The spokesman for the courts, Lucian Chalfen, said last week that the number of scheduled appearances in cases was down 41 percent compared with the first quarter in 2019, and the number of new cases filed was down 62 percent.
He said that a slowdown would “accomplish nothing,” as new cases would continue to pile up.
“Are the legal services providers really all of a sudden going to have an epiphany and be able to provide representation on all of those cases?” he said.
The new city law was meant to help tenants like Damian Winns, a security guard, who moved into a one-bedroom apartment in East New York just before the pandemic. At $1,200 a month, it was one of the few places he felt he could afford.
But Mr. Winns, 44, struggled to find work during the pandemic, and missed a few months of rent last year. He thought a pandemic rent relief program paid for the missed months.
Instead, Mr. Winns found himself at a hearing in a courthouse in Downtown Brooklyn last week after his landlord moved to evict him, claiming he still owed the money.
“Where else am I supposed to go?” Mr. Winns said in an interview.
Although he may have been eligible for a free lawyer, nobody was there to take his case, and a court official told him a legal group should reach out before his next court hearing this month — maybe.
New York City’s housing courts, located in a handful of buildings and offices across the boroughs, were created by the state almost 50 years ago to enforce the housing code and keep homes from deteriorating. But the bulk of cases have nearly always been eviction proceedings over unpaid rent.