Let’s fight for programs that actually house the most vulnerable tenants, challenge capitalism, and build a new world. — The following is based on the original, longer, collectively written article “Affordable Housing” Is A Scam, by a group of organizers with the LA Tenants Union. This is being co-published with the Law and Political Economy Blog. You hear it everywhere: we need more “affordable housing.” It’s a seemingly uncontroversial…

History shows there’s always money for corporate development, the police, or any project that benefits rich people. Will the city now cry poverty when it comes to keeping families housed? — The numbers are in and they confirm what the Hillside Villa Tenants Association has been saying for months: purchasing their building using eminent domain would preserve affordable housing at a rate far cheaper than it costs to build new units.

The Cancel Rent Collective is done playing nice. — On Tuesday morning, a small press conference outside the LA County Hall of Administration kicked off what is likely to be the biggest and most coordinated effort yet to pressure politicians to cancel rent in Los Angeles. The “Cancel Rent Collective” — made up of organizations including the Alliance of…

A look at how California’s current tenant protections will actually work, or fail, in practice. UPDATE: The August 14th date of the Judicial Council rule being repealed (which would allow courts to start processing new eviction cases again) now looks like it’s being changed to September 1. …

But The Hillside Villa Tenants Association has sprung into action and is fighting back. On Monday, June 29th, dozens of tenants at the Hillside Villa Apartments in Chinatown opened their mail to find notices telling them that their rents would increase massively in October of this year. …

My City Council representative needs to be called on his actions. — On May 30th, as LAPD officers were brutalizing huge numbers of demonstrators across the city, LA Councilmember Paul Koretz tweeted his first public statements regarding the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis: “I will not stand for the lives and property of my constituents being endangered,” he wrote. “I’ve…

Rather than address our concerns, Mayor Garcetti would prefer to curtail our right to protest about unhoused people in LA dying on the street. — On Sunday, May 10 a recently formed group the People’s City Council held a “die-in” protest outside the home of Mayor Eric Garcetti in the wealthy neighborhood of Hancock Park. …

Meanwhile, Mayor Eric Garcetti is refusing to use his power to commandeer hotels and get people indoors during a deadly pandemic. — Nothing better captures the cruelty and racism of modern Los Angeles than the fact that there are more vacant rooms in publicly-subsidized luxury hotels just within the borders of Downtown LA than there are unhoused residents of Skid Row. At least 4,923 hotel rooms in downtown are part of luxury…

What will people do when they’re expected to pay back rent after the crisis is over? Tenant organizations across the country see what’s coming, and are demanding that collection of rent be suspended. — In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic and the associated economic catastrophe, cities across the country are now acting quickly to try to minimize the fallout. One idea that’s rapidly spread, and is being acted upon, is a moratorium on evictions.