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HCHA meeting September 7, 2021 <br />on August 6th and as it expired, Act 57 was enacted which was signed by <br />Governor Ige, this new law requires that landlords provide the option of <br />mediation to tenants before landlords can file a summary possession case in <br />court. So the same week that the State moratorium ended, the CDC extended <br />a federal moratorium and two weeks ago that moratorium was overturned by <br />the Supreme Court. As of today, September 7th, landlords who have tenants <br />who are three or more months behind on rent can begin the mediation eviction <br />process. For tenants in Hawaii County, landlords must email the 15 -day notice <br />to the mediation center or give us a call on the side on which their tenant lives <br />so if they live west side, they call West Hawaii Mediation Center, they live on the <br />east side, they call Kuikahi Mediation Center and the landlord will receive an <br />email confirmation back, kind of a form letter, letting them know that the <br />process has started for them. Sharon, if you could go to the next slide for me. So <br />it's really important for landlords it's kind of a dual process, they need to let their <br />tenants know that the eviction process has started but they also need to call the <br />mediation center right away when they've received the notice because <br />mediation for us has to be scheduled within 15 days from the date of that <br />notice. Now the mediation doesn't have to occur within that 15 -day scheduling <br />period but we are letting the landlords know as the process goes whether or not <br />those mediations are being scheduled and when. So the mediation center will <br />then schedule those mediations as soon as possible, we're working with <br />contract mediators in order to expedite that process and then after 30 days <br />from the date of notice, the landlord can then file for summary possession <br />eviction case in court. So that's kind of the process that it goes, both of our <br />centers have case managers that are strictly devoted to this program as well as <br />contract mediators that are working with in order to make sure that the program <br />itself, the mediations, can go as efficiently as possible. So I'm going to hand it <br />over to Julie now, she'll go over a few other things. <br />Mitchell: Hello, thank you for having us today, we appreciate sharing with you <br />folks. So, I think most of you here today are familiar with the non-profit mediation <br />centers do and how we help our community and are aware that Act 57 is the <br />Statewide program so the five non-profit community mediation centers in the <br />State have been working closely together on this program and we will send <br />people in the right direction because again people may call a different center <br />and so we'll direct them to where ever the rental unit is located to that <br />mediation center. So, for mediation, we're letting the landlords and tenants <br />know that mediation is a safe, private and confidential process, it helps people <br />make their own decisions about their own issues rather than having the courts or <br />the judges have to decide. The goal is to help improve the communication <br />between the landlords and tenants, it's been very strained during COVID times <br />so we've had situations where the landlords were not sure how to approach <br />their tenants and the tenants are behinds and maybe shame or what have you <br />and so don't want to approach the landlords so a lot of the work that we're <br />Page 27 of 34 <br />