brittany's blog

A few hundred housing activists, impacted community members, and occupiers in New York City came together last week to disrupt the weekly foreclosure auctions in all five boroughs of the city.  The disruptions began with a reading of a "Declaration of the People's Moratorium on Foreclosures":

“What has taken place was not only predictable, it is a consequence of the very structure of the housing system and financial system,” says Michael E. Stone, Professor of Community Planning at the University of Massachusetts, reflecting on the ongoing foreclosure fallout. Ten million families have already been evicted from their homes as a result of foreclosure, while another 8 to10 million more may join them, according to industry expert Laurie S. Goodman of Amherst Securities Group in a late 2011 testimony delivered to the Senate.

 It is extremely disappointing that Congress has chosen to pass deep cuts to crucial federal low-income housing programs (-3.8 billion).  Yet, perhaps the biggest letdown is, at the same time, the increase in funding for problematic programs that demolish and ultimately lead to the privatization of permanently affordable housing.  One of these programs, the Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD), was strongly and clearly opposed by many residents, resident groups, advocates, key legislators, and many experts in such fields as urban planning.

There is an overwhelming consensus right now that we face a severe market failure with regard to housing. One industry expert recently testified before Congress that, unless something is done about it, 8 to 10 million more homeowners will lose their homes to foreclosure(1). That is 1 in 5 owners with an outstanding mortgage, and in addition to the 8 million owners who have already lost their homes to foreclosure since 2007.

Even if the winds of winter blow the Occupy Chicago protesters and percussionists off the corner of LaSalle Street and Jackson Boulevard, civil disobedience is not going into hibernation.

Special Rapporteur Raquel Rolnik Reflects on More Than a Roof’s Launch, Crackdowns on Dissent & the Struggle to Be Heard in Vermont

On October 21st, 2011, NESRI attended the side event of the 66th United Nations General Assembly on the Right to Adequate Housing. The event was hosted by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing, Ms. Raquel Rolnik, who presented a report on The Right to Adequate Housing in Disaster Relief and Recovery.

National civil and human rights organizations with a long collective history of defending the right of political expression and challenging the targeting of movement leaders submitted a strongly worded appeal letter to the Los Angeles City Attorney on behalf of Mr. Steve Richardson, a community organizer with the LA Community Action Network (LA CAN) based in the Skid Row community of downtown LA. 

This past summer members of the Media Mobilizing Project (MMP) out of Philadelphia, PA traveled the country alongside PBS broadcaster Tavis Smiley and Princeton professor Dr. Cornel West on a Poverty Tour of the United States.

Yesterday, October 10th PBS’ Tavis Smiley began broadcast the fruits of this outing in a five-part documentary series called “Understanding Our Struggles and Changing Our Conditions: A Poverty Tour Documentary.” It will continue to run through Friday, October 14th.

“I am aware that there are many who wince at the distinction between property and persons – who hold both sacrosanct. My views are not so rigid. A life is sacred. Property is intended to serve life, and no matter how much we surround it with rights and respect, it has no personal being. It is part of the earth man walks on; it is not man.” – Martin Luther King Jr. in 1967

In response to the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s (FHFA) recent Request for Information: Enterprise/FHA Asset Disposition (RFI), one letter, submitted to the FHFA on behalf of the Campaign to Restore National Housing Rights (Campaign) and its allies today, delivered the message that the RFI's bulk sales approach itself was inappropriate during an affordable housing crisis for what is essential "public" housing.