By Cameron Orr

I applaud the city council for passing ordinances on Wednesday that establish the Right To Counsel and fees on developers to fund affordable housing and free legal representation for tenants. This is a big step forward, and will contribute to a more humane city and economy. I hope that the city will demonstrate urgency in fully implementing this program as soon as possible, rather than considering it satisfactory to simply meet the 2026 deadline.

However, I want to express my concern that while all our city council members ultimately made the right decision in passing these ordinances, some were upset that real-estate investors weren’t adequately consulted, or were worried about the effect these reforms will have on the “market” and developers’ “right” to make a return on their investment.

I’m afraid this shows a certain level of confusion. Perhaps we have allowed a corporate-dominated political environment to warp our mindset. Nobody has a “right” to make a profit. That’s a risk you take when you make an investment. But people should have the right to a home.

Property rights are not sacrosanct; human lives are. Housing, food, clothing, a quality education, healthcare — these things are basic needs and should be considered human rights. Many countries with far less resources than ours provide these things. The United States has more than enough resources to make them available to everyone; we simply choose not to. That shows who is really in control.

If those who control immense resources can be compelled by city, state, and federal government to make these basic human needs accessible to the general public, that is well and fine and good. But when those who control basic resources like land and housing fail to make them available to people, and even stand in the way of government measures to improve people’s lives, they prove themselves to be bad stewards and deserve to lose those privileges. If a slumlord or big developer is suddenly unable to collect huge rent checks, they’re still in a much better position than the ordinary worker who just lost their job. Many of us have already been there at some point in our lives, with little to no help on the way; so, it’s hard for us to show much sympathy for those with great wealth who cry poor.

Read “Letter: On Right to Counsel, Jersey City Made The Right Choice” at Jersey City Times

Jersey City renters can’t keep up with a housing crisis fueled by proximity to New York City. A new right to counsel program, funded by development fees, could help.

“Two ordinances creating a new right to counsel program and new fees on development to fund affordable housing were approved by the Jersey City Council on Wednesday, June 14. The first ordinance allows tenants in eviction proceedings who make less than 80 percent of the area median income to receive a pro bono attorney. The second ordinance establishes a new fee for development.”

Read “Jersey City Grants Free Counsel to Renters Facing Eviction” at shelterforce.org

“The ordinance was the result of a year-long campaign by the Coalition for Right to Counsel Jersey City, and the campaign was recently endorsed by Jersey City Together. In New Jersey dot com, an opinion piece from a New Jersey City resident urged the passage of right to counsel, calling it a ‘moral imperative’ and saying, ‘Housing should not be a commodity to be traded and speculated on, but a basic human right. A right to counsel places us in the right direction.’”

Read “Jersey City Grants Free Counsel to Renters Facing Eviction” at civilrighttocounsel.org

By Mark Koosau

In a place that’s become known for its sky high rents and cost of living, Jersey City finally has a free program in place that will help tenants facing illegal evictions, funded by the landlords themselves, developers in the city.

The city council voted unanimously Wednesday night in adopting a right-to-counsel program, in which the city will provide free legal representation for tenants facing evictions, and a 1.5-2.5% fee on new developments that would fund its budget.

“You would be hard-pressed to find another city that is doing more on this front than Jersey City, as we have made meaningful policy changes when it comes to affordability and protecting our most vulnerable populations,” Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop said of the new program.

The program, which will be housed under the Department of Housing, Economic Development and Commerce, will allow tenants who are at 80% or below the area median income to seek representation in court if they are served an eviction notice. Attorneys will be either staff employees or a contracted firm.

It will also require the program’s director to compile a tenants’ rights and resources document, which must then be presented to tenants during a leasing, rent demand, or eviction, as well as to tenants of the Jersey City Housing Authority and affordable housing units.

“It’s a huge step for Jersey City working families,” said Councilman James Solomon, who was one of the sponsors of the legislation. “It’s going to level the playing field and ensure thousands of tenants stay in their home when facing illegal and unfair eviction.”

Read “Jersey City approves right-to-counsel program to help tenants facing illegal evictions” at nj.com

Right to Counsel Jersey City’s Coalition Chair, Isaac Jimenez, chatted with Hudson County View about how only a mass movement of tenants can win RTC JC, make sure it’s implemented fairly and justly, and fight back against landlord and developer interference.

Watch “Hudson County View Live - 06-13-2023 Guest: Isaac Jimenez” on YouTube

Connecticut tenants face a housing emergency. Already high rents have skyrocketed since 2020. Buildings in both the cities and suburbs are deteriorating under the management of negligent landlords speculating on our homes, posing health risks to adults and children. Evictions and homelessness are on the rise. Our rental vacancy rate is the lowest in the country—landlords can hold tenants hostage. Young people cannot afford to live independently, families are forced into overcrowded arrangements, workers cannot afford to live near where they work, and some are forced to flee the state altogether over the cost of housing.

Democrats held a super-majority this session and had the opportunity to boldly address this emergency, despite obstruction by the Republican minority. Tenants and our allies demanded a rent cap and good cause eviction protections to give us immediate relief and stability while we tackled the housing emergency head-on. Hundreds of us stayed up all night at the Capitol to testify about the urgency of taking on a housing system that’s unaffordable, unsafe, and unfair; rooted in legacies of racism and exclusion; and that is displacing many of us from our homes and communities. We were out on the streets of our cities and towns, in our community spaces, and in our apartment buildings talking to our neighbors. Polling showed the vast majority of voters agreed we should stabilize rent and take action to address exclusionary zoning. This was the chance to cap the rent, empower tenants, and begin to shift the immense resources and wealth of our state towards guaranteeing affordable and stable housing for all.    

SB 998 improves tenants’ rights, but it does not shift the paradigm of housing in our state—housing that’s unaffordable and unsafe for many of the 1.3 million renters in Connecticut. It does not address the systemically racist practices of suburbs that continue to lock-out disproportionately Black and Latine renters, and it does not increase the availability of affordable housing. We support SB 998’s limitations on eviction blacklisting by landlords, caps on application and late fees, higher fines for landlords, translation of notices and forms, and additional resources for security deposits. But these changes only skirt the edge of what tenants need and are demanding. They do not reshape our housing system to create prosperity for us all in Connecticut, and they do not prioritize the working class. Rent will keep going up. Landlords will still wield no-cause evictions to deter organizing or force out tenants for no reason at all. Power over housing will remain concentrated in the hands of the few.

The tenant-led housing justice movement is here to stay, and next year our movement will be even stronger. We will organize in our buildings and cities to protect each other as we continue to fight for housing stability for all, so that all of us can put down roots in the communities we love.

June 8, 2023, Co-Authored by CT DSA and CT Tenants Union

Right to Counsel has secured FIVE council votes for passage at June 14th's Jersey City Council meeting! With the ordinance poised for approval, we must continue to organize and ensure that the city commits to housing justice by enforcing RTC.

“They will be the fourth and fifth vote for this bill, guaranteeing its passage. Above all, their commitment to our residents means that Jersey City will pass one of the strongest Right-to-Counsel bills in the country, protecting tenants across the city.”

Read “With DeGise and Rivera on board, Jersey City RTC proposal poised for approval next week” in Hudson County View

(Image: https://www.transnational-strike.info/)

In our latest episode, we are talking about what we can do to stand up against apartheid in Palestine. A new bill sponsored by New York State Assembly Member Zohran Mamdani aims to stop nonprofits funding illegal settlements benefiting from charitable status. Zohran joins the show, along with the Adalah Justice Project's Sumaya Awad.

You can find more information about the The Not on Our Dime bill here.

You can also read the legislation here.

By Jonathan Martin

On August 4, 1997, 185,000 members of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) led by president Ron Carey began a fifteen-day strike that would cost the United Parcel Service (UPS) over $600 million. They won 10,000 full-time positions with higher salaries and benefits, and preserved Teamster’ pensions from UPS takeover.

John Sweeney, president of the AFL-CIO at the time, said of the strike, “You could make a million house calls, run a thousand television commercials, stage a hundred strawberry rallies, and still not come close to doing what the UPS strike did for organizing.”

On August 1, 2023, UPS Teamsters, now numbering 340,000, are ready to strike again if the company refuses to meet their demands. In an economy increasingly reliant on drivers to deliver online orders, and a logistics sector awash in COVID profits, the leverage of such a large strike is unmistakable. This would be nearly twice as large as the powerful 1997 strike; in fact, it would be the largest strike in the United States since the 1959 strike of around 500,000 steel workers.

Burned by concessions, Teamsters elect new leaders

Yet just five years ago, militant action by the Teamsters was off the table. In 2018, when a weak UPS contract was brought to the membership by James P. Hoffa’s bargaining team, they rejected it. Invoking an obscure provision in the IBT charter, Hoffa Jr. forced the contract through, angering many Teamsters. 

Especially contentious was the creation of a “two-tier” system for drivers. New full-time positions that split time between driving and warehouse work would earn less pay overall, and have no protections from overtime abuse. Teamsters say that in practice these workers largely act as delivery drivers, earning less pay for the same work as others. (This video offers an in-depth explanation.)

For many Teamsters, the overriding of their vote rejecting the contract was the final straw. Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU) had been organizing for decades to reform the union and elect a more militant and democratic leadership, and in November 2021 they saw success. Teamsters United, a coalition made up of Hoffa critics and TDU members, successfully elected fourth-generation Teamster Sean O’Brien as president, and TDU leader Fred Zuckerman as its secretary-treasurer.

O’Brien has promised militancy and a win for the Teamsters, no matter what it takes.

Teamsters pose an array of demands

This year, the “two-tier” system implemented in 2018 is a key bargaining issue. Removing the so-called “22.4” category for drivers would see thousands of full-time workers get an immediate bump in pay, bringing them in line with the other full-time drivers doing the same job.

The Teamsters also seek to raise the pay of part-timers, who often earn little more than minimum wage. In 1997, part-time work was a key issue that resonated with the public, and became a rallying cry for the striking workers. In an economy driven by gig and part-time work, this demand could once again be key to winning the support of the public and could galvanize demands by workers in other sectors.

Another key issue is forced overtime, where workers are required to work a sixth day of the week (called the “six-day punch”). The Teamsters also want to address the driving conditions of workers. Many UPS trucks lack air conditioning units, hospitalizing workers during heat waves. 

These are some of the top national demands. However, the national contract only entered bargaining 3 weeks ago, as regional “supplements” to that contract are still being negotiated. (Currently, Oakland’s Local 70 and Zuckerman’s former Louisville local, the massive Local 89, are in the two regions that have not yet settled supplements.)

UPS has already begun to cry poor, making negative predictions about revenue in an attempt to undermine the Teamsters position. In reality, however, profits at UPS continue to grow.

According to data from TDU, UPS ships around 20 million packages each day, and made $13.8 billion in profit in 2022. It dwarfs its competitors, controlling nearly two-fifths (37%) of all revenue from package delivery services in the US. The company plans to reward its investors with $8.3 billion in dividends and buybacks 2023. 

A crucial link in the supply chain, UPS moves 6% of the United States’ GDP each year. A strike could cost UPS $185 million a day. 

Solidarity Delivers the Goods

In the past year, East Bay DSA and the broader community have stood in solidarity with thousands of workers on strike. This includes public education workers in Oakland, and last year’s strike of 48,000 academic workers at the University of California. 

UPS Teamsters supported both those strikes, turning out to the picket line at Global Family Elementary in solidarity with OEA. Many honored loading dock pickets at UC, helping build the power of UAW’s strike. 

The Teamsters’ contract fight is already mobilizing UPS workers in every state in the country, but if they are forced to strike, it could galvanize workers across the U.S. in the way that the West Virginia teachers’ strike did for education workers nationally in 2018. The current struggle represents a huge opportunity for national organizing both in the broader labor movement, and for community supporters here in the East Bay. 

We can stand in solidarity by contributing to organizing funds, educating other workers about the working conditions and demands of UPS Teamsters, and preparing for a possible strike on August 1. These networks not only strengthen the power of contract fights and strikes across union lines, but represent important linkages as unions like the Teamsters seek to unionize Amazon.

DSA members and their communities are getting strike ready with UPS, and helping strengthen the wave of labor militancy sweeping across the country. Many have already pledged to support a strike. From Trader Joes and Starbucks, to the Teachers’ Unions, to UPS, our solidarity is critical in the working class’s fight against the bosses and billionaire class.

Add your name to DSA’s pledge to support a strike.

Jonathan Martin is a member of East Bay DSA.