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From the Chief Organizer Blog:
When ACORN began in Little Rock, the next city where we organized was Pine Bluff in 1971, a river and mill town about 50 miles down the Arkansas River. The first organizer there was Herman Davenport, who I had poached from the Pulaski County Legal Aid office when we briefly officed there in 1970. I had gotten him a slot with the FRAC, the Food Research and Action Council, which covered his work. There was a list of others, including Madeline Talbott, who worked for ACORN in a number of offices before building a spectacular operation in Chicago, and now the even longer serving Neil Sealey, who has moved seamlessly from being the Pine Bluff organizer to the head organizer of Arkansas ACORN to the executive director of ACO, Arkansas Community Organizations.
The members and leaders were the through lines for the organization for the last fifty years. Maxine Nelson was at the point of the leadership there from local group to elected member of the school board to national secretary of the ACORN board and head of the ACORN Political Action Committee. One of the rocks on which the entire operation was built who was a member from the 70s was Susie Thomas. When young guns talk about people being “present” and “engaged,” they would be unable to imagine how Ms. Thomas lived those words to the fullest. She was at every local group meeting. She was at every action, as long as someone picked her up. She was at board meetings in Pine Bluff and Little Rock for the Arkansas organization, and she was at the biannual national ACORN Conventions time after time. She was as recognizable in Pine Bluff as the ACORN flag, maybe more so.
Susie Thomas passed away a couple of days ago at 107. Zach Polett, a longtime ACORN veteran, shared with me memories of visiting with Susie a year ago. She was still clear as a bell and reminiscing about ACORN meetings and actions. It seems like only yesterday, but it must have been almost five years ago when I last sat with Susie in her home in Pine Bluff. Sam Pollard, the photographer and filmmaker, famed for his work with Spike Lee and in the news now for a documentary on Martin Luther King, Jr., was there with a crew working on a documentary being done by Reuben Atlas, who shared a clip of their interview with Susie. Her boundless spirit and infectious laughter and liveliness jumps out of every frame.
I remember the conversation well. She talked about local actions and how much she missed ACORN conventions. Towards the end of our conversation, she drew me closer, looked me in the eye, and said, “When are we going get ACORN back again?” I parried her question, saying that ACO was still right there in Arkansas as the successor organization. She wasn’t having any of it. She shook her head and said, “It’s not the same, Wade, I want ACORN again!”
Susie Thomas was a rock and an inspiration. When you made her a promise, you do everything you can to live up to it.
From the CBC:
A housing group that lobbies on behalf of low and middle-income renters has learned from a recent survey that one third of respondents are living in sub-standard conditions in London.
ACORN Canada, a national grassroots organization which opened a chapter in London, Ont. in October, has been surveying renters in the city.
Sarah Henke was one of the 72 people to respond. She lives with her husband in a two-bedroom unit in a five-building high rise apartment complex at 520 Mornington Ave., in east London.
“It’s a bit of a gong show,” she said of the complex that is operated by Sterling Karamar.
“Maintenance requests do not go answered. I’ve had a maintenance request for my tub that doesn’t drain since November 10th and a maintenance request in for my sink that doesn’t drain since November 18th,” Henke said.
CBC News has made multiple attempts to contact Sterling Karamar but has yet to receive a response.
Henke has lived in the unit for seven years and pays $1,000 a month, including hydro, which is below market value in London.
“My husband and I have actively considered leaving and have looked but we can’t afford anywhere else in the city.”
Henke said a comparable apartment today would cost $1,400 a month, plus parking and utilities, which is why she says she puts up with the living conditions.
“The building itself is infested with [cock]roaches. So regardless of what unit gets treated — because the whole building is so infested — it’s just a losing battle,” she said.
ACORN London leader, Nawton Chiles, who is also a philosophy student at Huron University College, hears stories like Henke’s too often.
He’s been taking stock of survey responses and sees patterns that he hopes the lobby group can address.
“The number one thing that people are complaining about is that the rent is too high. We’ve got almost 75 percent of tenants saying that,” said Chiles. “But the second most popular concern is that repairs and maintenance never get done and that the housing condition is poor to begin with.”
A third of respondents said their conditions were substandard.
Henke, and ACORN London believe one solution is for the city to license landlords.
“What we’re asking the city to do is to license all new and existing rental units in a publicly accessible database,” Chiles explains, emphasizing the importance of random, annual inspections.
Chiles said that would strengthen property standards, “so that a landlord could be fined for repeated infractions, have their license revoked, if they continue to provide substandard housing.”
“We need accountability. These landlords have gone unchecked for so long,” Henke said.
From CKNI:
A national tenancy advocacy group has established a New Brunswick chapter.
ACORN New Brunswick will join previously established chapters in British Columbia, Toronto, and Nova Scotia.
Their first goal is to push Blaine Higgs’ PC government toward reinstating the eviction ban that was rolled back last spring.
“There are so many people facing economic pressures in their personal lives, and the government as of now hasn’t really done anything to accommodate that,” said Raven Blue, an organizer with the new chapter.
The newest ACORN chapter has released a petition calling on Higgs’ government to freeze evictions through the COVID-19 pandemic.
Blue says the Higgs government doesn’t understand the issues many New Brunswickers are facing during the Public Health emergency.
“The government has not shown interest in protecting people during a pandemic when you have exceptional market pressures that are causing rent increases to spike,” he said. “People are being evicted, and so my sense is they are not really aware of the issues. They are more interested in enabling gentrification in our communities, rather than helping tenants or people at risk.”
Blue says he’s noticed changes in the rental market provincially and locally over the past five years, and he himself has been evicted under what he called questionable circumstances.
“It’s a widespread issue where housing market pressures are taking advantage of very low tenant protections in New Brunswick,” said Blue.
While many have called for rent control in the province, similar to what Nova Scotia’s government rolled out in late 2020, Blue says it isn’t a cure-all for the issues faced by tenants here.
In provinces like Quebec, Blue says tenants have 21 days to pay off late rent, and then receive a tribunal hearing. But in New Brunswick, tenants can be evicted after just seven days without paying rent with no recourse.
“In New Brunswick it’s among the worst in Canada, the triggers for eviction,” said Blue. “So if you can easily evict a tenant then rent controls don’t really matter a great deal. You can evict somebody and just name your price for the rent.”
From Swindon Advertiser:
Campaigners have held a virtual day of action to express their desire to save the Oasis and bring it back into public ownership.
The Swindon branch of the community union ACORN has held the latest in a series of public events online last Saturday.
Photos of supporters with ‘Save the Oasis’ signs were tweeted to Swindon Borough Council, Seven Capital and members of the Oasis Task Force.
Member Jon Timbrell said: “It would be an absolute tragedy to lose the Oasis and that’s why we’re going to do everything we can to keep it.https://56e910633adaa60ea8b3e2d18018ff2f.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-37/html/container.html
“ACORN is not here to just protest or signal our discontent that it’s closing down. We’re here to fight to keep it open.
“We’re serious about keeping it open and about organising a community to win this fight,” he added.
From CTV News Canada:
VANCOUVER — On Saturday, advocates dropped a banner off the Cambie Bridge in Vancouver calling for rent debt forgiveness.
BC ACORN, an advocacy organization, said the banner drop was an effort to escalate its campaign to end rent debt caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Many of the people that lost income because of the pandemic restrictions also found themselves unable to afford rent and buy enough food,” said ACORN’s housing advocacy spokesperson Murray Martin in a news statement.
The white banner read “end rent debt” and included an illustration of the coronavirus.
Specifically, the group wants the B.C. government to reinstate the moratorium on evictions, end rent debt and enact vacancy rent control – a type of rent control attached to homes that prevents landlords from hiking the rental rate when a tenant leaves.
“(ACORN) hopes that by showing broad support for ending COVID rent debt (it) will convince (its) old housing ally David Eby that something needs to be done,” reads the news statement.
The organization says it will be meeting with Eby, B.C.’s Housing Minister and Attorney General, next week.
“David Eby used to come and speak at housing forums we held before he was elected. He was always showing unequivocal support for the cause. We hope he hasn’t changed too much” said ACORN member Peter Gardner in the statement.
Wade Rathke was recently interviewed for this 3-part podcast about the history of KNON in Dallas, Texas. Listen to the full series below:
Students win battle with North Oxford Property Services
Tenants in Oxford celebrated a hard-won battle against a local estate agent after a row over a bedroom.
The five Oxford University students sharing a house in Cowley were in dispute with North Oxford Property Services (NOPS), which they rented a nearly £3,000-a-month house from in September.
The students sought the help of tenants’ union Acorn Oxford and, after weeks of negotiations, the estate agents has now agreed to pay Ms Lanceley a £200 compensation.
In a victorious statement on its website the union wrote: “These housemates received a confusing and worrying order from their property management company, to vacate and padlock Aleisha’s bedroom and refused to explain why.
“Luckily they are all ACORN members, and the union put the pressure on NOPS and got the situation resolved in our member’s favour.”
From London ACORN:
On Saturday November 28th, London ACORN members and tenants of 186 King Street who have been silently living with pest infestations and lack of maintenance and repairs, held a tenant speakout. Their landlord, Briarlane Rental Property Management, who boasts of owning and managing rental portfolio across Ontario, has been extremely negligent. Tenants need a management that responds to them. Currently, there are no standard office hours when tenants can approach them to get any issue resolved. On top of that, they enter tenants’ units without proper notice! There are even reports that a senior died of heat during summer as the building lacks proper heat/cold conditions. ACORN members and tenants decided to speak out against their landlord to highlight the issues they have been facing.
Close to 20 people joined the action. The action was led by London ACORN leaders. Members were joined by the NDP MPP Terence Kernaghan.
Tenants are demanding that:
We haven’t still heard from the Property Management Company & Owner – Briarlane but we will keep the fight on!
News from Ottowa:
Leaders from the Ottawa advocacy group Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), along with impacted tenants of Manor Village, in Nepean, will be gathering outside Ottawa City Hall this week, in an effort to prevent the community from being demolished to make way for a future light rail transit (LRT) station.
As part of the Stage 3 LRT planning, city staff recommended that 120 units of low-income housing be demolished, in order to build the future Knoxdale LRT Station. The move would force the eviction of over 300 low-income and working class families.
According to a statement from ACORN, city staff say tenants will have multiple years to find a new home if the city goes forward with the plan, but residents are concerned they will be unable to find somewhere as affordable as Manor Village, given the rising cost of rent in Ottawa.
ACORN leaders, along with affected tenants, will be gathering outside city hall at 9 a.m. on Wednesday, November 25.
From ACORN Manchester:
Alone we are weak, but together we are strong. Our belief in this maxim is vital amidst a pandemic which has further exposed the injustices at the heart of society. As ACORN, we’ve shown that grassroots organising not only brings results, but by delivering these together as ordinary people, we advance concrete examples of community solidarity to last beyond the pandemic.
ACORN’s ‘Member Defence’ teams utilise the collective power of the union to fight alongside fellow members on housing issues, empowering them to take action and win. We do not buy into direct action ‘only as a last resort’ – when already rigged in favour of the rich and powerful, going through the system has both little appeal and often little success. Despite the obvious impediments that Covid-19 guidelines have had on our ability to visit landlords and letting agencies in a big group to demand justice, our teams have displayed impressive creativity with incredible results. So much so, that we now have a prominent pro-bono housing solicitor referring people to us, because it’s clear that we can achieve so much more through people power than the courts.
During the UK’s nationwide lockdown, and before our Manchester Member Defence Team was formally established, Sabrina’s household was hit with a rental increase of 24%. The household had been devastated financially as a result of the virus; the ability of the tenants to cover their rent, let alone manage an increase, proved a severe challenge. One housemate reached out to ACORN for support, and signed up the rest of the house as members – the root of all our union power is getting each other’s backs; if we get your back, we expect you to have ours too by becoming a member. Collectively, with direction from ACORN, a campaign strategy was drawn up. In the end, the mere threat of union action is all it took for the rental increase to be dropped in its entirety.
This inspired Sabrina to take an active role in the union, getting trained up to join the first cohort of our Member Defence Team (whilst joining our Community Protection Team against evictions and supporting vulnerable people through our food delivery scheme). Sabrina went on to give talks to other fledgling ACORN branches in the UK, such as ACORN Swindon, sharing her insights, and inspiring them to get their own victories. One simple win transformed a non-member into a passionate leader, committed to solidifying the collective power of renters.
Early on in the COVID-19 crisis, Sophie lost her job and her Universal Credit payments were not adequate to cover her rent and bills. Sophie, like so many others, started to accrue rent arrears. In June, she contacted ACORN for support. We pride ourselves on empowering our members to take action with the union’s backing, rather than us performing a service for them – this is essential to building a powerful and engaged movement. Accordingly, we worked with Sophie to draw up demands and a strategy to win them. Much of the devised strategy was unnecessary, as once it became clear to the letting agents that Sophie had our backing, they quickly relented to her demands. In the end, all it took was an email from ACORN to secure a £500 arrears reduction and a favourable repayment plan. This relatively easy victory not only made a difference to Sophie, but it strengthened our union; the new team members involved gained experience, and Sophie became another determined member of the team. As long as we continue to ensure that every victory – easy or hard-fought – empowers our members, we can build ACORN into an ever-stronger fighting force.
In another case, a member came to ACORN after being furloughed and having their repeated requests for assistance to their letting agency ignored. The tenants had been unable to move into the property for a month at the start of the tenancy, despite paying full rent, due to multiple pest infestations and the general uninhabitable state. ACORN members took bold and cunning action alongside the tenants, leaving a flood of negative reviews online, tanking the agency’s ratings. This forced them to the table, and even brought the landlord out of the woodwork. With these avenues of communication open, and the backing of ACORN members, the tenants were able to unearth a series of lies and omissions from the letting agent to both the landlord and themselves, throughout the tenancy. With their deceit laid bare, the letting agency conceded defeat, agreeing to refund the first month’s rent and offer an on-going 20% rent reduction. And yet again, our winning member has joined our Member Defence Team, building our power to get even more wins, and on an even more ambitious scale.
These are just a handful of wins that the four of us writing this article have helped to organise. When we have been able to all go down in-person to a dodgy letting agency together,we’ve managed to stop a member being taken to the small claims court for rent arrears, and win the cancellation of all his rent debt, worth over £1500.
ACORN gives members the support and tools they need to stand up for themselves. The growth in membership month on month speaks to how people repay this faith shown in them, allowing ACORN to go from strength to strength in the process. Simply put, there is power in the collective – ACORN intends to remind the masses of this crucial fact.
Written by Chris Moore, Ethan Green, Jack Yates & Sabrina McDonnell. You can join ACORN here.
