Helping people with rent during the coronavirus crisis

Some people staying home during the coronavirus crisis are not able to work and can't pay the rent.

New data from the National Multifamily Housing Council shows that between April 1 and 5, just 69 percent of tenants nationwide paid any of their rent, compared to 81 percent for the first week of March.

"We knew people were going to have a hard time paying rent," said Christopher Persons, the CEO of Capitol Hill Housing.

His organization's buildings have more than 1,500 affordable apartments and 17 small businesses.

April rents are still coming in, but so far, 34 people have asked for help from Capitol Hill Housing’s new COVID-19 Resilience Fund.

“Ultimately, our goal is to keep all of our residents in place and all of our commercial tenants in place,” Persons said.

Capitol Hill Housing has long had a rental assistance fund, with a balance of about $50,000.

"This is sort of residential assistance on steroids," Persons said.

With help from All In Seattle, the resilience fund now has $300,000 in donations.

“We launched it maybe 10 days ago,” Persons said. “Just seeing how people have come together in all of this gives me some reassurance that we’re all right, we’re going to be fine.”

Many people are offering help.

Longtime Seattle radio host Bender Cunningham is running a drawing with Oberto Sausage Company each week this month, paying up to $2,000 in rent or mortgage for someone in need.

Cunningham said he’s had close to a thousand people enter so far.

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