New York State housing advocates want a permanent statewide rental assistance program.
The Shelter Arrears Eviction Forestallment program only helps renters outside of New York City catch up on rent payments. It began as a $10 million pilot program in 2024 and has been renewed in each state budget since.
Juan Diaz, policy manager for the Children’s Defense Fund of New York, said making the program permanent is vital as housing costs balloon and evictions grow.
“That would make this program a law but also expand eligibility not just to families under the federal poverty level but also working families. We learned under COVID-19 that we are an emergency away from being in rental arrears,” Diaz explained.
Although a bill was introduced, it failed to pass out of the Senate’s Social Services Committee during this year’s legislative session.
Rental and home prices have risen statewide since the pandemic. Program data show some of the counties with the highest rental and home price increases, like Erie, Monroe, and Westchester, used the most program funding.
Housing advocates and lawmakers support the program but there has been pushback over the cost. The Senate’s 2026 one-house budget called for increasing funding to $50 million but the final budget reduced it to the original $10 million.
Diaz argued the financial and personal costs of eviction can harm renters.
“The parents, heads of households, start getting into disputes with landlords, the waiting time in housing court evictions, potentially losing employment, going from place to place seeking assistance, and ultimately being evicted. It disrupts children’s education; it creates family instability,” Diaz contended.
New York has taken other action to help people maintain housing. In 2025, the state began a four-year pilot of the Housing Access Voucher Program, which provides rental assistance to people who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless.
A bill in the state Legislature would have made the program permanent too, but Gov. Kathy Hochul opposed it, saying it was too expensive.
Edwin is a reporter and producer in North Tonawanda, New York. He’s previously reported for the Niagara Gazette and the Ithaca Times. Edwin got an early start in radio interning for WBFO-88.7FM, NPR’s Buffalo affiliate. In 2018, he graduated from SUNY Buffalo State College with a B.A. in Journalism, and in 2022, graduated from Syracuse University with an M.S. in Communications.