Philly sheriff wants to double size of eviction unit after shootings shuttered for-profit system. She may not get it

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Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilal wants to more than double the size of her office’s eviction unit, a budget request aimed at clearing a sizable backlog of cases and keeping pace with new ones.

The office currently has eight to 12 detectives assigned to perform eviction operations each day, including lockouts. To meet the demand, Bilal hopes to hire another 14 detectives as part of a broader push to increase headcount across the office, which also staffs courtrooms, transports prisoners and manages sheriff sales.

“We need staffing,” Bilal told City Council during a budget hearing this week. “We need funding.”

Her request is rooted in recent history.

More than a year ago, the sheriff’s office became the sole entity responsible for conducting evictions in Philadelphia. The shift substantially increased the workload of the eviction unit, prompting Bilal’s effort to add capacity.

The sheriff’s office previously conducted only some evictions. The vast majority of them were completed by armed contractors hired by the Landlord and Tenant Office, a private outfit led by a court-appointed attorney. That stopped in late 2024 when the LTO shut down, the direct result of two tenants being shot by deputy landlord-tenant officers attempting to evict them.

During this week’s budget hearing, Chief Inspector David Fallen said, for several months after the transition, the sheriff’s unit was bringing in cases more quickly than it could schedule evictions, in part because it had inherited thousands of cases from the LTO.

The unit went from scheduling about 25 evictions a week to more than 140, an uptick that has routinely required overtime hours, according to a spokesperson.

Fallen said the office is “about to turn the corner” when it comes to staying on top of the new cases coming into the office now.

“We just have to work to reduce what’s behind,” Fallen said.

Independent landlords strongly back Bilal’s request for more eviction detectives. At present, it takes an average of six months to complete a single eviction case — three times longer than it did when landlords were able to hire the LTO.

“That time period has to be reduced significantly,” said Paul Cohen, general counsel for HAPCO Philadelphia, the city’s largest advocacy group for landlords and property owners. “Every day that goes by is another day the owner of the property is losing rent.”

Cohen said that’s translating to landlords raising their rents to make up for the lost revenue. He said it has also made the application process more stringent, because landlords are more fearful of getting stuck with a problem tenant that could cost them big. That means landlords are taking fewer risks when deciding who they want renting their units.

“To lose five months’ rent, that’s devastating. They still have to make the mortgage payment. They still have to pay the taxes, insurance and all the rest of the expenses,” Cohen said.

All of this set the stage for an ongoing fight over City Council legislation aimed at protecting renters that landlords say will make it even harder for them to remove problem tenants.

For now, it’s unclear if the sheriff’s office will receive any new funding to make additional hires.

Bilal is calling for an additional $19.2 million for the fiscal year starting July 1. The money would be part of the city’s five-year plan.

The mayor’s budget proposal, however, effectively includes no new funding for the office, which currently has a $35.5 million budget.

Lawmakers must pass the city’s next budget by June 30.