Because we are not being provided for.

Bay Area City officials ordered businesses to close and residents to stay home. But their order has no provision for our lost wages. Their order does not address the fact that our rent is still due. Their order says nothing about our real necessities, like food, household supplies, and healthcare. In other words, their order has nothing to say about our survival through April 7 and beyond it, for the duration of the pandemic. The government has neglected to provide people with a way to live, even as the state offers businesses generous loans and bailouts to get through the crisis. If the government will not help us, then we must take matters into our own hands. 

At this point, we cannot trust city governments to provide for our needs. This trust was frayed long before the pandemic. For the last decade, our government has been enriching the real estate market and corporations at our expense. Skyrocketing rents, rising prices, homeless encampments, stagnating wages, and the undoing of Black and brown communities are all part of the brutal treatment of the Bay’s working-class. Though the state and local government has given some concessions, like Alameda County’s moratorium on evictions, these are not comprehensive enough to protect us during this crisis. Absent any provision for lost wages and our collective health, this shelter-in-place order is just another instance of cruelty. Enough! If the government will not ensure our wellbeing, then we must organize to defend ourselves.

If we have no wages, then we cannot be expected to pay rent. We demand rent suspensions from every landlord effective immediately. The fact that anybody has to fear being evicted because of their inability to pay rent during a global health pandemic demonstrates the utter wickedness of this system. During this crisis, rent must be completely forgiven; there should be no expectation to pay it now, or “back pay” it in the future.

Nobody should profit from this crisis.

We need to get organized to prepare for the social and economic consequences of the COVID-19 crisis now. We can’t afford to wait until people have run out of money. We can’t have one more person on the street! Every person in this society has already suffered enough from the pandemic.

What We Need

1. Suspend Rent Now. Immediate suspension of rent pending livable wages and good health.
2. Rent Forgiveness. Rent forgiveness for suspension period. No backrent, no evictions, no retaliation. 

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