” of other requests the organization fields, such as money for car repairs or to reconnect with family members.

As the coronavirus appears to be on a declining trajectory, residents are feeling pinched in different ways, she said.

“People working barely livable wages often do not have sick time or a great childcare situation — we’re seeing increasingly complex situations,” Milligan said. “The confluence of the uptick in COVID is now making things especially desperate.”

Westside CARES has an 85% success rate with funds they provide to help avert eviction and 80% success with Covid-specific rental assistance, Milligan said.

With a low supply of housing stock, particularly in the affordable housing market, and high demand, the Colorado Apartment Association is calling for construction of new rental units as population growth and need continue to outpace supply.

Said Barton: “I don’t know that we’re going to be able to build our way out of it (a shortage of affordable housing).

“There’s no easy button; as long as we continue to see an influx of folks into this community who can pay for the increased market-rate housing, it’s going to continue to be a problem.”