COVID Has Catalyzed a Wave of Tenant Organizing That Was Long Overdue
Members of the community attend a rally for tenants rights at Frank Ogawa Plaza in front of City Hall in Oakland, California, on September 26, 2017.
Anda Chu/MediaNews Group/Bay Area News via Getty Images
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Fifty billion dollars. Thatâs the amount of past-due rent accumulated during the first year of the pandemic, according to some estimates. And with the Centers for Disease Control and Preventionâs (CDC) eviction moratorium now facing trouble in court and set to expire at the end of June, the situation for renters in this country has become even more precarious.
Let’s begin with report cards.
Legally, neighborhood councils cannot donate money to political candidates unlike unions, lobbyists, and special interest groups. But that should be no impediment to the ability of the councils to flex their considerable muscles.
Politicians love money because they convert it into attempts to convince the voters to love them at election time.
They print lawn signs, buy media ads, and crank out mailers. These methods are effective primarily because voters don’t have any other meaningful source of information about the candidates, so they pick the one whose name is familiar.
The end result is too often the election of the same old politicians who do the “dance of the lemons” as they move from one layer of government to another on the strength of their names.
CommUNITY Cleanup hailed as a success by organizers
NeighborWorks Great Falls
and last updated 2021-05-12 12:45:27-04
GREAT FALLS â Last week, NeighborWorks Great Falls hosted its annual CommUNITY Cleanup, starting with a free community shred day sponsored by Montana Credit Union. More than 16,000 pounds of personal information was shredded and properly disposed.
NeighborWorks Great Falls said in a news release that 24 sites around Great Falls were cleaned up by 15 teams of volunteers, with the Malmstrom Air Force Base Dirt Boyz picking up rubbish along 56 miles of roads.
Vanessa Hayden of Vision Net said, âWe care about the communities we live and work in so weâre always looking for opportunities to make our community better.â Vision Netâs team of volunteers spent several hours on Friday picking up debris along the Riverâs Edge Trail.
NC VOTER SUPPRESSION This Tuesday, May 11, 2021, at the Los Angeles’ City Council’s Arts, Parks, Health, Education, and Neighborhoods Committee meeting, the Committee will consider Council File # 21-0407, offered by Councilmember Monica Rodriguez (photo above).
The Council file # 21 – 0407 has strong language related not only to our Neighborhood Council System’s Elections, but language related to “Voter Suppression.” This is the Motion for Council File #21-0407:
“The Neighborhood Council system was established in 1999 to connect LA s diverse communities to City Hall. Neighborhood Council board members are volunteers, elected to office by the members of their community, with the purpose of ensuring that the diverse voices from every neighborhood are heard by City Hall. Democracy cannot exist without a fair electoral process at every level of government. As the closest form of government to the people, Neighborhood Councils must ensure their elections are inclusive,
City Councilmember Takes a Swing at LA’s Neighborhood Councils Details
GELFAND’S WORLD I don t know why City Council representative Monica Rodriguez (CD 7th district) would want to make trouble for mayoral candidate and fellow City Council representative Joe Buscaino, but that s what she just did, only a few weeks ago.
She did it by taking a swing at the neighborhood council system. This means that neighborhood council board members as far away as San Pedro will have to review what she is doing and to the extent that what she is trying to accomplish makes trouble for us we will have to take time and effort to defend our interests. That means that we go to Joe Buscaino and complain, and our complaints will put him in the uncomfortable position of either ignoring his constituents (us) or disagreeing with his fellow council member. And he s running for higher office.