Activate the Tenant Class with the Neighbourhood Organizing Centre
This installment of the TENANT POWER series features three members of the Ottawa Neighbourhood Organizing Centre (NOC) and their work supporting tenants in their fight against landlords, and of course, capitalism.
The work of the NOC began in the most organic way. By going into their community and talking to as many people as possible. Listening to their neighbours and finding common ground. Overwhelmingly, people needed and most importantly, wanted to fight, as tenants.
Hear how they continue to learn from one another and build power where they are. Quite literally going door by door, building by building and block by block to Activate the Tenant Class.
Guests: Seema Shafei, Shivangi Misra, Ethan Mitchell
CALLS TO ACTION:
- If you are a tenant organization, please reach out to NOC through their Instagram, or email us at bpofdisruption@gmail.com
- Donations can be made to the Bank Block Tenants here
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Transcript
This is Blueprints of Disruption, a podcast made for rabble rousers, and I'm Jessyl McClean.
Speaker:You're in for another installment of Tenant Power, a series that should really worry landlords,
Speaker:which is actually what our next guests aim to do. Landlords really, their whole business
Speaker:model is based on inflicting violence on people, on tenants, which they are completely removed
Speaker:from. So they can force people out of their homes, onto the street. They can force people
Speaker:to live in horrible conditions while they live in mansions and they never have to deal with
Speaker:it. So I think with 2025, I know Toronto is a bit ahead of where we are in Ottawa, but
Speaker:we're gonna show them that they can't get away with it anymore. That you can't inflict this
Speaker:kind of violence on people and expect to just wash your hands of it and live comfortably
Speaker:in your home. It's just not gonna, that era has passed. That was Ethan Mitchell. He'll
Speaker:be joined by Seema Shafi and Shivangi Misha, all of the Neighborhood Organizing Center in
Speaker:Ottawa. This piece perfectly complements last week's discussion with the Bag Block Tenants,
Speaker:who praised the work this group is doing to activate the tenant class, as they say, door
Speaker:by door, building by building, and block by block. How would you describe your organization?
Speaker:I mean, we'll get into the nitty gritty, but like you have to come up with a little bio
Speaker:for your insta. How can you describe yourself to the audience? Yeah, I would say that the
Speaker:neighborhood organizing center or knock, and I'm also a big fan of the acronym in part because
Speaker:we've knocked on so many doors over the last couple of years. It just seems appropriate
Speaker:at this point. But yeah, the brief description of it would be that we are a group of people
Speaker:who have come together to build capacity to support tenant organizing. So our focus is
Speaker:on being that kind of structure in our community where we can build familiarity, where we can
Speaker:develop knowledge of how tenants can fight and win, and where we can develop some structures,
Speaker:too, of community support. And concretely, um, work with tenants who want to get organized
Speaker:in their buildings or on their blocks to form a tenant committee or a tenant union. So we
Speaker:see ourselves kind of in that supporting role and building capacity. Just because there have
Speaker:been so many struggles where tenants are faced with an eviction or with some serious maintenance
Speaker:issues or an above guideline rent increase. And it's not like in the in labor organizing
Speaker:where there's a very clear framework for how things like bargaining and unionization are
Speaker:supposed to work. A lot of the time tenants are having to learn those lessons for the first
Speaker:time when they're faced with a critical issue. So our goal is to make sure that tenants don't
Speaker:have to learn the same thing every time, but that there's a group of people in the community
Speaker:who can be there in support of those tenants and help share some lessons that have been
Speaker:learned and support them in forming, building their power in their buildings. That really
Speaker:hits because we've talked to so many tenant unions that have begun when their backs are
Speaker:against the wall. They're having to do that learning process in a moment of crisis. It's
Speaker:traumatic getting an eviction notice or exhausting having to go up against a landlord for a maintenance
Speaker:issue. It's likely hit a peak in your frustration and then you have to figure out how to organize
Speaker:yourself. absolutely, it's like preventative medicine. And I can't tell you how excited
Speaker:I am to talk to you folks because. The audience will know we've really focused on tenant organizing
Speaker:and tenant unions here at Blue Sub-Disruption because of the potential it holds to harness
Speaker:the power of the, you know, quote unquote, working class. 30% of people are tenants in Canada.
Speaker:That is a huge number to leverage. It's also a huge power imbalance, which I'm sure you've
Speaker:heard about. We've got a million episodes dedicated to that as well. So these folks are going to
Speaker:help us understand how they do what they do, what those support structures look like, and
Speaker:update us on how it's going for tenants in the Ottawa area. Seema, is there anything you want
Speaker:to add to Ethan's description of the organization that makes you unique? Essentially, the Neighborhood
Speaker:Organizing Center came out of a bunch of mass work that was done, work. door knocking on
Speaker:people's buildings throughout Ottawa to ask people what it is that they saw as a really
Speaker:pressing issue in the city that they needed assistance with or that they wanted to organize
Speaker:around. And that was over the course of a year, year and a half. We did door knock in the neighborhood,
Speaker:in the center town, center town west neighborhood and spoke to people and we spoke to, like we
Speaker:door knocked, we spoke to a bunch of people about their jobs, about... just our everyday
Speaker:life and what matters the most and what are the main issues that our community is facing
Speaker:and overwhelmingly it was housing and then followed closely with the cost of living. It's not a
Speaker:surprise to anyone, but I think talking to more and more people strengthened that and that
Speaker:led to the People's Assembly, which was an event where people came together and we spoke about
Speaker:what... kind of neighborhood organizing has happened. It is in the history of Ottawa and
Speaker:what can be done. And from People's Assembly, as we were organizing the People's Assembly,
Speaker:some tenants on Bank Street had begun organizing a tenant committee to resist their mass eviction.
Speaker:And one of those folks organizing BBT was also one of the main organizers of the People's
Speaker:Assembly. So we were closely connected right from the beginning. At that event, we spoke
Speaker:about some general analysis of the housing situation in Ottawa as well as what we can do about it.
Speaker:And the kind of big takeaway from it on the one hand was the need to fight and to struggle.
Speaker:Recognizing that what's often called the housing crisis is not a system that's not working the
Speaker:way it's intended to. The housing crisis is a system working exactly the way it's intended
Speaker:to, which is to say exploiting working class people. in order to enrich landlords and developers
Speaker:and big investors. So a big focus of the People's Assembly event last summer of 2023 was how
Speaker:do we fight? And our next steps that we identified based on hearing from other tenant organizers
Speaker:in the city, for example, folks that had been involved in the Herringgate struggle, as well
Speaker:as an eviction. defense at Osgoode Chambers, also in Ottawa in the Sandy Hill neighborhood.
Speaker:The big takeaway was that we need to get organized, not just at the city level or building organizations
Speaker:at a large scale or at the neighborhood or city level, but building by building and block by
Speaker:block, which also gelled with our initial assessment of the People's Assembly, where we had a good
Speaker:turnout at the event. but it wasn't necessarily the people who we really wanted to be there.
Speaker:We spoke to a number of tenants in preparation for that who were facing severe issues, whether
Speaker:maintenance or eviction, or other kinds of abuse by their landlord. And even though we spoke
Speaker:to some of those people a number of times, many of them didn't show up at that event. So we
Speaker:kind of realized that we need something deeper and more structural if we want to actually
Speaker:support. tenant organizing in a way which is impactful. Our goal as a group was to find
Speaker:tenants who had issues and support them in getting organized. And this is the group that evolved
Speaker:over the last year plus into the Neighborhood Organizing Center as we gained more experience
Speaker:doing that and internally became more organized. And now we're at a point where we're going
Speaker:to reconvene the People's Assembly, but with these lessons in mind. I absolutely love how
Speaker:you had to re-evaluate. Like you knew you had people in mind and you knew there was people
Speaker:who needed help. And, you know, even though I've heard great things about the People's
Speaker:Assembly, it wasn't enough, right? So rather than just beat your head against the wall,
Speaker:it was a pivot of sorts, but I... I would be curious to hear the lessons you're going to
Speaker:apply because some of the people in the audience have organized town halls, I'm sure, or been
Speaker:to them. Maybe not, like a people's assembly with that spirit in mind, if you understand
Speaker:what I mean. I mean, most of the town halls I think a lot of us have experienced are usually
Speaker:just platforms for politicians or... local leaders or somebody with an agenda, right? Somebody
Speaker:who wants to relay information, maybe just be accessible for questions. But this is different.
Speaker:This is a form of democracy. A lot of people have an experience. I mean, maybe you did a
Speaker:great job the first time, but can you talk a little bit how you create an environment that
Speaker:you can rightfully call a people's assembly? Right? So you're not talking to people, but
Speaker:you're gathering voices in an effective way. Yeah, I think that's a great question. I'm
Speaker:sure others will also want to speak to this, but I'll just start off. For us, the assessment
Speaker:is really that it's good and it's necessary to have something like a larger people's assembly
Speaker:or a larger forum, which brings together people from across different neighborhoods. But in
Speaker:order for that to be successful in the way that we want it to be successful, it has to be built
Speaker:on a foundation. And that foundation is immediate organizing in people's buildings with their
Speaker:neighbors and on people's blocks. Because what we're talking about really with tenant organizing
Speaker:is something that is genuinely it has the potential to be transformative. And in order to get people
Speaker:organized to a point where we can push forward that kind of transformative politics, we need
Speaker:to have more than just a few conversations with them. in a large group, we found while working
Speaker:with the bank block tenants, for example, how neighbors who see each other every day, who
Speaker:live side by side and who share the same conditions and the same interests and the same struggles,
Speaker:in those groups there's potential to have a much deeper form of discussion, of democracy,
Speaker:and also of engagement. So moving forward with organizing at the level of the people's assembly,
Speaker:our goal is really to build up from immediate struggles in buildings and on blocks where
Speaker:neighbors can have that direct engagement with one another. And then from there, it can be
Speaker:built up to a larger level where people in different buildings representing their buildings can
Speaker:engage with one another. And that's our goal going forward. a tenants union union.
Speaker:If I could add to that, like what Ethan had said previously about, you know, there being
Speaker:rules and regulations and legislation specifically around labor organizing, what that looks like,
Speaker:certain parameters that have to be met before the next step is completed. there isn't really
Speaker:that rule book in the same way for tenant organizing. In Ontario, the Residential Tenancies Act simply
Speaker:just says, you have a right to organize and the landlord can't interfere with that organizing.
Speaker:But beyond that, it's really up to tenants themselves to be able to figure out what exactly needs
Speaker:to be taken, how to create power for themselves. And in that realm, there is a lot more creative
Speaker:potential because there isn't, there's not limitations to tenant organizing in the same way that labor
Speaker:organizing is. So we are kind of at a really good ground for shaping how tenants build back
Speaker:their own power. Union organizing can be so frustrating because you have to stay in these
Speaker:avenues of bureaucracy often that just, you know, it's not really effective to... disruptive
Speaker:change. And when you're going up against landlords, and I imagine we've seen tenant unions bring
Speaker:cockroaches down to the office buildings of the landlord. And I imagine that just wouldn't
Speaker:be on the manual of union organizing of ways you could negotiate with your boss. The good
Speaker:news is also the threshold, that number threshold, although it's ideal to get as many people as
Speaker:possible in your building signed on. five good shit disturbers in a building telling the landlord,
Speaker:you know, pushing back on the lack of notice or anything is better than nothing, you know,
Speaker:and can get a lot done. Right. Even in the labor organizing context, right, all this legislation,
Speaker:all the rules came out a very specific history of labor unions becoming very real shit disturbers.
Speaker:So the point that the government needed to pass legislation to be able to control it and saying,
Speaker:okay. We can't control this any longer just by putting people in prison, because that's
Speaker:really not working anymore. We have to create this very bureaucratic rule book for labor
Speaker:unions to be able to still exist, but we still have control over them. And over time, as we've
Speaker:seen, you know, government support a lot of the times. So we've seen this in, you know,
Speaker:private companies having more and more power. places, taking their factories overseas, that
Speaker:kind of thing, that there's not necessarily the same idea of a workplace floor anymore.
Speaker:And it becomes harder and harder to organize. So whatever unions do exist, a lot of the times
Speaker:their current idea, their current focus is around how to maintain the power that they do have
Speaker:rather than organizing the unorganized. But we currently intend on organizing. We're still
Speaker:in that. preliminary stage to be able to have the breadth and freedom to be able to define
Speaker:those parameters without that government intervention. And there's also room for mutual solidarity
Speaker:there. So the nature of the struggle that we are in, the tenant organizing, it makes the
Speaker:labor movement a natural and necessary ally as well. So Building a working class movement,
Speaker:which is based on the collective power to be able to bargain and win gains for ourselves
Speaker:is the basic principle which is connecting us to labor. So that remains. And we see the differences
Speaker:and we see that we have the tenant organizing, we see it as a part of the labor movement,
Speaker:even though the labor movement may have, with the concessions from the government because
Speaker:of the labor organizing. So similarly, the working class movement in Canada. tenant organizing
Speaker:is a part of it. And these struggles can mutually reinforce each other too. So we see the unions
Speaker:in Canada with thousands of workers, they have the potential to support organizing in neighborhoods.
Speaker:And also our homes have become the site of struggle as well. So it is important to recognize that
Speaker:the tenant unions can also support the labor unions in building that community support for
Speaker:their bargaining efforts. So there can be mutual support at the workplace, but also where we
Speaker:live, right? So... For example, the BBT, the bank block tenants, they received critical
Speaker:financial support from locals and regional union committees. These funds are so crucial for
Speaker:supporting tenants materially. So in BBT's case, to be able to afford lawyers against landlords
Speaker:and big law. And if you want to see successful organizing in our city, the labor movement
Speaker:can play that important role through material and hopefully political support as well. Absolutely.
Speaker:It can help politicize people as well. I met union workers or tenants quite often going,
Speaker:realizing your power through connecting with your neighbors and having a villain of sorts
Speaker:that you band against. It creates an awakening. Class consciousness naturally emerges without
Speaker:literature perhaps. That always helps, but it just kind of seems to happen naturally when
Speaker:people especially get to see a victory. So encouraging the work of somebody already there pushing
Speaker:up against a landlord, it's great to see that the locals recognize that value, right? Could
Speaker:you only imagine if the city of Ottawa could see a victory from the tenants union there?
Speaker:I mean, it's not like it's been without. Can you report on any victories from tenants in
Speaker:Ottawa? There is definitely victories, not in the same way, because our odds are stacked
Speaker:against, you know, laws and big landlords. But there are moments where you see, basically
Speaker:things would have happened much faster, evictions would have gone on much faster, the compensations,
Speaker:like landlords would be getting away with much more and much lesser time if the tenants were
Speaker:not organized. Even looking at the bank block tenants, like they've been able to organize
Speaker:against their landlord smart living properties that their own employees have also. in some
Speaker:cases left the organization or there you can see the community support that is rising around
Speaker:to push back, exposing investors in their land, people who are doctors in the neighborhood
Speaker:who are invested in these landlords which are evicting people. So victory is also in different
Speaker:steps, like step by step, we are seeing it every step of the way that even gaining, for example,
Speaker:what I spoke about the labor movement supporting it, more and more people getting involved.
Speaker:I would count that as like a big win for tenants as we go along. As Ethan mentioned, like we've
Speaker:seen an incredible amount of support from people. So for the bank block tenants have been an
Speaker:inspiration for many week by week, day by day, being present in the community. We are meeting
Speaker:people passing by, doing their groceries on the weekend, walking their dogs, stopping to
Speaker:see the tenants and us on the sidewalk and talking to us. And we see that people are interested
Speaker:and they want to know more. But what is important about this interaction is that it's not just
Speaker:to support from the outside. People are sharing their own experiences of renovations and demo
Speaker:evictions. And you hear about the landlords neglecting their homes, the lack of repairs
Speaker:and maintenance, constant threat of eviction looming over all our heads. And then we learn
Speaker:about landlord tactics. So to evict tenants before even reaching the landlord and tenant
Speaker:board. And we can go more and more into this, but I feel like this is a time where because
Speaker:some people have that these tenants are leading the struggle and have organized themselves
Speaker:and are opposing some very powerful people in the city, people are feeling more empowered
Speaker:to come out and not only in support, but also organizing themselves and their buildings.
Speaker:So I would count that as a win, I think, starting that process. I would agree in the sense that,
Speaker:you know, we are quite new, but one of the things that we have constantly seen is through being...
Speaker:organized, we are seeing tenants recognizing themselves as political actors. And so it's
Speaker:not just about, you know, understanding their rights or feeling empowered to enforce their
Speaker:rights, but even going so far as to demand more, to see themselves as having a role to play
Speaker:in the sort of society that they want to live in for themselves and for future generations.
Speaker:Oh, that's just music probably to everybody's ears who's hearing that because that is half
Speaker:the struggle, if not more. Obviously, you can't quantify people realizing that they deserve
Speaker:more and that they absolutely have the power within them to get it, if organized. If organized.
Speaker:And that doesn't just mean teaming up. with your neighbors. That is the first step in tenant
Speaker:organizing, you know, meeting your neighbors and finding common ground. But if we could
Speaker:talk about to making these connections and how you folks talk about a lot of door knocking,
Speaker:we'd call that deep canvassing, right? And that seems to be how you're reaching a lot of people.
Speaker:You also have weekly meetings where you're finding new tenant groups or potential new tenant unions
Speaker:popping up. I told you that I just kind of put a TikTok up about tenant organizing and a friend
Speaker:mentioned, oh yeah, last year my building was organized into a union, just like really nonchalantly.
Speaker:And I'm going, how many are there out there? And if there's so many out there, we need to
Speaker:get them connected. We need to get them organized amongst themselves, right? To create that massive
Speaker:power. So. few folks can hit on the things that you do that would kind of qualify as organizing.
Speaker:Because I think sometimes when we say it, people don't know sometimes what that means, what
Speaker:that means for your time. What are you actually doing to support the bank block tenants and
Speaker:grow networks of tenants? Since last summer, I suppose, we've been working on building community
Speaker:support for the... bank block tenants and their struggle. That process has been led by the
Speaker:bank block tenants as an organization and our role is to work as supporters based on what
Speaker:they tell us they need from us to try to build that community support. And what that looks
Speaker:like concretely is as we alluded to before, a lot of door knocking. So when they have calls
Speaker:to action. or if they have stuff they want to put out, we share it on social media, but we
Speaker:go door knocking, often with members of the Bank Block Tenants, to directly talk to others
Speaker:in the buildings around them in the neighbourhood about what's going on Bank Street and asking
Speaker:folks if they know about it, if they're interested in supporting, sharing the action items with
Speaker:them. But as part of that process, also asking them about the situation in their building.
Speaker:And we've found that more and more it seems like almost every building we're in has some
Speaker:kind of serious issue. Whether it's an above guideline rent increase, whether it's maintenance
Speaker:issues, there are so many rent evictions and dem evictions happening in central Ottawa,
Speaker:roughly speaking, right now. Almost everyone we talked to can relate immediately to what's
Speaker:happening on Bank Street. So as part of having those conversations, in addition to sharing
Speaker:the info from Bank Block Tenants, we also try to provide a way for those people to get involved
Speaker:by coming out door knocking with us maybe in the future or coming out to meetings. But we
Speaker:also support them if they have things in their building that they need, even if it's as simple
Speaker:as putting together a survey or delivering a letter. We can support them. in doing that.
Speaker:So it's just a lot of face-to-face interaction, connecting with people, seeing what they need,
Speaker:and building the capacity to support them. And now we're at a point where, since we've spoken
Speaker:to so many people, and we've learned a lot through building the People's Assembly, we're trying
Speaker:to create a space where tenants in those other buildings can relate to one another. and to
Speaker:struggles like those on bank block. Because we've seen the number one thing that people
Speaker:ask if we talk to them about getting organized is, has this ever happened before? Or they
Speaker:ask, has anyone ever managed to fight something like this? Has anyone ever won? Like the same
Speaker:question you were just asking. And there are examples locally too, at Osgoe Chambers and
Speaker:Manor Village for example, where tenants have been able to successfully resist eviction attempts.
Speaker:So just being able to, when we talk to people, putting them in touch with the bank block tenants
Speaker:and showing them what's going on, sometimes one block down the street from them can really
Speaker:open the doors for what's possible in their building. And that's a lot of what that community
Speaker:support building work looks like concretely.
Speaker:These landlords and law firms, and they rely on the isolation and alienation of tenants
Speaker:as well. And in a lot of these cases, you will see that because of the lack of support, because
Speaker:of the lack of awareness, and awareness is not everything. However, it is key to know that
Speaker:you can fight this. And when they see that other people are also organizing, we have actually
Speaker:seen in how... Even a little bit of just connecting from one tenant to the other can lead to them
Speaker:deciding to take action and then leading that. So the landlords are organized among themselves.
Speaker:They are well organized with their common lawyers, with their team of people, with a team of property
Speaker:managers and strategies. So on our end, combining our efforts just makes sense. With tenant organizing
Speaker:happening all across Canada. We, and like a big shout out to Vancouver Tenants Union, who
Speaker:we have worked in solidarity with, extended our solidarity to them, and they have extended
Speaker:solidarity to us as well. So one of their landlords and, or investors and one of their owners of
Speaker:their buildings was in Ottawa recently speaking at a public event and talking about different
Speaker:issues. completely ignoring the fact that they're actively evicting people in Vancouver. So,
Speaker:people in Ottawa have disrupted their events, have spoken to them and asked them the tough
Speaker:questions in Ottawa that why are you evicting people? How are you comfortable evicting people
Speaker:in Vancouver and what do you have to say about that? But no answers. Similarly, a Toronto
Speaker:tenants, Thorncliffe tenants recently drove six hours to Ottawa. and attended and confronted
Speaker:the PSP investments, their public event where they were reporting to their decision makers
Speaker:and also the people whose funds they manage. And these tenants confronted them, Thorncliffe
Speaker:tenants here in Ottawa and asked them the questions like, what do you have to say for increasing
Speaker:rent above guidelines and evicting thousands of tenants? Complete silence in the room, not
Speaker:a word. So, you know, they cannot even look the tenants that they are evicting in their
Speaker:eyes and have a response. Nothing. I love how they fly across the country or halfway across
Speaker:the country, some of them, and just to be faced with the issues they thought they left behind
Speaker:and how heartwarming it must have felt as being those tenant unions and seeing folks act in
Speaker:solidarity all that way away, just haunting these investors wherever they go. Absolutely.
Speaker:I don't think they should be at peace and remove themselves from the tenants who they are actively
Speaker:evicting. Make landlords afraid again. And Toronto has experienced a few victories of its own
Speaker:with tenant unions, even at the Landlord Tenant Board, which would surprise a lot of people.
Speaker:You can tell the people you talk to, they have gone on rent strike and won. There's another
Speaker:set of tenants that just the other day were able to come to an amicable agreement with
Speaker:their landlord after being on rent strike for a very, very long time. And no wonder people
Speaker:feel like that. I don't think some people will realize, especially if they've been listening,
Speaker:because we know about tenant rights, but there are people who will simply get an eviction,
Speaker:not notice, like not an N13s. They'll get their landlord telling them to get out. And they
Speaker:have no idea if they have. any rights at all. Like they are just scrambling to find a new
Speaker:place to live. So for those people to then discover what a possible alternative is, that must be
Speaker:mind blowing at first and come with a lot of skepticism, right? I imagine that folks are
Speaker:worried about getting in trouble going up against their landlord in the same way that you would
Speaker:get in a workplace hesitation to unionize as to not stir the pot. So Yeah, finding more
Speaker:and more examples to provide people is critical. That's how all revolutions begin. Typically,
Speaker:it's also by learning from previous ones, right? Seeing previous victories and knowing it is
Speaker:something that's achievable. You know, if we think back to the course of the past half century
Speaker:and we see a decimation of social supports, government services, wages not keeping up with
Speaker:inflation. And even those who might be afforded social supports, you know, their constant surveillance,
Speaker:the government constantly threatening to yank these supports away at a moment's notice. This
Speaker:lack of a social safety net ends up performing this disciplinary force over the working class
Speaker:so that people, working class people become concerned with maintaining what little scraps
Speaker:the government provides them. rather than feeling empowered to enforce any rights that the government
Speaker:tells them that they have, let alone even demanding more. And so we have, we see this constantly
Speaker:with door knocking, with talking to tenants is they're constantly in a situation where
Speaker:they feel they don't want a target to be put on their back for enforcing rights. They don't
Speaker:want to become a problem. So, you know, as you said, when a landlord tells them you have to
Speaker:leave, or even if they are given an N13 notice, which the landlord tenant board doesn't even
Speaker:have access to, it's just the preliminary notice. they might immediately read that and think,
Speaker:oh, I have two or three months to leave, I'm just going to leave. And no matter how many
Speaker:times an individual is told, oh, you don't necessarily have to leave right now, you can have a hearing
Speaker:in eight or nine months or whatever the time period is to be able to possibly get your apartment
Speaker:back. Tenants oftentimes just think it's not worth the trouble, it's not worth the stress
Speaker:of thinking, oh, I might be thrown on the street. So it's just this intense. power imbalance
Speaker:that has had this civilizing effect over the course of the past half century or so. And
Speaker:it's only through this collective power for people to be able to turn to their neighbors
Speaker:and say, you know, as an individual, we might have this power, but together, we have a hundred
Speaker:times as much power. That's where we see an ability to be able for tenants to successfully
Speaker:organize and fight against the immense power of these landlords. You used civilizing with
Speaker:such disdain. Like, I've never heard anybody use that word in a negative way. I know we
Speaker:all understand the issues with that word and Western civilization, but like she didn't miss
Speaker:a beat, you know, it's had this civilizing effect, you know, that we wish we could undo. And it's
Speaker:just. Sorry, that was such a moment for me because I was like, he knows where we're at. Right?
Speaker:She gets it. Ethan, I'm sorry. What were you going to say, brother? Oh, no problem. No,
Speaker:I was just going to say I think that the point that Seema was making connects to, I think,
Speaker:another point that she's made many times in our organizing, which is the importance of
Speaker:being proactive. And that's something that, as the knock, that's one of our focuses is.
Speaker:not just waiting until there is a critical issue, not just waiting until there is an eviction
Speaker:to organize in a building, but to create tenant committees and structures in buildings well
Speaker:before that happens. Because we've seen landlords try to use every trick imaginable to get tenants
Speaker:out of the building, whether it's directly threatening them, whether it's trying to trick them into
Speaker:there's really no low that they won't stoop to. So I think it speaks to the importance
Speaker:of having people organized even before that point, so that when something comes up, people
Speaker:know what their rights are, but they're also already in touch with their neighbors, they
Speaker:don't feel as isolated, they can discuss it collectively. And going forward, that's one
Speaker:of the things that we're really trying to do, is develop those structures in buildings and
Speaker:blocks. getting neighbors talking to one another well before a building has been issued with
Speaker:eviction notices or a similar critical crisis point has been reached. We've heard from York's
Speaker:Southwest tenant unions that immediately after the ruling in their favor from the landlord
Speaker:tenant board, the attitude of the landlord changed. interactions with property management became,
Speaker:shall we say, civilized. And it was the repercussions of tenant organizing that started to mitigate
Speaker:some of the predatory behaviors of the landlord. Do you think we're reaching a level of tenant
Speaker:organizing where landlords will have to change
Speaker:they, I think, will need to adapt their tactics because this isolation that you say that they
Speaker:rely on, which is absolutely true, you and other people doing this good work are eroding that
Speaker:and they can't use the normal manipulation tactics and the power imbalance is also being eroded,
Speaker:right, with the people power you're building. So can you imagine how landlords are going
Speaker:to respond? Should I say our goal is to... Our goal is to make housing not profitable again.
Speaker:Abolish landlords, is that the new hashtag? Yeah, I mean, that is the ultimate goal. Until
Speaker:we get there though, it'd be nice to know that they at least make it known to them that we're
Speaker:here to keep them in check in the same way bosses of unionized workplaces understand their limitations.
Speaker:because a lot of landlords don't take unions seriously. Are you finding that? I mean, obviously,
Speaker:because you've been dealing with bank block, one of their main gripes was, you know, the
Speaker:landlord refused to even talk to them collectively, recognize them collectively. Now the landlord
Speaker:tenant board did recognize the tenants in Toronto collectively because the landlord tried to
Speaker:take them to the board for their rent strike. And they said, okay, well, we're also going
Speaker:to bring our complaints at the same time collectively. And that was a huge, that was a huge win. I
Speaker:mean, that's what ensured that they were able to, I think, gain the upper hand there. Can
Speaker:you speak to that at all? In just trying to find ways to get landlords to understand this
Speaker:absolutely is a serious thing that you are going to have to deal with as a collective. Like
Speaker:you said, whatever that big win may look like, and of course we want to end the commodification
Speaker:of housing, right? Like that's the ultimate goal. We look at them as investors, not the
Speaker:rebranding that they're attempting to do with like, oh, they're small landlords, big landlords.
Speaker:At the end of the day, the commodification itself supported by policies and government laws and
Speaker:policies and infrastructure is at the root cause of this. That goal in mind, but on an everyday
Speaker:level, like the immediate demands that Ethan was talking about. In the case of bank block
Speaker:tenants, they have been consistently from day one saying, we are a collective. You will talk
Speaker:to bank block tenants. That's what they're saying to the landlords. And as we have seen, there
Speaker:was a rally recently. It's almost like movie-like villain. They would shut their drapes on us
Speaker:as we are standing outside their offices, and the tenants are standing outside saying, you
Speaker:said you want to talk to us. Here we are with 40 and 50 other people. Let's talk. and the
Speaker:property managers are shutting their drapes, closing in as if we are, I don't know what,
Speaker:they're closing the doors on us and hiding inside, trying to enter from the back doors to their
Speaker:own offices. The extent that they would go to avoid talking to tenants is just crazy. They
Speaker:also, one of the things, one of the tactics that they've used, that's an example of when
Speaker:landlords are forced to change their tactics or scramble in the face of this collective
Speaker:power is, the rebranding that they keep doing. So smart living properties, they own whose
Speaker:names and faces people in our community know that you are the owner of smart living properties.
Speaker:They will go ahead and change their name to something else and rebrand completely and then
Speaker:show up again in your neighborhood. So that's an example of what they try to do, that they're
Speaker:in a corner, they're cornered and so they come up with new tactics, but they're not fooling
Speaker:anybody. people realize in the neighborhood that we are talking to each other. And when
Speaker:these changes happen and you cannot do that in isolation anymore, you cannot have a hearing
Speaker:expecting the tenant to not show up. Because if they are talking to other tenants, they
Speaker:know that showing up is important. So things like that, I think, is one of the examples
Speaker:that I could think of that how the landlords also are now coming up with new tactics is
Speaker:because they're forced to. And any victory in labor history or any other people working class
Speaker:victory is because they were forced to change that. So this collective power, it's not going
Speaker:to be asked nicely and they are going to give these concessions. I think this building of
Speaker:collective power is absolutely necessary and issuing, I think, results. LESLIE KENDRICK
Speaker:I was just thinking of another example of a tactic that landlords have taken now. What
Speaker:is that now they're filing defamation claims against? tenants and tenant unions, and that's
Speaker:happening in Toronto and Vancouver, to get to use their resources, their whole host of lawyers
Speaker:to file these bogus defamation claims in the hope of instilling fear in these groups so
Speaker:that they have to second-guess the sorts of posters and information that they're distributing
Speaker:in public. so that they have to second guess communications that they're having amongst
Speaker:each other. So it ends up having this, their intention is to have this sort of chilling
Speaker:effect on the organizing of tenants. Those have to be slap suits, you know, hopefully a court
Speaker:sees those for what they are. Those are, and Ontario does have protections for that, but
Speaker:that's when, you know, those material supports that you're talking about that not everybody
Speaker:can provide, but locals can, and some people can, but. it for the legal fees, the unnecessary
Speaker:legal fees. Some people might not understand just how extensive it gets, but those are really
Speaker:classic tactics, I think, of capital. We've seen corporations use those tactics. I'll tell
Speaker:you, the NDP employed similar tactics. Their main focus was keeping writings from talking
Speaker:to one another so that you couldn't share gripes or experiences with abuses And that is, it's
Speaker:all part of that civilization, that's civilizing, diminishing of power, right? And the second
Speaker:guessing is when you're asking people to just forge ahead and take risks, that's really tricky
Speaker:when it just gets thicker and thicker, you know, with lawsuits that they wouldn't expect. I
Speaker:don't imagine it worked though. Hopefully, hopefully that just makes people more angry. Like we
Speaker:shouldn't succumb to the legal. avenues because they've never worked for tenants in the first
Speaker:place. Landlord and tenant board and these other legal avenues, they are not designed to be
Speaker:giving or providing justice in this context. The Land, the Tenancies Act, it treats landlord
Speaker:and tenants, like landlords and service providers, and then the tenants that are receiving these
Speaker:services. That's how the treatment is. And if they're simply applying the law, but the law
Speaker:in itself. is not created or designed to see this as an exploitative relationship in the
Speaker:first place. So there is lack of recognition or development of the law at this point that
Speaker:sees this inherently as an exploitative relationship at the landlord and tenant board stage. So
Speaker:if they don't recognize that, the adjudicators have no responsibility and legal obligate.
Speaker:They have through the law, they can, right? But that needs to develop over time and that's
Speaker:what the struggle hopefully will also go. But organizing is primary because right now without
Speaker:that, they will not be compelled to. These facts that are being brought to the adjudicators,
Speaker:they have the ability, but they can only do that once they are forced to face the facts,
Speaker:which is this is how the tenants have organized themselves and also making those arguments
Speaker:in and of itself. So that's... work has to come. The second point I also wanted to say is this
Speaker:movement will require everybody. So it's, yes, we need the legal fees and we need the support
Speaker:and allyship and political and material support of the labor movement, but also lawyers and
Speaker:people who want to get involved using those skills to help the tenants as well, not for
Speaker:profit, not to profit off these services as well, because at the end of the day, these
Speaker:are absolutely critical services that the movement needs as well. So we have, there's different
Speaker:roles to fill. And I think more people getting involved and getting involved in those parts
Speaker:as well as necessary. But not the most important thing because without organizing there are
Speaker:massive limitations. What's the one number one need that you folks have right now? Whether
Speaker:it be material or logistical, if you could wave a magic wand and we could get you one thing.
Speaker:There's not one thing, but I think others can speak to that better. But I will say one thing
Speaker:that, yes, definitely, I think material support is necessary. So financial support for lawyers,
Speaker:yes. But secondly, I think what's important is come out, get out in person, come out for
Speaker:the door knocking, come out, meet us at the tables, and increase the strength as we meet
Speaker:out, for example, on Saturdays or any other weekly meetings to come out and then go out
Speaker:door knocking with us, get involved. become tenant reps in your buildings and organize
Speaker:your building, talk to your neighbors. That just cannot happen alone in an isolation. So
Speaker:come out, meet us in person, and reach out to us so that we can get involved and think of
Speaker:concrete ways how people can start supporting tenants. Because this is at the end of the
Speaker:day, not aid walk, this is not charity. Housing is not just a topical hot issue or strictly
Speaker:an academic issue, even though there's great work happening to study and expose systemic
Speaker:issues. While that is important, and policies and laws change when the ruling class is forced
Speaker:to change them. When I say that this isn't charity, then what it is, it's actually a group of tenants
Speaker:who are getting organized. If you are a tenant and this directly applies to you, it's your
Speaker:interests are advanced through working with tenants, then people will be able to get involved.
Speaker:working people in the city need to come out and strengthen it, and also learn how to organize
Speaker:our own buildings and neighborhoods. I mean, deep canvassing and door knocking, I think,
Speaker:is something that is undervalued. I mean, grassroots organizations understand its value, but for
Speaker:those who have only canvassed politically, you're typically taught, you know, go to the door,
Speaker:knock on it, find out. if you've got the right person and who they're going to vote for and
Speaker:move on to the next one. It's so when you say door knocking, you really mean go talk to your
Speaker:community members or listen rather to your community members. Do you want to speak to the difference
Speaker:between those two types of door knocking just a little bit? No, for sure. I think that gets
Speaker:to a key, a key point, which is maybe in the case of what people are familiar with from
Speaker:electoral politics would be a kind of canvassing that sees people as passive. You go door to
Speaker:door to identify who people are voting for, to collect data, but it's not so much geared
Speaker:at encouraging those people to take action beyond maybe just voting. So what we're talking about
Speaker:is instead seeing... people that we speak to as potentially active in the process of organizing.
Speaker:And that can be a number of levels. That can be just by encouraging them to come out if
Speaker:they if they're not at a stage where they're ready to organize in their building, encouraging
Speaker:them to come out in support of other tenants like the bank block tenants. But it can also
Speaker:be if people identify that they have issues in their building and they're interested, instead
Speaker:of us telling them exactly what to do or us coming in and doing it for them. Our goal is
Speaker:then to work with that person and be a strong supporter for them in taking action for themselves
Speaker:with their neighbors in their building. So every tenant that we talk to we see as a potential
Speaker:organizer as well, not just somebody who we are going to organize and mobilize and do things
Speaker:for. And in so many ways, I think this approach can be more effective too. in the sense that
Speaker:it'll allow them to build power in their buildings, but also I think a network of people in buildings
Speaker:who are in touch with their neighbors and who are able to work with their neighbors to, you
Speaker:know, whether it's bringing them out for a demonstration or whether it's organizing a more direct action,
Speaker:that's something that has an incredible amount of potential power in it. So I think the distinction
Speaker:is whether when we're going door knocking, we see people as data points or as passive contacts
Speaker:to be mobilized. Yeah, exactly. Or if we see them as potential organizers who can play a
Speaker:leading role in the struggle as well. Before we started recording, you folks were talking
Speaker:about something you've got brewing. I mean, the idea of getting tenants connected with
Speaker:one another must just scare the shit out of landlords. I mean, you should jokingly invite
Speaker:them to this just so they know just at what level you folks are talking to one another.
Speaker:Because I think that could have a chilling effect on even those mom and pop landlords that we're
Speaker:really supposed to feel bad about when we're shit talking landlords. What do you folks have
Speaker:up your sleeve that you can leave the audience with? So just since I teased it, I guess I
Speaker:might start. So we, the Neighborhood Organizing Center, although we've been organizing for
Speaker:a while, us doing it under that name is relatively new. So we are encouraging people, if you are
Speaker:interested in doing this kind of work of supporting tenant organizing and helping... helping build
Speaker:the capacity for tenants to get organized. Please reach out to us. There are a lot of folks in
Speaker:the community who have different levels of, different kinds of time on their hands, different
Speaker:capacities, and there's room for people to be involved at whatever level works for them.
Speaker:At the same time, the NOC, the Neighborhood Organizing Center, is convening the People's
Speaker:Assembly, which is that wider forum for participation. And as mentioned, we're hoping that will be
Speaker:the product of deeper organizing, where tenants are attending as representatives of our buildings,
Speaker:and that can be a space where tenant committees and tenant unions can thrive and can help support
Speaker:tenants in getting that started in their buildings. So if that interests you, in January, on January
Speaker:18th... We're going to be doing a workshop, which has a more educational focus on tenant
Speaker:organizing. And then for the first meeting of the People's Assembly in this new forum, it
Speaker:will be in February of 2025. And we in our own work will continue to learn from other tenants
Speaker:and tenant unions and tenants as well, which I think this podcast also talks a lot about,
Speaker:but that's sort of the way forward. Yeah, and connecting our different movements and different
Speaker:struggles is also a key part, but that can be a whole other episode too. So, kind of not
Speaker:talk about that right now. That is like the whole podcast, you know, social movements,
Speaker:labor movements, tenant movements, how can we get them all going in the same direction at
Speaker:the same time? And can we imagine what that would look like if we could? Definitely. Even
Speaker:if you're not based in Ottawa and you're organizing across Canada, we would still be interested
Speaker:in hearing from you. As has been mentioned previously, this is a struggle across the country for tenants
Speaker:and for the working class more broadly. Yes, I wish we were recording when I asked Ethan,
Speaker:you know, is this your sole focus, tenant organizing? And he said, well, right now it is. And I said,
Speaker:Oh, had you done something previous? And it was like, No, no, just this is where we're
Speaker:starting people. You know, this is just the beginning, the seed of the potential that people
Speaker:could hold. Right. Ethan, did I represent you well enough there? Absolutely. Yeah. So that,
Speaker:yeah, like, like Seema said, we see this, the tenant struggle is not an isolated thing. It's
Speaker:not cut off from the rest of society, but it's a part of the larger system that we're living
Speaker:in. And the way that the housing system is exploitative is the way that capitalism is exploitative.
Speaker:And the way that working class tenants can get organized for power is the way that the working
Speaker:class can get organized for power. So we see it as part of that larger movement and larger
Speaker:struggle. And that's why we're very thrilled to be on a platform like this. I will just
Speaker:say one more thing. just because I was thinking about it earlier. Landlords really, their whole
Speaker:business model is based on inflicting violence on people, on tenants, which they are completely
Speaker:removed from. So they can force people out of their homes, onto the street, they can force
Speaker:people to live in horrible conditions while they live in mansions and they never have to
Speaker:deal with it. So I think with 2025, I know Toronto is a bit ahead of where we are in Ottawa, but
Speaker:we're going to show them that they can't get away with it anymore, that you can't inflict
Speaker:this kind of violence on people and expect to just wash your hands of it and live comfortably
Speaker:in your home. It's just not going to... that era has passed. That is a wrap on another episode
Speaker:of Blueprints of Disruption. Thank you for joining us. Also a very big thank you to the producer
Speaker:of our show, Santiago Helu-Quintero. Blueprints of Disruption is an independent production
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