Tenant Organizers Regroup After Statewide Rent-Control Ballot Dies

Tenant organizers across western Massachusetts are redoubling their grassroots work after the state's highest court struck down a rent-stabilization ballot measure in late June, sidetracking a statewide campaign to limit annual rent increases. The setback has not deterred activists who say they are shifting focus to supporting local-option legislation while building tenant unions to address immediate housing crises in their communities.

The defunct ballot question would have established rent stabilization in Massachusetts, capping annual increases at 5 percent or the Consumer Price Index, whichever was lower. Organizers had gathered over 157,000 signatures from residents supporting the measure before the Supreme Judicial Court tossed it out on a technicality. The decision prevents Massachusetts voters from deciding this election cycle whether to reinstate a form of rent control, which the state banned in 1994.

In Northampton, Milla Wenick and other tenants at 126 King Street organized a union after encountering what they described as violations by their landlord, Michelle Sun. Wenick said their neighbors faced rent increases of up to 9 percent and struggled with broken air-conditioning during a recent heat wave. The 126 King Street Tenants Association held a sidewalk protest on July 10 to draw attention to housing conditions across the city, with supporters from regional tenant unions joining the demonstration.

August Nelson, a member of the grassroots housing-justice organization Springfield No One Leaves, said the loss of the ballot question left organizers without an official venue to amplify tenants' voices. Kat Miller, an organizer with the Greenfield Tenants Union, expressed frustration that elected officials continued to ignore residents' housing crisis. "It would just be nice if, for once, the people who were in charge would listen to the people that hired them to be in charge," she said.

Organizers are now directing energy toward a local option bill that would allow cities and towns to decide independently on rent stabilization. State Sen. Adam Gomez, D-Springfield, said the legislature must act urgently to address the housing crisis, noting that residents face impossible choices between paying rent, buying food, and seeking medical care. Springfield's City Council voted unanimously to back the legislation, and the Senate bill, filed by over 20 members, is currently in the Committee on Ways and Means.

Tenant unions continue to form across the region despite the ballot loss. The Greenfield Tenants Union, formed about three months before the court decision, has drawn dozens of members. Miller said her landlord raised her rent by 20 percent and then 40 percent, spurring her to organize in her hometown. She predicted the field would expand. "I think we're going to see more tenant unions," she said. "I think we're going to see more local organizing. I think we're going to see more regional organizing."

Natalia Ruiz, an organizer with the Easthampton Tenants Union, said her involvement in tenant activism began after a conflict with a former landlord in Northampton. She spent the past year collecting signatures at farmer's markets and outside grocery stores. Despite the setback, she noted that the campaign effort connected tenant unions across the state in new ways. "Unions need to think about how they organize outside of the support of policymakers," Ruiz said, citing public education as one strategy the Easthampton union has pursued.