Santa Clara Co. Led Bay Area In Evictions During Pandemic: Report

SANTA CLARA COUNTY, CA — Santa Clara County evicted the most residents out of the nine Bay Area counties during the pandemic, according to a report by KQED and UC Berkeley’s Urban Displacement Project.

The report analyzed data from sheriff’s departments from Mar. 19, 2020 to Mar. 31, 2021 and found that the Bay Area’s most populous county accounted for over a quarter of its evictions. Santa Clara County’s 274 evictions placed slightly higher than Contra Costa County, which came in second with 227 evictions.

San Jose accounted for the majority of evictions in Santa Clara County with 178, which was also the most in the Bay Area and nearly three times more than Vallejo, next highest city. The city of Santa Clara had 17 evictions, Sunnyvale had 11 and Gilroy had eight.

More than 1,000 people in all were evicted in the one-year span in the Bay Area, the report found. The data only represents instances where sheriff’s deputies were called to physically remove someone from their home.

Evictions have still been happening despite statewide eviction moratoriums being in place because some counties' moratoriums are weaker than others and landlords can claim violations like nuisance, Caryn Hreha, a staff attorney at the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley, told KQED.

Click here to view the full KQED report and here for the raw data.