Tacoma for All and Coalition Partners Announce Tenant Rights Action Conference
Conference Will Consider Whether to Move Forward with Ballot Initiative
TACOMA, WA – Tacoma for All has announced a Tenant Rights Action Conference to take place on Saturday, Feb. 11th from noon to 4:00 PM at Common Good (located inside First United Methodist Church, 621 Tacoma Ave. S), endorsed by over two dozen unions, community groups and elected leaders. Attendees will discuss and decide whether to bring a “Landlord Fairness Code” ballot initiative to voters this November.
“It’s clear that urgent action is needed to address Tacoma’s unprecedented housing crisis,” Tacoma for All organizer Ty Moore said. “Alongside an array of inspiring speakers, Saturday’s Action Conference will be an opportunity to decide together, as a community, whether or not to move forward with a tenant rights ballot initiative to lift Tacoma up to the highest standards of renter protections in the state.”
Moore noted that landlords hiked rents by 43 percent in Pierce County over the last five years and are evicting Tacoma residents at the highest rate in the state. “Over half of Tacoma tenants are officially ‘rent burdened,’ paying over a third of their income to landlords, yet tenant protections in Tacoma lag far behind cities across Washington,” Moore said. “Tacoma urgently needs basic tenant protections that cities like Seattle have now had for years. With landlords hiking rents far faster than wage increases, rates of displacement and homelessness continue to grow, costing lives and placing huge pressures on us all. We must fight back, and we must turn the tide to protect our neighbors and our families,” he continued.
Endorsers of the Tenant Rights Action Conference include the Pierce County Central Labor Council, Tacoma-Pierce County Democratic Socialists of America, 27th LD Democrats, UFCW 367, State Senator Yasmin Trudeau, The Conversation, Lived Experience Coalition, Tacoma Tenants Union, Pierce County Councilmembers Justin Camarata, Jani Hitchin, Robyn Denson, and many other organizations and individuals.
For more information and to register for the conference: www.bit.ly/tenantaction.