------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the Aug. 05, 2004 issue of Workers World newspaper -------------------------
ALAMEDA. CALIF: TENANTS WIN BATTLE TO KEEP SECTION 8 HOUSING
By Shane Hoff San Francisco
Whoever said "You can't fight City Hall" never met the people of Alameda, Calif.
In early June, 238 tenants received notices in the mail that they and their families were being dropped from the city's Section 8 program. Without that program, the largest source of subsidized housing for poor people, most tenants faced homelessness. But they didn't accept that fate. For a month they waged an unprecedented struggle to get Section 8 housing funds restored.
And on July 20 they won. Gathered at the steps of City Hall with their children, tenants were jubilant when they heard the Alameda Housing Authority had reinstated every single housing voucher.
"One month ago I stood here crying my eyes out," said Kenija Henry. "The Hous ing Authority told us there was nothing we could do. But we went to their houses and shook up their meetings."
The battle began when tenants and their supporters showed up at an Ala meda City Council meeting in June, although the issue of Section 8 wasn't on the agenda. After listening to a long discus sion about a parking lot, the tenants disrupted the meeting and demanded that the council discuss the housing crisis.
In response, the director of the Alameda Housing Authority, Michael Pucci, met with the tenants in an effort to quell their protests. Pucci told them "nothing could be done" since the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development had cut funding for Alameda's Section 8 program.
The tenants wouldn't accept that. They rallied outside the Alameda Housing Authority. And then about 40 tenants and supporters occupied Mayor Beverly John son's office demanding a meeting with her. Ignored by the mayor, they held a picket outside her home, as well as Pucci's.
A few days later they led a march to City Hall. The city and Housing Authority relented with a special City Council meeting where officials worked out one month of relief for the tenants. The victories were piecemeal as the city and Housing Autho rity tried to see how little they could get away with. But the tenants were determined that not one person would be evicted.
Pucci trekked to Washington, D.C., where he met with HUD officials. Some how the agency found $600,000 for Alameda. So half of the city's tenants got their Section 8 vouchers back. But that still left 108 people facing evictions.
So the Section 8 Tenants Union and Campaign for Renters Rights held a rally July 20 at City Hall where the City Council was to discuss the tenants left behind. When the tenants showed up they got a surprise. Pucci had issued a media release that day announcing that everyone's vouchers would be restored.
Organizers said Alameda was the first Housing Authority in the country that tried to put people on the streets. But it may not be the last. Pucci's release noted that about 25 percent of housing authorities across the country--between 800 and 900--have funding shortfalls. The San Francisco Bay Guardian reported that the federal government has proposed cutting Section 8 funding by another $1.6 billion in 2005, which would put 268,000 households at risk for homelessness in 2005.
"This is going to be happening around the country," tenant Malika Nassirruddin told the crowd. "We have to show the people how to fight."
Speakers at the rally stood in front of a big sign declaring "Save Our Homes." During the rally Nassirruddin painted another message in red across the sign: "We saved our homes."
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