ALBANY COUNTY — New York’s final extension on prohibiting evictions ran out on Saturday, Jan. 15.

On Thursday, Governor Kathy Hochul had announced that New York State was joining California, New Jersey, and Illinois, calling on the federal government to prioritize additional rental relief funding for high tenant states that have exhausted their initial federal allocation.

New York State has issued more than $1.3 billion in rent relief, totaling more than 104,000 payments to landlords. In total, the state has obligated all $2 billion in available funding, covering roughly 161,000 applications and leaving roughly 85,000 unfunded.

Despite the funding shortfall, the state was legally compelled to fully reopen its application portal last week following a court injunction.

“As Governors representing over a quarter of America’s population and 30 percent of the nation’s low-income renter households, the Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) Program has been a crucial lifeline for millions of our residents as the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic continue to be felt,” wrote Hochul, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, California Governor Gavin Newsom, and Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker in a letter to Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen.

The Democratic governors urged, as guidelines are developed for a second round of Emergency Rental Assistance, that unspent funds are quickly recaptured, that grantee demand be accurately captured, and that communities with the greatest need be prioritized.

“This methodology factors in a grantee’s share of very low-income renter households paying more than 50 percent of income on rent, overcrowding, rental market costs, and change in employment since the beginning of the pandemic,” the governors wrote.

Under Hochul’s direction, the governor’s office wrote in a release, the state Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance requested $996 million in reallocation funds from the Treasury, which would have funded tens of thousands of additional applicants. Yet late last month, the Treasury indicated that New York would receive $27 million from its initial reallocation — less than 3 percent of the state's request and enough to fund approximately 1,960 applications.

“From the start of my administration, I pledged to deliver relief to struggling tenants and landlords who were still recovering from the pandemic,” said Hochul in a statement. “Since then, we’ve issued more than $1.3 billion in rent relief out the door, made $100 million in rent supplements available, signed an increase in rental voucher amounts into law, invested $25 million for free legal services for tenants, and unveiled a number of bold, achievable proposals to address systemic housing needs.

“However, the harsh reality is that there are still too many New Yorkers in need of housing assistance. We were disappointed in the amount of additional rental relief funds available from the U.S. Treasury to be reallocated to New York, and given that our Emergency Rental Assistance Program portal already reopened this week, I am asking the Treasury to revisit its process. It is crucial that we not give struggling tenants and landlords false hope for long-awaited financial relief when — without federal intervention — there is no funding to support them, and I thank California, New Jersey, and Illinois for joining us in this important effort.”

Short staff in nursing homes

In a 5-to-4 vote on Jan. 13, the United States Supreme Court decided that the Biden administration’s mandate for health-care workers at facilities receiving federal funds to be vaccinated could stand. (At the same time, in a 6-to-3 vote, the court blocked the vaccine-or-testing mandate for big employers.)

The American Health Care Association, representing more than 14,000 nursing homes and long-term care facilities across the country, responded with a statement from its president and chief executive officer, Mark Parkinson, that “the repercussions of the vaccine mandate among health care workers will be devastating to an already decimated long term care workforce.”

Parkinson went on, “When we are in the midst of another COVID surge, caregivers in vaccine hesitant communities may walk off the job because of this policy, further threatening access to care for thousands of our nation’s seniors.”

Many nursing homes were already experiencing acute staffing shortages. Parkinson’s organization says that the profession has lost more than 230,000 caregivers — nearly 15 percent of the workforce – since the beginning of the pandemic.

Parkinson asked for leniency and a testing option for unvaccinated workers and said that 83 percent of nursing home staff are now fully vaccinated.

“However,” Parkinson concluded, “rampant misinformation has sowed doubt and concern among many on the frontlines. We must collectively address the root cause of vaccine hesitancy rather than penalize providers who are making valiant efforts.”

Parkinson’s organization also issued a report this week showing, with the Omicron surge, current infections of nursing home staff far exceed last year’s surge; residents also experienced a surge — but just a fraction of the deaths suffered last year, presumably due to vaccination.

In New York State, Hochul issued a directive last fall requiring all health-care workers to be vaccinated. 

At midnight on Monday, Sept. 27, a state mandate went into effect, requiring health-care workers in hospitals and nursing homes across New York to be vaccinated. Hospital and nursing-home workers were furloughed or let go if not vaccinated.

National Guard members — including at Albany County’s nursing home — have been deployed to make up for staff shortages at some facilities.

Six more deaths

Albany County Executive Daniel McCoy, in his daily COVID releases, reported four more deaths over the weekend. On Saturday, he reported three Friday deaths: a woman in her forties, a woman in her sixties, and a man in his eighties.

On Monday, McCoy reported three new COVID-related deaths on Sunday: a man in his fifties, a man in his seventies, and a man in his eighties.

The county’s COVID-19 death toll now stands at 460.

New COVID-19 cases soared to 1,526, McCoy reported on Saturday, but by Monday were at 498.

The county’s seven-day average of new daily cases is now down to 995.8.

This number, however, does not include untested patients, as tests remain in short supply. It also does not include people who have tested positive at home but not reported the results through the county’s website.

Statewide, the average positive case numbers are declining and the seven-day average for hospital emissions across New York is down 10.7 percent over the past week.

Albany County’s most recent seven-day average of cases per 100,000 is at 212.3 and its average infection rate is at 19.9 percent.

Statewide, the seven-day average of cases per 100,000  is at 250.57 and the positivity rate is at 15.68 percent.

Upstate, where vaccination rates are lower, is lagging behind downstate in coming down from the peak of infection. Omicron now represents more than 95 percent of the viruses in circulation, according to the governor’s office.

McCoy, on Monday morning, reported 15 new hospitalizations with 16 county residents currently hospitalized with COVID-19; 14 of those patients are in intensive-care units.

The first-dose vaccination rate for adult Albany County residents is at 88.5 percent while 72.3 percent of all residents are fully vaccinated.