renter’s rights

Los Angeles Tenant Union Founders’ Call To Action

October 14, 2024 Roshan Abraham, Next City. Organize! Book Review, California, Housing, Housing Crisis, Los Angeles, renter's rights, Tenant Unions

Tracy Rosenthal and Leo Vilchis first met in 2012 through an activist art project in Los Angeles called the School of Echoes. The project took Vilchis, Rosenthal and others to six different L.A. communities on listening tours to hear residents’ concerns. The concerns they encountered were largely about displacement, gentrification and the feeling that people were being pushed from their communities. Their attempt to address these problems led to the creation of the Los Angeles Tenants Union, which has a membership of 3000 due-paying households. And over the past 9 years, the pair has worked alongside some of the union’s local chapters to coordinate some of the most public, and often successful, organizing fights on behalf of tenants in the country.

Affordable Housing Movement Rises From Foreclosure Crisis

December 3, 2017 Michael Arria, www.inthesetimes.com Resist! Affordable Housing, Housing, renter's rights

By Michael Arria from In These Times. Over the last few years, housing activism has boomed—a trend that transcends the issue of rent control through its focus on halting gentrification and protecting low-income people of color from displacement. This work is even more important in the era of Trump, as the GOP is actively pushing a tax plan to benefit the richest members of U.S. society. House Republicans just passed a tax plan that will cut corporate rates down to 20 percent while increasing taxes for households that make between $10,000 and $30,000 a year. The movement has taken hold throughout the country, and it’s recently chalked up a number of important victories. After activists staged a hunger strike in San Jose, lawmakers approved some of the strongest renter protections in the nation. Seattle’s city council was pushed to end housing discrimination against formerly incarcerated individuals. Earlier this year, New York became the first city to guarantee attorneys for low-income renters facing eviction.

9to5 Colorado Fights For Renter’s Rights, Affordable Housing

September 21, 2017 Staff, www.9to5.org Resist! Affordable Housing, Housing, judicial system, renter's rights

By 9to5 Colorado. Colorado - Community members from Denver, Aurora, Westminster, and Commerce City came together to participate in the National Renter’s Week of Action alongside other affiliates of the Right to the City Homes For All campaign. These impacted community and non-profit organizations behind the following local actions are all part of a statewide coalition called Colorado Homes For All, which was formed as a response to the national and local housing crisis. Colorado kicked off the National Renters’ Week of Action here locally with “Evicting THE EVICTOR,” an action that exposed the Tschetter, Hamrick and Sulzer Law firm that represents 80% of corporate landlords across Colorado.

Renter Nation Assemblies 2015

August 15, 2017 Staff, www.homesforall.org Organize! Affordable Housing, Boston, Housing, Rent, renter's rights

By Staff of Homes for All - Hundreds gathered and gave direct testimony about the citywide displacement crisis. Grassroots activists also planned strategies and tactics for passing Just Cause Eviction, breaking down by city council district, and they shared a variety of organizing approaches to the displacement crisis through interactive and cultural presentations. Topics included inclusionary development policy, community land trusts and community control of public land, creation of neighborhood stabilization zones, and struggles for local hiring and community benefit standards. The Right to Remain Assembly culminated in a massive citywide action cosponsored by Boston Tenant Coalition, Right to the City Boston, Alternatives for Community & Environment, Boston Workers Alliance, Chinatown Resident Association, Chinese Progressive Association, City Life/Vida Urbana, Codman Square Neighborhood Development Corporation, Dominican Development Center, Dorchester People for Peace, Fairmount Indigo Community Development Collaborative, Jamaica Plain Progressives, Neighbors United for a Better East Boston, New England United for Justice, SEIU 32BJ.

Chicago Renters Back ‘ROOTS’ As Solution To Affordable Housing

October 2, 2016 Chloe Riley, www.equalvoiceforfamilies.org Create! Affordable Housing, Chicago, Housing, renter's rights

By Chloe Riley for Equal Voice for Families. CHICAGO – In Roxanne Smith’s kitchen, a framed excerpt from Barack Obama’s 2008 Grant Park presidential victory speech hangs for all to see. “America, we have come so far,” it reads. “But there is so much more to do.” Smith, 60, has come a long way herself in recent years. In 2013, she faced potential homelessness after the Northwest Side apartment where she lives with her 35-year-old son was foreclosed upon. At the time, the downstairs neighbors in her two-flat apartment complex had accepted a payout and left the building. But Smith, whose son Roget lives with a developmental disability, couldn’t afford to leave. Sitting in the dining room of her two-bedroom apartment, Smith holds tight to a green plastic bag, which was left on her door over a year and a half ago.

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