Dear RUN, We got some tough news last week: a bill died that many of us have been working on for months. AB 1703 would have given tenants, community land trusts, and nonprofit housing developers the first chance to buy any apartment building that went on the market, preventing the kind of corporate buy-ups that we saw during the Great Recession. The official word is that the Senate Judiciary Committee had far too many bills to hear during a shortened session, which is why only a few bills survived. We know that won’t be the last of this bill, because we know the need for it is not going away. The other piece of bad news is that California’s Judicial Council ruled that eviction courts can open again, likely on August 14, unless cities or counties decide something different. That decision, along with the end of federal unemployment checks, means the wave of evictions is coming. In the meantime, August rent is due on Saturday. What can we do to make sure Californians stay housed in the coming months? We can fight for statewide rent relief. AB 1436, which prevents evictions due to unpaid rent from COVID and SB 1410, which would provide direct emergency rent payments to people who can’t pay rent because of COVID, will be essential in keeping renters, whether in affordable housing or not, from living on the street. We can shift our focus to these bills in the next month; look out for ways to support them in the coming weeks, and get your people ready to take action! Take good care, Tori | |
Thanks to Diana Gomez, our Spanish-language interpreter for weekly Community Care! Our regular calls are now accessible in both English and Spanish at the same time. Invite your friends! Here’s the video chat link. Just have a phone? You can call 669 900 6833, meeting ID 963 6157 2844. Gracias a Diana Gómez, la intérprete nueva de nuestras llamadas de Community Care. Ahora, las llamadas son en inglés y español simultáneamente. ¡Inviten a sus amigos! Aquí esta el enlace de video, se puede conectar por teléfono marcando 669 900 6833, codigo 963 6157 2844. | | | |
- Looking for more information about the return of legal evictions? The LA Times has a rundown here, and here is more information about evictions in Silicon Valley and in the East Bay.
- The Trump Administration is using housing as a way to make trans people’s lives even harder. Last week the Department of Housing and Urban Development, led by Ben Carson, proposed a cruel new rule to exclude trans women from shelters, building on years of cruelty in the midst of a pandemic. Read more here.
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