If the rent check you write to your landlord every month continues to eat up larger %'s of your income, then you’ll be inspired to see what happened in Seattle last night, and what’s been happening there.
I personally don’t know much about the ins and outs of the rent control concept, but I do know that the rising cost of living, skyrocketing rent increases and job stagnation here in NYC where I live are a very real and present crisis. A recent report ranks Seattle as the the top of fasting rising rents out of 81 cities. Kshama Sawant’s fundamental socialist platforms are by far the most progressive in the country, as they apply to finding relief for the 99%, and I believe in her. And she’s taking on the issue in a big way.
Sawant has already earned more credibility than most elected politicians. To wit, she was just a City Council member-elect when she went on record encouraging Boeing workers to take over their manufacturing plants in response to the long-time Seattle company's threat to leave if they were taxed more. Her election campaign group Socialist Alternative are behind the formation of the popular and growing #FightFor15 campaign. Her fearless passion for holding the banks, corporate monopolies and wealthy landowners more accountable, is the kind of real change any democratic voter can truly believe in.
But there was more to last night’s incredibly animated town hall meeting than just a public forum, which was expressed by Sawant in her opening remarks. She added that while the meeting was about offering affordable housing and the reeling out-of-control rent hikes, it wasn’t only about hearing remarks from your elected leaders. This was about starting a movement, which is exactly how she was elected.
She and her colleague Nick Licata outlined concrete ways they can tackle the legal restrictions in place against rent control, and talked about tactics for pursuing residential land trusts in order to challenge investment realty. “This is the ground zero for the housing justice movement today,” she proclaimed to great applause. She explained how important it is to take back the messaging, not letting the real estate cabals hijack the conversation. The assembled were not mere passive spectators. They were thoughtful and impassioned and in obvious solidarity with these two politicians. For an outsider look in, it did indeed seem like the kind of night in which movements were started.
I watched the packed town hall in delight. This was not Town Hall (TM). I’ve given up on all the msm garbage years ago, stale shows like Meet The Press with the same old crotchety, full of shit, tired war horses. Old white pandering patriarchal politicians give me the creeps. Cable news is mostly a joke too. I’m sick to death of hearing from smug, self-satisfied, on-the-payroll professional pundits. I want to hear more from everyday people, who have nothing to lose and are not afraid of speaking with refreshing honesty and authenticity about lives under enforced austerity and corporate domination. The kind of people Studs Terkel talked to.
Marginalized human beings of all creeds, colors, and backgrounds, were given the platform. Released from the darkness of anxiety sweating over how to pay their bills, they let loose with a fusillade of heartbreaking stories of displacement, homelessness and despair of feeling like one’s always just trying to catch up or hold on.
One after another they filed up to the mike, to be heard for 1.5 min.
It was riveting, sad and awe-inspiring.
With the corporate jet of the Citizen United States of Business Who Wants To Be A Millionaire American Idol Electoral Sweepstakes already on the runway warming up for takeoff and beginning to choke us with its noxious fumes, this was eminently hopeful and refreshing.
This is how it’s done, people.
(Apologies for not being able to make the screen bigger to watch on this page.)
Here's a link for full-size video.
The fight's been going on for some time.
"A brief history of rent control in Seattle, 1978-2015"