Dear Editor:
Some of us will come through the COVID-19 epidemic with our incomes relatively unscathed. Others will be desperate for money to put food on the table. Most landlords and utilities have generously deferred payment for the duration of the crisis and many of us are helping friends and neighbors. But struggling families still have to eat and deferred payments will come due all too soon. Some Moab households will have no way of catching up with the balances that have accumulated during this crisis. Some may face eviction just as the economy restarts and deferred payments come due. Neither the City nor County have the authority to levy a special tax to help out.
But we can make a difference. A special committee will administer a Housing Relief Fund to make sure the money goes to locals who really need help and don’t qualify for other aid: either to catch-up with the deferred payments or in cases of dire emergency.
Many of us will be receiving a government check for $1,200; for some of us, it will be a nice bonus. For others, it will be a life-saver. Still others will receive nothing at all.
Consider donating the amount of your check or a contribution of 0.5% or 1% of your household’s 2019 taxable income to the Housing Relief Fund. You will support locals who have lost their livelihoods and do not have any alternatives to get by.
These donations would generate a substantial fund to help families when deferred payments come due, or if all else fails, for immediate emergency assistance. The funds will flow rapidly, without any government bureaucracy, into the hands of locals who have nowhere else to go.
You may donate via the donate button on moabcovid.org or mail a check made out to the Moab Valley Multicultural Center with “Moab Housing Relief Fund” in the memo line to PO Box 55, Moab, UT 84532. 100% of these donations will go to the Fund, not to MVMC.
You can help. Together our community will get through this stronger than before.
Signed,
Emily Niehaus, Moab City Mayor
Mary McGann, Grand County Council Chair
Jeremy Day, Grand County Republican Party
Bob Greenberg, Grand County Democratic Party
Listing of affiliations for identification purposes only.
The Moab Housing Relief Fund Special Committee is Mila Dunbar-Irwin, Grand County; Ben Riley and Jenna Whetzel, Housing Authority of Southeastern Utah; Rhiana Medina, Moab Valley Multicultural Center; Kaitlin Myers, City of Moab
