Tenants, Labor Unite Against Eviction Notices

This was a stunning display of the unity between tenants and workers in the fight for a better world. Solidarity with Blake Street Tenants Union, CT Tenants Union, SEIU, UNITE HERE and CT Democratic Socialists of America, and all those who came out to build TENANT & WORKING CLASS POWER! ✊️

If you want to join the fight, join CTTU or DSA today! It's gonna take all of us to beat a slumlord like Ocean Management.

While I still believe in private landlords with proper regulation, I agree with most of the comments made in this article made by
Blumenthal-“This is about a landlord retaliating against people who are asserting their legal rights,” U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal said. ​“That is the worst kind of exploitation.”
He said that Wednesday’s rally and protest merited his attention as a federal legislator because what’s happening in New Haven is everyone’s business. New Haven should be watching. Our state should be watching. Our nation should be watching what is happening in New Haven. Because this is a test of a moral imperative, not just a legal issue.”
And Looney- “the kind of thing that happens economically in many places when there is excessive consolidation.”
And Caraway- “It’s a new day in New Haven,” he continued. ​“The tenant and labor movement is coming together in a way that will be replicated across the country. … Working class people across the entire country are dealing with rents that are way too high and wages that are way too low.”
“We are seeing larger and larger numbers of units owned by fewer and fewer numbers of landlords,” he said. ​“That is always a dangerous thing.”
And Walker-Myers- “We believe that housing is a human right,” and “We’re on the front lines. We’ve got your back.”

Bust the trusts! Break the monopolies! Housing is a human right, as is nutrition, healthcare, clean running water, properly treated sewage, energy for heating, cooling, cooking and storing food, education, and the right to peaceably assembled and petition or criticize the government for a redress of grievances without retaliation.
The whole country should be watching this case as it progresses through appeals and the courts systems. It could be ground breaking in setting precedent in tenants rights and tenant unions rights versus landlord rights and the human rights to safe, decent affordable housing.

"Abolish Landlords"... and they have gone from 0 to hardcore socialism and wanting to nationalize housing. Why do I get the feeling that when Ocean or Mandy sells one of these buildings with a tenant union, to a landlord with decent ethics, that the union is not then going to dissolve?

I'm almost positive that one of these tenant unions is going to attempt to hold one of the properties hostage either during a sale, or give the subsequent owner an unreasonably difficult time.

Let me first start with the landlords.
Being a landlord is an investment.And investments come with risks.But housing is a human right.And shouldn’t be utilized as an investment opportunity.

Is housing a human right not a privilege?

Franklin Roosevelt, in his 1944 State of the Union address, declared that every family in the United States should have the right to a decent home. In 1948, the United States signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which recognizes adequate housing as a human right.

Bottom line.Risks that landlords take are by choice.Being a landlord is a choice.Can not handle the Risks.Sell and get out.

“We’re on the front lines. We’ve got your back.”

Are you kidding?The only back I saw she had was when she hug Master Elicker.In fact how many of you remember this.

City Sells Park; Housing Call Prevails
The Board of Alders voted overwhelmingly in support of trading a Kensington Street park for 15 new affordable apartments — but only after an impassioned debate about the relative merits of building low-income housing atop public green space.
https://www.newhavenindependent.org/article/kensington_park_sale
That's right.The BOA Try to sell Kensington Street park

The Politicians that are in these pictures are just selling you Snake Oil and Three Card Monte.Ask your self this.How come not one of these Politicians have said the word gentrification?And this is what this is about.Gentrification

The 5 Phases of Gentrification -- When can it be stopped?
and when is it too late?

Phase 1 – Pioneering
New residents move in to abandoned or under-maintained buildings.
Banks will not lend so renovation is limited to the resources of the Pioneers.
No displacement of original residents, yet.

Phase 2 – Potential is Seen
Real estate agents promote the area's "potential." Vacancy rates drop.
Rents begin to rise. Banks begin to lend. Speculators buy distressed buildings.

Part one

So happy to see people finally organizing to stand up to the mega-landlords! Mega-landlordism -- or more precisely, the growing monopolization of housing stock by national-sized, quick-turnover investors, rather than by local small-time landlords -- is a huge problem in this country. Housing used to be a reliable route to generational wealth; now it's just another way for the investor class to squeeze the paycheck-earning classes dry. And with the owner-investors hidden behind multiple layers of LLCs and financial instruments, accountability for things like retaliatory evictions and poor maintenance becomes increasingly difficult to obtain. Reprehensible, and unsustainable.

Part Two
Phase 3 – Safety and Media Hype
Gentrifiers create historic preservation, business and neighborhood associations.
Rents increase dramatically and displacement of the original residents fuels tensions.
Police adopt "broken windows" tactics and selectively enforce loitering and similar laws.
Media attention promotes the new safety and changes in the neighborhood.

Phase 4 – Peak
The first wave of Pioneers gets priced out.
Banks and investors create more high priced apartments and condos.
Buildings bought for speculation in Phase 2 get put back on the market.

Phase 5 – Post Peak
Vacancy rates increase as rents push above the limit.
Speculators take the money they made in Phase 4 and look for new opportunities in neighboring communities.
Landlords are absentee, including large banks and institutional investors.
Property values stagnate or fall from their peaks.

I told you all over six years ago that this was going to happen.Told you all to read the Book City for sale.You did not listen.This is going to get ugly.You see the people from New York that are moving up here can afford to pay some of this big rent and Buy these Homes, Because the major of them are Civil Service workers making big money.A lot of them are school teachers and MTA New York City Transit workers.I got a whole lot of them on my block.For those of you with those Eviction Notices.You better start looking for a apartment. and I can tell you right now the only place with fair rents are Danbury.And I know this for a fact,Because I have been helping people move there with the section 8 housing voucher.

There are certainly legitimate concerns here. BUT, the New Haven Alders need to take a long hard look in the mirror and acknowledge they have failed when it comes to housing. First, The Livable City Initiative has been broken for more than a decade and if it were working then the living conditions in these properties would be much better. Second, the City hasn't done enough to build or encourage housing. A few quick examples. (A) The Church Street South property remains an empty lot while nearly every town along the New Haven to NYC rail line has built dense housing. (B) In Westville, the Delaneys lot remains vacant 7 years after the building was destroyed by fire, the city-owned parking lot in the Village can be developed, and the Church of Scientology building remains mothballed while its owners enjoy illegitimate tax-free status. (C) The city approved the Neuro-science building with 2500, repeat 2500, parking spaces and ZERO housing units. (D) The city negotiated a new PILOT arrangement with Yale and it includes no new housing.

It is really funny to see politicians who have direct control over these terrible conditions not only attend, but be allowed to speak at these rallies. Who are you protesting against? These politicos have been in power for over a decade and have done nothing.

FYI Elicker mailing of the day swears that "New Haven has never been better" how does this statement line up with the horrendous conditions found in these apartments? Are they better than ever?

So I read the legal complaint filed by the 311 Blake tenants, and the rent data was there.

These tenants are currently paying $900-$1100/month for their Westville 1BRs. Those rents are way below market.

According to the complaint, Ocean offered to renew leases at an across-the-board 20% adjustment, which would be 1BR rents at $1100-$1300.

It would be great to get more of the financial details. Are any utilities included? Is parking free? What condition are the apartments in? Are any renovations being made? When was the last time rents were raised.

It’s easy enough to demonize landlords, and Ocean is pretty wide open to being a poster child for evil slumlords. Still it would be good to be able to evaluate this controversy on its true merits.

CityYankee2- tenants living in terrible conditions and rents that get raised beyond what they can afford to pay don’t move, because they can’t find anywhere else they can afford to move to in better condition, within a reasonable commute from their jobs, families and friends in the area. Megaslumlords like Ocean and Mandy and the other real estate speculators and investors are fast buying up all the lower rent units and creating a monopoly and a blacklist of tenants that complain or can’t afford the outrageous hikes in rent since 2019. The current market going rate for rents are what they are because the market went crazy during the pandemic, and a lot of people from higher rent markets out of state moved to our state, the colleges and universities expanded their campuses without building sufficient on campus housing units due the influx of students and employers, higher wage STEMM jobs workers industries are moving here, starting up here or expanding here, and lots of out of state and out of country real estate investors and speculators decided New Haven area was a cheap market to buy in, flip, gentrify, build and market to out of state folks in.
If these tenants had anywhere else that they could afford to move to, I’m sure they would.

Dennis, the Church Street South site is vacant because its private owner chooses not to develop it. The city could acquire the property by purchase or condemnation. But that would cost tons of money and take several years.

The city has approved a development on the Delaney’s site. The current owner is unable or unwilling to move forward with it, or to seek the zoning changes that would permit a different development.

Part 1
I am not going to argue whether or not housing is a human right. That not for me to decide. It is for the community as a whole to decide. If the community decides that housing is a human right then it is the community that should collectively ensure that adequate housing is provided. It is not difficult to determine how much of a shortfall in housing there is. Once that number is decided then the community should get together, either privately or with governmental assistance to provide this housing. The community as a whole should also shoulder the financial risk, cost of maintenance and management that goes along with that housing. What they should not be doing is attempting to seize private property in order to solve a community problem.
I am a small housing provider. My landlords are the City of New Haven and the State of Connecticut. I pay rent to the city twice a year, and rent to the State once a year. This rent is a what’s known as a super-lien. If I don’t pay the rent then the city or state will lien my property and will evict me and take my property or sell my property in order to get their rent and their late fees. Recently the city increased my rent 120% on some of my properties. I went to my fair rent commission, which happened to be the city, in order to appeal this rent increase. They denied my appeal and conveyed to me that it was fair and equitable based on the increases in expenses that my landlord had in order to run the city. My landlord has a good friend that I also pay rent to. They are the insurance company. They are allowed to increase their rent 20% to 30% per year. Thankfully I am not committed to one insurance company, but in actuality they all work together and rates don’t differ that much from company to company. The rest of my expenses I pretty much have control over, but they are still there and increase over time.

Part 2
In order to gain the rights to control the property from my landlord I not only had to put up significant capital to purchase those rights, I also has to put up more capital to repair deficiencies in the property. This capital did not come out of thin air. I worked multiple jobs to earn the capital that got me started. I risked this capital that I worked for, to improve my neighborhood, provide for my family and create generational wealth. To gain the rights to the property I also had to agree to the rent my landlords would charge me accept any changes to that rent in the future. I took the risk and made the investment. I accepted the responsibility of being the property’s steward. I didn’t know that in the future my landlord was going to attempt to change the rules and put everything I worked for at risk.
I now had control of the property but my landlord has overseers that tell me how I have to maintain the property. If I don’t follow their rules then I will be fined and barred from using my property the way I want to. These overseers are the Zoning Department, the Building Department, and the Livable City Initiative (LCI). They have other departments working under them too, but together they make the rules that I have to follow in order to provide housing to people for a fee. I accept these rules because they are written in my “lease” in the form of laws. The property is my responsibility. I am its steward. If I take care of it, in turn it will take care of me. It’s a risk, but done right it will not only provide for my family but provide housing for the family of the people who rent from me.

Part 3
Now my landlord’s overseers have a big job and a lot responsibility. A lot of the time the overseers aren’t paid enough and don’t have the staff to properly do their job with the resources that they have been given by my landlord. Recently another housing provider, was accused of not following the landlords’ laws. The tenants also accused this housing provider of not following the laws of their lease for such a long time that it resulted in the housing to deteriorate to such a state that their housing was unlivable. The tenants banded together out of outrage and went after this housing provider to get him to follow the laws. The housing provider pushed back on their accusations stating that he was not the one who brought cockroaches and mold into his property but that It was the tenants not following the laws in his lease to keep the property clean that brought vermin and mold. He also stated that the tenants would not let him in to make repairs or that the tenants failed to properly inform him in a timely manner that there were deficiencies in his properties that needed repair. The community was divided on who to believe. Some blamed the tenants and some blamed the housing provider. The group of tenants that banded together grew and grew as did the outrage on both sides at what was going on.
My landlord has a property management company taking care of his properties. These managers are called Politicians. It is their responsibility to run my landlord’s properties. My rent goes to them and they are supposed to allocate it to maximize the efficiency in which the city or state operates. This recent issue was a problem for the management company, because it was their responsibility to allocate my rent properly so that the overseers had the resources do their job. Had the overseers been able to optimally do their job, they would have been able to ensure this issue never occurred.

Part 4
They failed at this, because they were spending the rent that I gave them poorly and not prioritizing what they needed to. They were afraid they would lose their job. They had to blame someone because the group of people angry at the housing provider was growing and gaining attention. They needed to shift the blame and then show that after years of mismanagement, they could solve the problem. They not only blamed the accused housing provider, but housing providers in general. Then they said they would pass new laws that would please the angry group of tenants, ensuring votes that would allow them to keep their job as the State and City’s property managers. They would cap the amount of rent a housing provider could increase his rent. They would not cap the rent that increase that they were allowed to charge the housing provider. They would also not cap the rent that their friend, the insurance company, could charge the housing provider. Then they also stated that they would not allow the housing provider to take back the property at the end of the lease if the housing provider did not wish to continue the lease another term. My lease with my tenants is a specific length, sometimes one year, sometime 18 months and sometimes 2 years. It has defined terms that my tenants and I mutually agreed to at the beginning of the lease. If I wanted, or my tenant wanted to have a “right or option to renew” clause (which is common in commercial leases) either party has the right to ask for it in the lease prior to making the agreement. My tenants have the right to safe and adequately maintained property during their lease agreement, which is my sole responsibility to provide, but they do not have the right to my property in perpetuity.

Part 5
With these new proposed laws my landlord’s property managers are not only attempting to vilify me but are seizing all of the financial control of my property. At the same time, my landlords are leaving me with the laws already in place to shoulder the burden of the risk I took on when I bought the rights to the property, as well as the responsibility of maintaining the property to the letter of their laws (if they ever get around to spending my rent properly and adequately fund their overseers). They propose seizing all of the possible financial upside control of my property and are trying to leave me with all the work, and the downside risk. Furthermore, by not allowing me the option to take back my property at the end of the agreed upon lease term and not agreeing to cap their rent or that of the insurance company they are setting my property up for insolvency. They can raise my rent so high that I am unable to properly maintain to properly maintain the property and maintain the rent cap. They can also hold the rents from my tenant hostage, without due process, which can lead me to insolvency. This is a massively hypocritical stance.
These proposed laws leave me with a dilemma. I do not typically raise my rents on existing tenants. I use the increase in rents I get when tenants move out to subsidize the keeping the existing tenants rents the same. This also covers the cost of apartment turnover repairs which can be excessive. I have some properties that cash flow negative because of this but the other ones make up for it. There are a lot of other small housing providers in the city that have the same practice. When my landlord recently did a revaluation and increased my rent, I sent a very detailed letter (I posted it in the NHI comments section on one of the articles) stating why I had to, in turn, increase their rents. I broke down my new costs per property and then per apartment in that property.

Part 6
Thankfully, my tenants understood and respected my position and did not haul me before the kangaroo court that is the fair rent commission. As these new laws, designed to vilify housing providers and keep politicians in office, are debated and become closer and closer to reality I am left with a really tough decision. Some of my rents are really below market. If I am capped at a 3 % yearly increase then the first thing, I will have to do is have a mandatory 3% increase on all rents every year. This is something that I have never done. If I can’t raise the rents or take my property back at the end of a lease agreement then I am left with an even tougher decision. Do I end the leases of my tenants that are so far below market rent while I still can? On the upside the decision will allow me to bring my properties to market rent and then do a 3% increase every year ensuring that the properties remain well maintained and solvent going forward. On the downside, that’s a horrible decision for my tenants who will never find the quality of housing I provide at their current rate. It changes their lives forever and it’s the worst position for both of us to be in. These people are human beings and my neighbors. Having to be in this position makes me frustrated and angry.

Part 7
I’m frustrated at the politicians for mismanaging my rent and not ensuring that adequate and safe housing was provided for all that needed it. I’m frustrated at the politicians for even putting me in a position to have to make this decision. I’m frustrated at the politicians for overspending on public housing and paying $500,000 to create a 2-bedroom apartment when I can do it for $250,000 and I don’t even have the benefit of economy of scale as they do. I’m frustrated at the politicians for wasting my rent when they could have spent it on public housing. I’m frustrated at the politicians for making all housing providers a villain because on the accusation leveraged against a few. Fuck the politicians for not providing properly for their overseers. I’m frustrated at the politicians for trying to seize private property to solve a public problem because they are impotent to do it effectively themselves. I’m frustrated at the hypocrisy of trying to cap my rents when my landlord won’t cap theirs.
To all the tenants and housing providers out there, we should all get together. The current laws in place, if enforced equally across the board, are more than enough to keep our current housing stock safe and up to code. It’s time that we hire a new management company. It’s time to kick out the politicians that have had unchallenged power and have been letting us all down for decades.

Very interesting to see Sen. Looney there because as we have read many times in the NHI New Haven's
efforts are stymied by rules at the State level and this falls squarely on his shoulders. He has been in the State Senate long enough to effect the changes that are so desperately needed.

Dennis, you’re entirely correct on the Delaney’s property, less so on Church Street South. That site was cleared by April 2019, well before the Inclusionary Zoning ordinance went into effect. If Norhland had received any type of zoning approval at any time before February 2022, it would have been exempt from the ordinance’s affordable housing requirements. Northland had plenty of notice the ordinance was coming; the concept was raised in 2019.

More housing is the only thing that will make housing more affordable. Making it expensive and difficult to be a landlord is not the solution. Government meddling into the free market is not the solution. Look at the cost of education and healthcare overtime compared to almost any other service/good. Why are those higher? Government. Last thing we need is to add housing to that mix.

City Restorations,

Thanks for your comments. One small comment:

I find the reference to being a "small housing provider" curious. Are beekeepers most accurately described as hive providers? I don't think so. Beekeepers are not in the business of providing hives to bees; they are in the business of extracting honey from bees. Hives are a means to that end. Similarly, landlords are not in the business of providing housing to people; they are in the business of extracting rent. Housing is a means to that end.

Having said that, there are important differences between industrial-scale beekeepers and backyard hobbyist beekeepers. Just as there are differences between large-scale landlords and mom & pop landlords. The former often hires third party property management companies, deploys complex formulas to maximize rent extraction, and ruthlessly evict tenants. You seem more like the latter in that you try to make a living, but not by maximizing rent extraction and minimizing maintenance.