Los Angeles renters demand protection during loud protest from their cars outside Mayors home

Record ID: 1467181

  • Title: Los Angeles renters demand protection during loud protest from their cars outside Mayors home
  • Date: 1st April 2020
  • Summary: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES (APRIL 1, 2020) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (English) LOS ANGELES TENANTS UNION MEMBER, JACOB WOOCHER, SAYING: "Eric Garcetti would love if all we did was tweet at him and e-mail him and call his office but it's going to take a lot more than that to make him work for the millions of tenants in this city so if we want the eviction protectio
  • Embargoed: 16th April 2020 00:33
  • Keywords: Mayor Eric Garcetti Protests caravan cars coronavirus signs social distancing
  • Location: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES; LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND
  • City: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES; LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND
  • Country: USA
  • Topics: Health/Medicine
  • Reuters ID: LVA002C7NW11J
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text:Social distancing and home isolation have made public protests impossible these days.
    However, in Los Angeles, a number of advocate groups have found a novel way to make their message heard, creating a convoy of cars and loudly honking their horns outside the house of Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcett, demanding rent suspensions and protection from eviction.
    The groups, LA Tenants Union, Chinatown Community for Equitable Development and NOlympics LA, organized the protest online, which attracted around 50 cars on Tuesday evening (March 31).
    Jacob Woocher from the Los Angeles Tenants Union told Reuters, "Eric Garcetti would love if all we did was tweet at him and e-mail him and call his office but it's going to take a lot more than that to make him work for the millions of tenants in this city so if we want the eviction protections we need, if we want the rent forgiveness and the rent suspension that people need then we have to get a little more radical, escalate our tactics a little bit and you know, show up to his home. People are suffering right now. The stakes are really high."
    The syndicate is demanding three things; to prevent anyone being evicted during this crisis, that rent should be forgiven or suspended and that hotel and motel rooms should be used to home the homeless.
    "Rents are extremely high in Los Angeles. It is the homelessness capital of the country, if not the world," said Woocher, adding "We have a real estate market where property values and rents keep going up and up and up and wages are not going up and people are struggling to stay in their homes and now this pandemic comes and people are being laid off and are losing hours and it's even harder."
    Woocher said that despite Mayor Garcetti and California Governor Gavin Newsom giving a mandate in the last week that no evictions would be enforced until May 31, he argued it wasn't a proper moratorium because landlords can still file an eviction and tenants can still be evicted. They just have an additional defense in court.
    He added that people are still going to have to pay the rent back after the coronavirus crisis has ended and so it's just delaying further evictions, which he fears will be in greater numbers, for a few months.
    He said "It's an unbelievable public health hazard to have people being evicted, maybe falling into homelessness and if they're luckier, just having to search for a new apartment during this pandemic. It is absurd that Los Angeles would allow any evictions to happen right now. We need much stronger protections and Eric Garcetti is not taking this crisis seriously enough. He's not taking the lives of the millions of tenants in LA seriously enough. An eviction crisis on top of the current pandemic and economic crisis would only make everything so much worse."
    To date, the syndicate has protested on March 31 and April 1, the days most people pay their rent, but will continue to protest the same way in the future.
    (Production: Rollo Ross)
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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