Renters are being evicted across the country because they can& #39;t pay rent.

And they& #39;ve been saddled with back rent + utility debt.

"Rental assistance" has been... insufficient.

If you care about climate crisis but *haven& #39;t* heard about the renter crisis, thread is for you.
I spent the last 3 years working on a project to encourage utility programs + multifamily affordable housing refinancing + other money to align & make energy efficiency upgrades happen that weren& #39;t happening. Housing + energy make up two of the biggest costs of any household.
I learned a lot. Now my focus is on supporting renters& #39; rights and broader societal change within the climate & clean energy silos. Tackling climate change requires tackling building end uses. That means residential buildings. That means renter issues are now climate issues.
Remember this? Renters in New Orleans @NolaRenters blocked landlords from evicting people from their homes in July- the middle of the pandemic, the middle of the summer, and 15 days before Hurricane Laura first started to develop. https://twitter.com/misaacstein/status/1288846847163998210?s=20">https://twitter.com/misaacste...
Now renters like @KCTenants today, @WSTASF, @RePower_LA just to name a few, are organizing & taking action to protect themselves and each other from both eviction + utility debt because the government& #39;s COVID & "recovery" https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😒" title="Unerfreutes Gesicht" aria-label="Emoji: Unerfreutes Gesicht"> response has equated to sanctioning violent evictions.
All over the country people are self-organizing to not only stop evictions but re-claim *vacant* housing. Victories have been won for community land trusts & ownership & the work continues: @PhlHousing, @moms4housing and more including @atun_rsia. https://twitter.com/atun_rsia/status/1313935905099456512?s=20">https://twitter.com/atun_rsia...
Look for local tenant unions working on renter rights and standing up against evictions. Get involved, support mutual aid efforts, and join in with some I& #39;ve dropped already if you don& #39;t know where to start locally. Next I& #39;ll talk data if you& #39;re not already convinced.
I focus on people who miraculously survive in America on nearly nothing bc that& #39;s who I identify with. When I first shared data like this in the climate + energy space, some were shocked. We need to get serious about poverty as a major obstacle to a clean climate future.
This is what I believe: if climate + clean energy folks don& #39;t take the lack of renters& #39; rights & housing insecurity seriously, there& #39;s no path to decarbonization of buildings that doesn& #39;t put millions of people on the streets over time.
This will mean changing the accepted capitalist belief that housing should be treated as a commodity, the belief that owner interests outweigh tenant interests*, and that climate change is so urgent that we should address it first and poverty later.
*This thread is long enough already but if you dig around you& #39;ll see that community ownership is part of the overall solutions proposed, so that we eliminate the owner class and transform into a system where tenants ARE the owner.
The research so far has raised the profile of this urgent work. That& #39;s good. And with that has come a lot of covering old work in "equity". What is needed now is climate + clean energy to re-direct their funding, their analysis and put it in service to the existing leadership.
There is significant *existing* leadership *from affected communities*; you need to follow. Anything that makes renters& #39; work harder - including fighting your ideas because they are harmful - slows everything down and, with active evictions, that obstacle will hurt someone.
Renters across the country are already asking for decarbonized homes, but as a part of the bigger package that we need as renters to survive. Just take a look at @PplsAction and the #HomesGuarantee https://homesguarantee.com"> https://homesguarantee.com  https://twitter.com/WorkingFamilies/status/1245105125317885952?s=20">https://twitter.com/WorkingFa...
The folks at @ourcityRTTC are leading a campaign to #CancelRent and #CancelMortgages and create #HomesForAll. They know that the back rent can& #39;t turn into long term debt for our people to have a chance at a just recovery: https://twitter.com/ourcityRTTC/status/1316753330450898946?s=20">https://twitter.com/ourcityRT...
There& #39;s work emerging daily from the people most impacted & those who have a long background in racial equity work. In addition to the already tagged in this thread, follow @PSEquityMatters @GCCLP @weact4ej @CCEJN @antievictionmap @BuildPowerMoKan @rooseveltinst @ChallengeIneq !!
You can follow @isevier.
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