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Issue #1 - Hot Tenant Summer - Spring / Summer 2024

Updated: Jul 24


Introduction

Something is cooking in the valley of the sun this summer, and it’s not just the pavement. Valley Tenants Union have been hard at work holding know your rights sessions, meeting monthly for popular education, and supporting our neighbors wherever possible. This year an idea was floated for a union newsletter - a platform for us to share updates on our fight to build a world without rent. We hope that this newsletter will serve not only as a current state of affairs, but as a space to imagine the future and acknowledge our past in the tenant struggle. For our inaugural issue, several VTU members contributed a variety of pieces in the form of organizing updates, local tenant histories, and member interviews.


Interested in contributing? Reach out to any research and analysis committee member or email us at valleytenants@proton.me


What’s new?



 

1yr 4 rise TA Attempts 🙁

Almost a year attempting to form a Tenants Association🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳


What is the Union and what kind of power can we hope to build without at least one operating and functional tenant association (TA)? It’s easier to dream about joining something huge that is already working, than to know where to start at building it from the ground up. But hello, put the dreams aside n just start trying at the work in the meantime.


Anyways when VTU split into locals last summer, we laid out some ideas for organizing projects. I started to doorknock at my apartment in July in north central Phoenix. I had just moved in, wasn’t tapped into any existing community at my apartments, and knew only a few neighbors in passing. But for most of the summer I didn’t put daily effort in.


Several VTU members helped in reorienting my ideas in how to move as one person after a few weeks of doorknocking left feeling lost. Very advised to start on the building level and go from there. My dream in this would be that I would build enough familiarity and trust w neighbors as a friend + in the idea of tenant organizing. My roaches are your roaches, and so on. But yeah, these ideas probably lacked both the attention needed and the constant changing of tenants in my building was depressing, like once you feel you’re getting somewhere w someone, next week you're loading the u-haul w them.


So I just ignored that earlier advice and expanded my scope out to all the buildings. Couldn’t pick just one, because what if the tenant leaders are hiding behind all the doors I haven’t hit yet? What if someone is tryna organize a TA in here at the same time as me and feel just as helpless?


I figured I can just go hard at building connections until I get to a point where others are involved in the cultivation of the TA. I’m still on this hill.


In the beginning stages, a lot of this organizing felt like losing. Reactive. Pandering to the landlord stressing the legality of organizing. But once I had heard from some neighbors in another building that 12 tenants were in the office, after receiving 5 day notices on the same day. Gossip around the complex right, but to me that sounded like a TA minus the name. Tenants acting together around a shared grievance. This really gave me a clear direction + urgency and I was able to reach out to everyone I had numbers for so far like, have you heard about this? Two neighbors and I drafted a letter that same day about demands we had, and we agreed to form the Tenants Association that night, as 3 units. We never sent it. Since then, both of these neighbors/TA members were served writs of restitution and locked out of their apartments with their belongings still inside.


Beyond us 3, I wanted to get a fuller picture of widely-held deeply-felt issues. Many tenants were agitated about plumbing leaks, utility costs and water shut offs, plus the super high rent costs. Some neighbors go the whole summer with their inside temperature over 90 degrees. Looking at it now, I’d say probably a ¼ of talkative tenants had experienced a flood.


The VTU locals + their members built the TA to a huge degree. VTU providing all this support in doorknocking, childcare, printing, interpretation sometimes, plus talking me down off the ledge when needed. The Tenant Know Your Rights event really helped with both establishing more of a tenant-power conversation around the complex + bringing up the formation of the TA and the next upcoming meeting.


The TA started holding monthly meetings around January and was able to keep that routine for a few months,


Facilitating is really challenging among almost-strangers. Good to take stock in your own place there, like who am I to this community, how long have I lived here, and what can I bring to t he table? I had a definite wish to get the words Tenant Association in writing on the desk of management, as early as possible, to preemptively put some protection against retaliation if it were to come. We never managed to get that far thought so when threats of retaliation did come, it convinced some previously engaged neighbors to dip out of the organizing.


The tenants at the first TA meeting weren’t at the second or the third and so it’s been interesting tryna engage members in something that we are building together.Tenants experiencing some of the most severe conditions had already set sights on different apartments or housing situations. Where does that leave the rest of us?


Stifled growth in April (despite March’s meeting being the largest number of tenants attending) is depressing! I usually relied on myself to do the bulk of meeting prep routine while inviting neighbors to join me with smaller pieces (like flyering, knocking two doors, running the agenda through a translator) but taking up the tasks that weren’t done by others likely came back to bite me. No more individualism!!! I feel that where I’m at now, the work needed to build a strong foundation here hasn’t been done, otherwise you could rely on other neighbors to step into different portions of keeping-the-TA-alive. The TA isnt alive though, its still in the womb tbh.


All in all it’s been 11 months of trial and error and perpetual mistakes. I swear every decision feels like a wrong one, and I’m still worried a lot of the decisions I made were unwise and have slowed growth here.


Sleepless from these worries + the roaches that crawl on me in the dark lol! Sweet dreams 2 all my tenants out there!!!!!! 🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳🪳

 

Rent Strike Against Racism

Hey comrades! I’ve always wondered what kind of tenant organizing happened in the Valley’s history. Elsewhere, the 20th century spilled over with struggle, like the 1922 rent strike in Veracruz, Mexico, the 1932 Great Rent Strike War in the Bronx, the Black Panthers working with the Berkeley Tenants Union in the ‘60s, the 1975 SONACOTRA rent strike in France, the recent wave of rent strikes around the US, and so on.


But what about where we live? I mostly assumed that rent strikes just didn’t happen, especially since we don’t have the same reforms/concessions that others won, like rent control. Some friends in the North/Central local (credit to Chris, Lieu, and Tam) thankfully set me straight. In fact, tenants organized a rent strike in apartments that still exist to this day.


Matthew Henson Apartments

The site of this battle, Matthew Henson Apartments, opened in 1941 around 7th Ave and Buckeye in South Phoenix. White settlers built a racial divide into the layout of Phoenix, with spacious “ranch-style mansions” for themselves up north and polluted slums down south, where redlining ensured that segregation would persist even after it was made formally illegal.


The settler city managed it by creating the Phoenix Housing Authority and building public housing projects that were themselves segregated: “The Matthew Henson for African-Americans, Marcos de Niza for Hispanics and Frank Luke for Anglos”. Matthew Henson may have been a step above dilapidated shacks without running water, but it was still a ghetto that packed Black people into inhumane living conditions, like crumbling walls, pest infestations, and cruelty from white property management.


The AZ Republic, at its core a mouthpiece for the white business elite in the Chamber of Commerce, even ran a series of articles sensationalizing these conditions, though without treating its residents with dignity. Even if that rag wouldn’t, these tenants could speak for themselves.


Matthew Henson Tenants Council

At first, they went through the "proper channels" to voice their concerns, submitting maintenance requests that got ignored or half-assed. This was a valuable lesson in itself; after years of suffering through inaction, they got organized and took action. At first, 9 tenants began the “Matthew Henson Neighborhood Council” in 1962. In 1965, they won the transfer of a racist manager within the city-sponsored “Progressive Neighborhood Council”. Conditions continued to deteriorate and the racist manager even returned in 1969, so they formed the “Matthew Henson Tenants Council” and collectively sent a list of 21 urgent demands, including for desegregation of the projects.


As tenant council leader Vernell Coleman put it, “we are tired of backslapping sincerity and committee surveys and reports” from the city agencies. This wasn't just talk: when their demands weren't met, they withheld their rent together on a rent strike. What did the Housing Authority and the AZ Republic call them? Terrorists. They fear-mongered about "black militant youths" and their "militant terror tactics" over some kids apparently throwing rocks. The Housing Authority claimed the rocks were attached with notes supporting the tenants council, but a rent striker also had rocks thrown through her window with no notes. Their lies couldn’t conceal their weakening position as they permanently kicked out the racist manager under pressure.


In December, the Housing Authority sent 84 eviction notices to hundreds of who they called “freeloaders”, but most tenants held strong through the intimidation. The Housing Authority flinched, so tenants didn’t receive evictions for Christmas. They kept going, and after 5 months on rent strike won many of their demands, even forcing the city housing authority to restructure. These tenants demonstrated that wielding their economic power in struggle could not only improve their living conditions, but take on the city’s structural racism with some successful concessions.


Postscript

What happened afterward was just as noteworthy. Vernell Coleman, who became known as the “Mayor of the Projects”, resigned from her position as president of the council in 1978, after reportedly getting frustrated with “the people who sit back, reaping the benefits while she and the others work to make the project a better place to live”. The tenants council quickly fell apart and disbanded without her.


Even before it collapsed, she did what many neighborhood organizers did in this city: collaborated with the government and its armed enforcers. Coleman sat on the City of Phoenix Housing Advisory Board, served in the Phoenix Human Resources Department, and worked in the “Matthew Henson Anticrime Committee” with the police. She also ventured into charitable work, like helping to organize the St. Mary’s Food Bank, reviving a Juneteenth celebration alongside the tenants council which would later provide scholarships to low-income students, and campaigning for the Seventh Avenue Clinic which expanded healthcare access. All of this earned her praise from the pigs in power, like when eviction-loving Mayor Kate spoke at a ceremony unveiling streets named after her.


We can understand the reasons behind and appreciate the benefits from trying to reform the system from inside while taking an honest, critical view. The perils of this path can be seen through the legacy of her coworker Travis L Williams, a prominent community leader in South Phoenix who praised Coleman “for bringing to light problems with the administration of city housing projects”. He was the first director of the Human Resources Department, a real estate developer, an honored Life Member of the NAACP, and the now-namesake of the Family Services Center where many now go for resources like rental assistance.


His son, Cody Williams, would act as city councilor before becoming a 15-year justice of the peace (the judges overseeing our eviction mill). Cody’s wife, Jeri, would become the disgraced chief of Phoenix police who resigned after getting caught in a scheme to repress and criminalize Black Lives Matter protesters in recent years. They embody what Malcolm X called the “black bourgeoisie,” or those whose wealth and political connections invested them in a system hostile to the broad masses of whom they acted as representatives. We’re left with the results: unbearably high rents, record-breaking eviction rates, slum conditions, systematic racism with the consolation of representation, and misery on the streets, where sweeps might displace you once more.


Another way forward

This episode also reminded me of another important tenant struggle in public housing projects: the fight against displacement during the redevelopment of LA’s Pico-Aliso public housing complex in the mid-1990s. In that case, the fight grew out of a history of organizing against police violence, so their relations weren’t exactly conciliatory. These tenants, calling themselves the “Union de Vecinos”, recognized they couldn’t trust “the politicians, the press, and supposedly progressive nonprofits” who supported the HOPE VI redevelopment that they correctly suspected would lead to their displacement if they didn’t fight.


After they succeeded in their fight to remain in their homes, they continued to focus on organizing independently from the state. They didn’t collapse after important leaders grew tired of inactive followers, but still exist today. In fact, they proved pivotal to the formation of the LA Tenants Union (who are fellow travelers in the Autonomous Tenants Union Network), where they now exist as one of their ~12 locals. Some might call the sort of radical, fighting politics that they embody “unrealistic”, yet they have proven not only a staying power but the power to grow and win tangible victories along the way.


Here, there was no organized pushback from tenants when the Matthew Henson projects also faced HOPE VI redevelopment in the early 2000s, and we don’t know how many were displaced. The AZ Republic, which generally boosted the “revitalization”, didn’t follow up on how many remained, but noted a HUD figure that only around one third of tenants had stayed in their homes after HOPE VI projects.


I’m proud that we’re walking a similar path as the LA Tenants Union, just as much as I’m inspired to know that Valley tenants waged a rent strike decades ago that succeeded. We have a long way to go, and it means choosing a longer, harder road than cozying up to politicians or taking grant funding. Still, we shouldn’t be ashamed if “spadework” (as Ella Baker would call it) can feel like we’re organizing at a snail’s pace, but rather embrace it like the Zapatistas do with the symbol of the “caracol”. What tenants need runs against this empire’s worship of private property and profit, so we need to stay determined for the long haul if we want to watch many rent strikes bloom (and more). Go tenants!


Sources:

 

Grassroots, Organic, Little-to-No-Planning: An Interview with Carmen

05/12/2024

This interview is with Carmen, “no-nonsense and poli-tricks!” tenant union member, mother, educator in the living room of her apartment in West Phoenix. I first met Carmen in 2023, it was the middle of the fight against mass displacement by Periwinkle Mobile Home residents against their landlord, Grand Canyon University. She spoke up in solidarity at several city council meetings and continued showing up at rallies, making me and others wonder – who was this brave activist so invested in the struggle of tenants?


In all my time I’ve known (and learned so much from her), Carmen has continued that fighting spirit in any organizing she’s been a part of - including pushing back against what’s corporate and liberal in activism and not being afraid to take what she calls the ‘back roads’ or grassroots approach to liberation. The back roads, although not as glamorous as the politician endorsed, foundation funded ‘main roads’, is a space where organic organizing thrives.It can seem slow at times but you get to see more, learn more and wholly interact with the communities around you and build relationships. In this interview Carmen shares her upbringing, who inspires her to fight for a better world and teaches us to remain curious, understand why things are the way they are.


L: Who are YOU, Carmen? Have you been in Arizona your whole life or where did you grow up?


Carmen: My name is Carmen and I’m from Virginia, I've been here since September 2019.


L: I remember you had told me in Virginia, you were also involved in organizing too?


Carmen: Yeah, a little bit.


L: What was the community like growing up in Virginia?


Carmen: It was good, because we have hard times but you know, in them days, it was small. But we did okay, you know, because we had to depend on each other and stuff and our elders we listened to, as well as the preacher. So we did what we did, and everybody did their thing, but we all came together.


L: When you mentioned how you all came together, were there any notable people in your life that really inspired you growing up? People who represented what community meant to you?


Carmen: I mean, it was my grandma, my aunt and uncle. And this family that lived in the same row, but it was up the street, and there was a guy who was the preacher. And I play with their children and stuff. You know, basically them and some few other people in the neighborhood but I think everybody in the neighborhood was okay. Because I didn’t know who my parents were but they helped me.


L: So, the community came together and kind of raised you basically. During that time, did you find yourself getting involved with community organizing?


Carmen: Well I learned more about it when I was with my soulmate (King), but that was years later. When I was in my early 20s or mid 20s. Because I would see my soulmate doing stuff; he was a grant writer and an activist for homeless folks. Just for people that didn't really have but, you know, every good activist does a little dirt [laughs] and they get in a little trouble but they do what they'll do but it's not bad, you know, because they are doing what they can to help.


L: I know you've told me a lot of stories about your soulmate. Can you share how you guys met?


Carmen: Oh, oh, that's the interesting part! Because we met at a soup kitchen for real. I’ll never forget it, it was in a church and I was just hanging around doing my thing, being in my 20s, enjoying myself. One day I was just having to go to the soup kitchen and there were a bunch of guys playing cards. I sat away and watched them. Then two of them said, “why don’t you come by here?”, because you know the way I was brought up. You couldn’t do that unless they asked you. So yeah, so that’s how I met him.


L: Ever since then, you kind of hit it off, basically?


Carmen: Oh, yeah. We were friends for two years first, but that man was like a brother to me and when he asked me I said, “Well, what! No, you're supposed to be my brother?” Because, some of us back East do stuff like that, where we know somebody for so long and we’ll claim them as family but they ain’t related to us. You know what I'm saying? That's it. You know, this ain't gonna work. You know you're a brother, man. We talk!


L: He was an activist. What were some of the things that he did? You said he helped out homeless folks, wrote grants. Were there qualities of his activism that really inspired you?


Carmen: I remember this one time he told me, he got arrested for “homeless racketeering”. That is a charge over there now, I don't know if it's still there now. Because Virginia laws change like we change drawls. But yeah, he was charged for that. I asked him, what is that? So he explained how he used to run a clothes closet, a place where people that are on the street go during the day. It’s like a drop in center or something, where they could go in and get a shower, get some meal and sit if it got hot or whatever, whatever the case, you know, play cards and all that. So they would have clothes donations and instead of all the people like, the administrators of this particular drop in center place, getting the best stuff that people donated. He would sit there and give it to people, but see, he had deals too. But it wasn't deals like how they had it being selfish, but he had his way of doing it and it worked out.


L: I didn’t know that about him and that he ran a shelter and got arrested!


Carmen: Yeah, because they found out and I’m just like, that don’t make no sense. The good ones got to rub against the law somewhere!


L: I remember you had told me about “Richmond homes for all” and more of the housing-related organizing, how all the old houses were getting knocked down, something like that. Do you remember? Can you share a little bit more Richmond homes for all or any of that kind of organizing back then?


Carmen: Yeah, because sometimes it's like UWU (unemployed workers united) and Fuerte (Arts Movement) and they do stuff for people but who are they really doing it for? Now? The tenants union there (Richmond/Virginia) it's more than one and I don't know why and it's like that here (Arizona/Phoenix) too, there’s more than one and still don't know why. But at least with them, they're consistent in the name. So it's not something like UWU because UWU honestly, is a tax thing or a wage thing and Fuerte, I guess is dealing with DACA and migrant issues? I guess? I mean, I could be wrong with that. The tenants union of Richmond and Richmond For All and the neighborhood tenant associations are all one consistent thing. Only thing, though, is I think that Richmond for all do the corporate stuff.


L: I think we talk about these kinds of nonprofits and corporate entities, groups that have a lot of private/state funders. How did you come to know the difference between grassroots and NGOs?


Carmen: Just by listening to what they’re saying, as well as just trying to keep up. I mean, more so because back East I saw the stuff, and then you always ask why. Back East they won't really tell you because they are trying to hide it. But out here they don't care. They'll tell you and that's good. See, out here is good. Because they’re not trying to hide stuff. They don't care.


L: Right, you see it for what it is here. They (nonprofs/ngos) are fooling people in a way but you can clearly see it here (in Phoenix). We’re talking a little bit more about Phoenix now. When did you start becoming more involved in the community here after moving to Phoenix?


Carmen: Well, when my children and I came I was trying to find a school for them to go to and that was close to the pandemic-time and I didn't know it. I was trying to find schools that would meet their needs but there was a setback. I think the setback was in where we were from as well as other things. So I'm like this is messed up and I heard about the Red for Ed movement. First thing I did was fool around with them and then I was told about Save Our Schools and the Arizona Education Association too. So I found out that this girl named Alexis Aguirre (educator/organizer with Red for Ed) was doing some petition signing right down the street from where I used to live. So I go talk to her and you know, she would send me info. But I would go to the Capitol on my own and would see folks, and would talk to folk. I was telling them stuff and then like, the one girl, she just came to me because she really wanted to hear what I had to say. Because everybody else was looking like at me like “what in the world” and then when she gave me the word then I attended those zoom calls with the legislators and stuff. So I was talking and folks were really interested in what I had to say and so that's how that one. Then after a while, I just started seeing other things and they're like Miss Linda. She reached out for the voting thing and I said “Okay!” so I met her. And Kristen, Alexis, the motor* rally and then I found out about Laveen. It’s so rich, I feel like I’m really at home when I’m in Laveen. As I kept seeing stuff, you know, people kept coming back and I'm learning more things and then next thing you know, boom! I'm here now. And you know, I know I'm not supposed to say it, but I gotta give credit where credit's due Sebastian from UWU told me about VTU and that was good. He knows that I really want to get to the root of things. So he put me in the direction, so you see?


L: Can you explain what Red for Ed was for people who don’t know?


Carmen: Well, what it was, was a movement where teachers rally together, you know, for better pay and stuff. Because teachers don't get paid enough and the school system is messed up. This was a statement that showed “look, we're not going to take this” and I heard about all this from back East though. Because one time I saw the news back East and I'm like, “What is this? They don't have this? Oh, my God.”


L: So moving here and understanding the school system is shit, that is what got you involved, because you’re thrown into it to find better schools for your family and trying to understand what’s going on. Can you explain where that curiosity comes from? Why do you want to get to the root of things, where does that come from?


Carmen: One, God. Then dreams, two. It was my dream to come out in 2008 but I just had a son, my little man so I couldn't do anything but god aligned it. I always asked where and I wanted to know who I could address. Because you got to tell somebody, you got to ask somebody and just took that leap of faith. I wanted a change in my life. The East was just too much and the activism I do, it's a coping thing. Because if I didn't have that, I probably don’t know where I would be. King left that legacy for me and my older son, enforced it. So when it was time for King to go, it was a sad time, but it was a good time too because it's like, well the stars align. And then when I had the means to go, I said to God, “Thank You”.


L: Getting emotional here.


Carmen: Yeah, if it wasn't for all this, I would be a wreck. I told all my children, especially my oldest, I said, I can't stay here son, because it hurts. So I had to come to Phoenix and then God said yup, you're going out there, you're going on that bus, you get out there. I know you’re in pain but I'm gonna see it through.


L: You said earlier that your activism is your coping mechanism?


Carmen: Well cause it's that legacy, because I learned so much from King and as he started getting sick, and was dying. I got more angry. Then when he died, I got sad. But something said, um, noo, nope. Dry your eyes. You have to do this. This is the cross you have to bear. You got to do this. King has gone home. King time is up. You got your oldest son, he's the product. You don't want him seeing you mope. He's a man. You have to do this for him and the others. It's hard, but I have to. Because it helps you and if not. Oh my god. I probably would have been just depressed and in a wreck.


L: Fighting that fight for King, continuing his legacy through his activism is so inspiring. That also includes, as of lately, putting yourself in a lot of different buckets and trying everything, attending Democrat meetings and attending the Mayor’s State of the City which I know can frustrate you. How do you navigate through that all?


Carmen: Learning comes in all forms. The goal is to be as grassroots as you can but sometimes you have to attend those things. It’s hard but it has to be done. That’s part of the learning. I’ve brought my children to council meetings, save our schools stuff and all kinds of stuff. So they can see, teach the children. Where they go with it, I don’t know but they remember that I took them to this and this. So they can see for themself.


L: This goes with what you had said earlier about grassroots - like your catch phrase?


Carmen: Grassroots, organic, little to no planning. Used to be no planning but had to change it to little planning. Grassroots is like taking the back road, you can see more and it’s longer but it gets you there.


L: What makes you want to stay in the grassroots?


Carmen: Grassroot is more about community, it’s about how people feel, who’s there when the cameras are off and the show is over. The main road is the stage of the movie, but when it’s over - who do you or where do you go? You go to the dressing room, where you sit down and let your feelings out and rest. Grassroots is that dressing room. With non grassroots and nonprofits, they’ll help you and they’ll see you. But like this stage, you’re the new actor and say you’re doing very well and they put you in the spotlight. Everything is cool at first and then you begin to realize what you’re doing - makes you want to go into the background or back to the dressing room.


L: The feeling of being used by non-grassroots groups, using up your energy.


Carmen: Some of them claim to be grassroots until you really look at them.


L: How do you feel that resonates with tenant organizing and VTU?


Carmen: From all the meetings we’ve been in, especially around people in the community. We’ve seen and heard a lot of experiences from neighbors. When we hear from them, they’re grateful. It makes the world of difference and it’s like they’re in the dressing room now. They don’t have to front. They don’t have to be uncomfortable anymore. It gets challenging but they know that somebody is here for them and there’s a safety net.


 

Making Reflection a Practice

What’s in a name? In December 2022, we voted to change from ‘Worried About Rent?’ to the Valley Tenants Union. Signifying a key moment, after a couple of years of stumbling through 2020 pandemic-era organizing and undergoing a ‘hiatus’ to reflect on challenges/successes and focus on collective study. Deciding to call ourselves a tenants union meant that we were unified enough to move forward in building an organization that would seriously combat real estate capital and landlord exploitation.


With 2024 on the horizon, members were excited to reflect on the highs and lows of the union’s past 12-months and investigate what improvements could be made. A small working group was formed to help plan this reflection, consisting of myself and another comrade. We understood that analysis and reflections are important to advance a militant tenants movement and without it we’d be making the same mistakes, losing in the face of organized landlords. So there was a lot of pressure felt… how do we have a union-wide reflection that is collective and democratic? how do we have reflections where members can address all their challenges, issues and share goals they look forward to accomplishing in 2024?  


While planning, we came across Los Angeles Tenants Union (LATU) ‘Naming the Moment’ handbooks from 2016 through 2022. Not only did these LATU handbooks have instructions of how they held reflections but also they documented the growth in size and make-up of their base members. It was encouraging to see an autonomous tenants union that started from a more ‘activist-base’ morph into one that is truly representative of poor and working-class tenants!


Taking inspiration, we grounded our reflection by understanding our position in history in order to reflect and act effectively. At the December 2023 Popular Education Meeting, we analyzed past land struggles such as the fight from Comite de Defensa del Barrio with the Mesa Royale tenants and compared that to our own current social and political conditions; naming the enemies of our communities and how to shift Power towards tenants. 


We then began our reflection on the past 12-months of VTU by asking individual members to share impactful experiences, pressing issues and challenges in the union, committees and locals in a survey. Receiving responses from members in different committees and locals, the working group compiled them into a report and analyzed the responses. Experiences, issues and challenges that were brought up repeatedly in members’ responses were categorized into 6 themes or common topics to be discussed:


1. Solidarity with Houseless Tenants

Throughout the year, we formed a houseless working group, held union-wide political discussion on houseless unions, joined Food Not Bombs to provide material support and build relationships. However, many of those efforts have become inert or fallen flat.


2. Language Justice in the Union

Everyone has the right to understand and be understood in the language in which they are most comfortable. This year, the Language Justice Committee was formed, VTU incorporated interpretation at a couple popular education meetings; however, language justice is varied at different levels of the union including outreach to multilingual communities and language barriers at the apartment–level.


3. Keeping Our Eyes on the Horizon

The fight for the human right to housing for all is difficult to keep in focus when someone is being pushed from their home or living in conditions. Much of what we do in our union grows out of supporting people in these crises. While we are often able to support their fight and even build organizing power within our neighborhoods, we do not make time for intentional learning and planning together on the broader issues that we face as a movement. Issues such as indigenous and international land struggles, high rates of evictions, light rail expansions and others that we often aren’t able to address.


4. The Union Is What Tenants Make of It

As we work to sustain our movement, we are challenged by the core organizing work being done by too few people whether that be in the union, local or committees. Additionally, those who have been members for a longer time wondered how to re-engage those who have fallen off, and newer members asked how to make getting oriented easier.


5. Organizing Where We Live, Block by Block

The tenant union is an important space where we all can support each other, show solidarity and share our struggles. We’ve done a lot to work on our internal structures, socializing between members and showing out for fights like the Periwinkle Mobile Homes Tenants against GCU! However, there’s not enough of us organizing where we live or bringing our neighbors into the locals.


6. Conflict Engagement


At the general meeting in January 2024, we formed small breakout groups made up of members in different locals and committees and each were assigned various themes to discuss. Groups were also provided with survey responses and supplemental questions to provide guidance while creating recommendations for the union in the new year.


In February, groups reconvened to share recommendations to the union and underwent a final round of union discussion before plotting them onto a 2024 timeline. In summary, our goals this year are to emphasize building our tenant union locals and encourage organizing within areas we live, more door knocking and workshops, increasing our language justice capacities, having more support for newer members joining and lower stakes opportunities to build the social fabric between tenants.


It might be excessive to reflect on the reflection… but how else would we learn to not repeat the same mistakes! There was a gap in-between the meetings so members’ capacities waned as some were able to contribute in either the beginning or the end. Discussing themes, recommendations and the 2024 timeline felt rushed because we had to fit it into the duration of general meetings that had other union topics. Would recommend that future end-of-year reflections span all day, over a weekend (convention-style) to be able to discuss as much as we can and with as many members as possible. The survey-style format was helpful for individual tenants to think about their own experiences in the union but we could have benefited if those questions were discussed more collectively (whether that be at the local-level, committees or union-wide) so that common themes/propositions would have been deciphered within those groups rather than by a small working group. We did not get a chance to discuss how we’d be accountable to these 2024 goals and a suggestion is that the union has a mid-year check-in to go over what we’ve accomplished or where we’re falling short.


Excited and hopeful for the growth of the union in 2024! Through this process, it’s clear that all revolutionary organizations need to be intentional and focused with their reflections, especially when it comes to collective analysis and assessment of our experiences.  Would like to just end this reflection by plainly quoting Jose Maria Sison and the importance of “Revolutionary Study & Proper Analysis”: 


“When we act on our plans, we continue to investigate and analyze the conditions. More information is added. We are able to confirm the main conditions, while we separate these from erroneous ones. We are able to analyze according to practice, the results of our actions whether these are right or wrong. We are continuously sharpening the whole condition so that we can determine and act on its changes. Based on newer, richer and more precise ideas and conclusions, we reassess our plans and modify our actions to streamline the change we want according to the present situation. We rectify our past errors, correct false ideas and actions and criticize wrong actions. We can also consolidate and strengthen what we concluded to be true and correct ideas and actions. 


If we are able to gather enough experience, we can conclude our entire experience to be able to gather deeper lessons. These lessons will serve as guides in newer and higher stages of struggle.”


Sources:

 

Valley Tenants Union // Sindicato de Inquilinos del Valle

instagram/twitter/facebook @valleytenants

Contact // Contacto: valleytenants@proton.me


North & Central Phoenix // Norte y Centro de Phoenix

Meeting every 2nd Monday at 6:00PM // Reunión cada segundo lunes a las 6PM

Email VTUNorthCentral@proton.me for meeting information // Envíe un correo electrónico a VTUNorthCentral@proton.me para obtener información sobre la reunión


South & West Phoenix // Sur y Oeste de Phoenix

Meeting every 4th Thursday at 6:30PM // Reunión cada curto jueves a las 6:30PM

Location // Ubicación: ​1625 N 39th Ave, Phoenix, AZ 85009

Email swvalleytenants@proton.me for meeting information // Envíe un correo electrónico a swvalleytenants@proton.me para obtener información sobre la reunión


Tempe & East Valley // Tempe y Este del Valley

Email VTUTempe@proton.me for meeting information // Envíe un correo electrónico a  VTUTempe@proton.me para obtener información sobre la reunión

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