The Chelsea Tenant Action Committee held their annual spring housing forum last night at the Hudson Guild’s Elliott Center building on West 26th Street. The three principal speakers focused on phony demolition, tenant harassment, and how to organize a tenant’s association in your building.
Organizing to Fight Phony Demolition
First to speak was Wasim Lone, Director of Organizing, Good old Lower East Side (www.goles.org). According to 
Lone there has been intense displacement of residents as a result of development on the LES. The Puerto Rico population has declined by 70% since the 1970s, while the African American population has declined by 20% and the Eastern European population has suffered a significant decline as well. They’ve mostly been replaced by urban professionals, in the process known as “yuppiefication.” (Photo: Wasim Lone and Daniel Peckham)
In particular, low income tenants in rent-stabilized tenant buildings are most vulnerable. Lately there has been harassment of almost all of these tenants in order to transform apartments into market rate apartments. The big change recently is that landlords are now trying to empty whole buildings rather than just focusing on the tenants one at a time.
One of their main tactics is the so called phony demolition. This is not really demolition where you replace the building with a new building. It’s just emptying out the rent regulated tenants so the landlord can renovate and charge more. It used to be that demolition meant the building had to be razed and something else built with the tenants relocated. Phony demolition makes it easier for landlords to clear a building because it is less of a financial burden. As the result of a 1997 reform act landlords are no longer required to have a hearing in order to use the phony demolition provision.
Last year in a lot of buildings, maybe 20 city wide, landlords began phony demolition proceedings. The good news is that in 12 buildings the landlords backed off because they were exposed. That’s the landlord’s weakness. They do not want to be exposed. They do not want publicity. What you need to do in these cases is to have press conferences, demonstrations, and you need to put pressure on the state government. In these 12 cases being organized had an impact on the ground.
Slap Suits and a New Movement to Fight Harassment
Benjamin Dulchin – Association for Neighborhood Housing and Development, (www.anhd.org) spearheaded the Landlord Anti-Harassment Campaign. He says that while it’s 
always been hard to be a tenant in NYC, especially Manhattan, things have been getting worse in recent years. What’s changed is that landlords expect to get more out of their buildings. Landlords always wanted a profit, but now they want more. Now, instead of investing in the stock market they invest in real estate because they can make a tremendous profit.
For example, say a landlord buys a rent stabilized for say 35 million. If the tenants are only paying say $700 per month, then the tenant rent might only support a mortgage of $5 million. This means the landlord must get rid of rent stabilized tenants in order to make a return on his investment. This is how most building purchases go these days. Landlords are buying buildings with the expectation of being able to evict rent stabilized tenants.
There are various ways to get around rent stabilization. In addition to landlord occupancy and phony demolition, landlords are now suing tenants for anything they can think of, such as non-payment of rent even when they paid. A notorious offender is the Pinnacle Investment Group which owns a bunch of buildings uptown. They sued almost half the tenants in their buildings. What they do is just keep suing you. You may win a couple of cases but eventually you’ll get tired or you’ll make a mistake. This is harassment and it’s illegal, but nobody will do anything about it. The judge in housing court won’t let you mention it. The DHCR is supposed to deal with it but they won’t do anything.
Various kind of harassment are taking place around the city. Some of the most common are:
1. Overly aggressive, “frivolous” legal cases not backed-up by the facts.
2. Fraudulent legal notices
3. Threats based on the tenant’s immigration status
4. Denial of essential services
5. Verbal and physical abuse
6. Repeated pressure to accept a buy-out
For harassment there must be a pattern of actions against the tenant by the landlord. In a building on Avenue B, the landlord actually planted a bomb, but since it was only one bomb the judge ruled that it wasn’t harassment since there wasn’t a pattern.
Housing court is the best place to protect yourself against harassment. Now there is a new movement underway to create a new right for tenants to sue landlords for harassment. It would fine landlords $10,000 for each count.
Steps To Follow in Organizing Your Building
Once again, organization is the most important tool in fighting back against profiteering landlords. Lauren George, Citizens Committee for NYC, (www.citizensnyc.org) spoke on how to organize your building:
First step: talk to your neighbors. See what others are experiencing: harassment, denial of services, failure to get repairs, etc.
Second step: organize a first meeting and invite everyone in the building. The law allows you to hold meetings in the common area of your building. The agenda is to choose a chair to keep control and to let everyone speak. Find common experiences and come up with common goals. Ask people to vote on whether you should form a tenants association.
Third step: Formulating a structure for the organization. You’ll need a president, a secretary, a treasurer and a communications person. You’ll also need a researcher to find out who the owner is, what are the regulations, who are the tenants and what are their situations. It’s very important to collect all information from all of the meetings. The association serves as nucleus of the buildings activity. You must document everything that happens in your building, from instances of harassment to ceilings caving in, etc. And you’ll need to collect dues, usually $10.00 per year or something small.
These are just the basic steps. George’s organization offers two hour workshops where you can get more detailed information.
Rally to Preserve Rent Stabilization
Merle Lister of CTAC announced that there is a rally on Wed, May 23 at Stuyvesant Town at 5:00 p.m. and a rally on 
Saturday May 5, from 11:00 a.m – 1:00 p.m. at Middle Collegiate Church 50 E. 7th St. The rally is to:
1.Repeal rent destabilization & the Urstadt Law
2. Preserve Mitchell Lama and Section 8 Housing
3. Stop unfair rent increases and harassment
4. Ensure adequate state funding for NYCHA housing
5. Limit rental payments for people living with HIV/AIDS to 30% of income
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