🏡💚 Grassroots reflections on social housing
May 23, 2024
I’m sending this out on Thursday night since I’m out of the office tomorrow and we don’t pay for the version of Mailchimp that let’s you schedule send. I know you don’t care, but the reason I wanted to make sure to get a newsletter out this week is because of the release on Wednesday of a report that’s been over a year in the making: Building Our Future: Grassroots Reflections on Social Housing.
Initially formulated by some of the rockstar social housing advocates in California (Rae Huang from Housing Now, Shanti Singh from Tenants Together, and René Moya from Debt Collective), the idea blossomed into a sweeping look at the vision for social housing, paired with an impressive inventory of social housing fights from across the country. From KC Tenants fighting for a Tenant Bill of Rights and municipal social housing in Kansas City, to the fight to win Measure ULA in Los Angeles, the report offers a detailed snapshot of the growing movement for tenant power and social housing.
It also specifically calls out the need for green social housing as housing that is “energy efficient, disaster resilient, and produced through sustainable renovation, rehabilitation, and construction methods,” as well as “healthy and safe from environmental contaminants in soil, air, and buildings.” It draws connections to the millions of vacant homes which could be acquired, retrofitted, and converted to green social housing.
Probably my favorite part of the report is the section where they provide an illustration of what social housing could look like, using an imaginary housing complex called The Commons. This does so well what it is often so hard to do: translating the concepts and ideas into a picture that feels real and possible. It captures the vision for green social housing as more than about just a type of building, but a housing system that prioritizes people over profit, sustainability over exploitation, and equity over inequality.
This report is part of a growing call of popular education materials and resources that have been released over the past several months (with more to come soon!). Its contribution goes beyond just articulating what social housing is, and instead actually connects the idea to active fights on the ground led by grassroots organizations and tenant unions. It draws the connective lines between these fights, uniting them under an overarching struggle to shift away from for-profit corporate control to an emphatic statement of housing as a human right.
I highly highly encourage you to read the report to see both the beautiful illustrations of green social housing, and learn more about the campaigns being waged across the country to make it a reality.
LEGISLATIVE UPDATE!
Last week, I provided a quick update on the bills in our CA GND slate that made it off the dreaded Appropriations suspense file. At least one astute observer noted that I mistakenly stated that SB 1201 had made it through to the Assembly when it was still waiting for a Senate floor vote, but no matter — SB 1201 passed through the Senate with a vote of 23-10 on Wednesday!
Here’s what I know of our bill slate so far:
Housing and Climate Justice Slate
ACA 10 (Haney) Right to Housing — still waiting for a vote
ACA 16 (Bryan) Green Amendment — still waiting for a vote
SB 1201 Durazo Limited Liability Corporation (LLC) Owner Transparency Act — PASSED, 23-10
General Slate
AB 846 (Bonta) Rent Cap for Affordable Housing — In Senate
AB 1866 (Hart) Idle wells — PASSED, 49-17
AB 2086 (Schiavo) Transportation Accountability Act — PASSED, 72-0
AB 2200 (Kalra) Guaranteed health care for all — HELD IN APPROPS
AB 2716 (Bryan) Idle wells — PASSED, 46-15
AB 3233 (Addis) Gas Code updates: local control — PASSED, 43-14
SB 252 (Gonzalez) CalPERS & CalSTRS Divestment — 2-year bill
SB 938 (Min) Utility Accountability — DIED IN PREVIOUS COMMITTEE
SB 1182 (Gonzalez) Master Plan for Healthy, Sustainable, and Climate-Resilient Schools — PASSED, 36-0
SB 1187 (McGuire) Tribal Housing Reconstitution and Resiliency Act — still waiting for a vote
SB 1497 (Menjivar) Polluters Pay Climate Fund — moved to Inactive File
It is very disappointing to see SB 1497 being moved to inactive, as they lack the votes to bring it to the floor for a vote. The campaign to Make Polluters Pay will continue with several other bills, and I don’t think this will be the last we hear of this legislation.
Bills have until the end of this week to get them through their house of origin, so we’ll see where the dust settles on the others (eyes on ACA 10 and ACA 16!).
Read the report!
WHAT WE’RE READING
FUNDRAISER: GoFundMe for Black Oakland Anti-Displacement Housing Fund, which is trying to raise $65,000 by the end of the month to acquire the home of Leslie Lewis, who is facing displacement from his longtime family home.
Homes Once Slated For Destruction To Expand 710 Freeway Will Now Be Fixed Up For Low-Income Homeowners (LAist) — really interesting story about publicly owned homes (by Caltrans), left vacant for years, that are now being sold. But during the pandemic, other Caltrans-owned homes were occupied by formerly unhoused Angelenos who say the region’s crushing rents and home prices have led them to “reclaim” the homes.
Latest protests on UC campuses: Workers demand higher pay, help with housing (SF Chronicle)
The Rise of Homelessness Among California’s Older Adults (CA Budget and Policy Center)
Why Don’t California’s Nonprofit Housers Embrace Social Housing? (ShelterForce) — timely reflections as we consider what it will take to build a powerful enough united front to win green social housing
​​3 Housing Lessons from Vienna and Berlin (PowerSwitch Action)
We’ve sent this out to everyone on the current CA GND listserv. If you don’t want to get these weekly newsletters, feel free to unsubscribe below. If you know someone that would be interested, send me their email, or you can forward this along to them and they can use this link to subscribe.
