Five tenants unions from around the country convened Tuesday to announce the launch of a new national organization to take on the power of multistate real-estate capital. The Tenant Union Federation marks the first major national effort at tenant organizing in 40 years.
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Billing itself as a “union of unions,” the federation is seeding a movement that hopes to turn tenants into a political force that can’t be ignored.
At the local level, the group’s five founding unions have already racked up an impressive streak of wins spanning a wide range of organizing tactics.
In the last year, the Louisville Tenants Union passed far-reaching restrictions on public funding contributing to gentrification in Louisville; KC Tenants defeated a billionaire-backed stadium tax in Kansas City; Bozeman Tenants United banned new short-term rentals and elected one of their own as mayor in the Montana tourism hotspot; the Connecticut Tenants Union negotiated a collective bargaining agreement with one of New Haven’s largest landlords and Chicago’s Not Me We won ballot referenda backing a landmark anti-displacement ordinance covering the area surrounding the new Obama Presidential Center.