Building With Justice For All Coalition
It has been an honor to deepen our partnership with the Justice For All Coalition (JFA). From door knocking to tool campaigns to trainings and more, JFA has been incomparable in their openness to try out pairing technology with their organizing efforts in several NYCHA developments in Queens. They’ve determined that using the Letter of Complaint (LoC) tool has been a successful first step in getting tenants involved in their organizing efforts, as well as tracking the most frequent apartment and building problems tenants are dealing with.
Accessibility has been a core principle of how we engineer the LoC, so when Stanley Morse, JFA’s Organizer known as Stan, identified that he wanted to explore making it more offline-friendly, we had to learn more. On Saturday, November 7, 2020, Atul Varma, JustFix.nyc’s Lead Engineer, headed to Astoria Houses to check out how the LoC was currently being used. Tenants at Astoria Houses have been without gas service for months, so JFA started to come through on Saturdays to organize tenants around the issue. Astoria Mutual Aid Network jumped in too, coordinating with local home cooks to bring prepared food for residents without the gas to cook their own meals.
These tenant meetings and lack of basic services have been bringing out such a high volume of tenants, that Stan struggled to scale his use of the LoC in follow up to calls to residents with whom he was establishing relationships on Saturdays. He noted that in using the LoC, tenants were struggling to use it with unstable internet, lack of smartphones, or general distrust of and discomfort with the technology. The idea was raised to make a paper version of the LoC, and after watching Stan and JFA steering committee members field tenant after tenant at the weekend gathering, Atul began to think through the way this particular tool could be adjusted to better serve this organizing strategy online as well.
Currently, 20 residents at 1–04 Astoria Boulevard are withholding rent and per Stan, it’s likely that lack of gas will persist through Christmas and New Years. But the residents will continue organizing and rent striking because Justice For All Coalition is awesome. And JustFix.nyc will continue to collaborate with JFA on how to most appropriately support their ability to scale up the LoC. If you want to offer your support as well, we highly encourage it — you can let Astoria Mutual Aid Network about what you can offer, and connect with Stan to help out with door knocking and other activities.
Note: As of December 10, 2020 gas was restored to Astoria Houses! For now, JFA reports that this issue of gas is resolved. However, the day after the gas was turned on, the heat went out. “These issues are emblematic of the need for funding for public housing,” said Kristen Hackett, Executive Committee Member of JFA. Tenants are continuing to stay involved with JFA, and JFA Steering Committee members are now using data collected from the Letter of Complaints at other developments to identify who should be involved in a group HP Action case. If you are a public housing tenant, or interested in resident management, securing public funding, and preserving public housing, reach out to JFA at jfacoalition@gmail.com.
