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I didn’t know what this was until a few weeks ago, and now I’m an at large member in the umbrella organization for my state that supports all the tenants unions forming here.
The idea is to organize your neighbors under the common cause of advocating for yourselves and asserting that you have legal rights and protections AS TENANTS. Tenants unions also lobby for local and state legislation that protects everyone. Every state is in a different stage of development of the movement, but with a housing and rent crisis literally everywhere in the country there could be a local group you can join right now that will help you organize your building/your neighbors. If you have a different living situation than being a tenant, you can support the union with your solidarity and time and by being a body at the rallies when they call you! Power is something we have to actively demand and we have to do it together, especially for the foreseeable future if we don’t want to lose more ground than we gain.
Nov 20, 2024
Related Recs
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see if theres a tenants rights advocacy organization in your city. they can be a great resource as they know local laws and how to navigate things like this. if your place is truly rent controlled they can probably help you put together documentation to show your landlord.
Apr 15, 2024
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Because safe and affordable housing is a human right, not a business model.
Sep 11, 2024
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This weekend i left town at 4 am to roadtrip to (redacted big city) with my mom then just did a deep dive of towns in the metropolitan area. Having her with me was incredible. She knew to approach friendly strangers at gas stations and barber shops about how good of areas are these.
Then after gaining so much intel and hunting down so many rental signs. We grabbed dinner with some friends i have out in this area, 2 more people i also lean on quite a bit. To my surprise we didn’t talk extensively about the hunt for places to the degree i assumed we would. Afterwards i went to a party with my friends and chatted with a friend of my friends about me working on making the leap.
I still have ways to go but have started to hear about people i know through a person who knows a person who knows a person who have job openings whom live over there and other rental properties that have popped up.
Basically alot of jotting info down, being proactive, and talking with people about it. Has been the move in making progress. And crossing my fingers i land what i want.
Feb 10, 2025
Top Recs from @bumbythefool
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I’m sick of feeling powerless so my new coping strategy is to not let a stupid system bully me into quiet despair. I’m learning how to use my state’s General Assembly’s online bill tracker and I’m subscribing to email updates for the agendas and the public hearings of the legislative committees I’m most concerned about. I’m memorizing all my legislators‘ names and emailing and calling regularly.
Also: Check to see if your state’s Legislative Library has Libguides that explain in layman’s terms what bills are passing in your state and other educational/legislative resources you have freely available to you!!!
Nov 20, 2024
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You will make about 60k if you're lucky unless you become a manager, and you will have 35k of debt or more from grad school (online grad school is cheaper sometimes and no one cares where you get the degree anyways). And sometimes you work for a university (which is essentially a corporation) or the government. But in general everyone in your field will believe in a code of ethics that raises the dignity of humanity above the mire of misinformation and censorship. And you help empower people with the information literacy to move through the world as confident capable individuals/professionals/scholars. Community college libraries are my favorite environment I've worked in so far because the students are cool, driven, and diverse in age and background. Public libraries also do amazing social work in 2025 to provide services to their communities like harm reduction, networks of resources for unhoused people, language teaching, professional development, basic technology training, literally just being a third space, I could go on forever. It definitely is a career that exists because of neoliberalism I'm not going to lie, like American public libraries only exist because robber barons in the 1900s donated a mind boggling amount of grants to towns across the country to build them (not sure about other countries' history with this to be fair). All that being said I decided I wanted to be a librarian when I was 16 and I've been committed to that path for 11 years with no regret.
To add a personal note to this rec and emphasize how meaningful this work really is, I'm going to indulge in a story because I could genuinely cry thinking about all the kind, interesting people I've met who have chosen to be vulnerable with me about their needs and goals. A couple years ago I helped an older man for multiple hours to remember his email login so he could get a copy of his birth certificate from his son-in-law who had emailed a scan of the physical copy which was in another country. The stakes were incredibly high and the task seemed virtually impossible because we didn't even have an email address to start. He was having trouble reaching his son-in-law to ask for help because of the time difference, and he needed the scan ASAP. We were together for so long I learned a lot about him. He talked to me about Islam and Christianity and angels. And then we got it! It's probably one of the defining moments of my career and to me is one of the most impactful things I've ever done.
So there's my job rec lol!
Mar 13, 2025
Apr 16, 2025