Tenants’ Voice Magazine: The Newsletter of the Katarokwi Union of Tenants

Tenants’ Voice Magazine:

The Newsletter of the Katarokwi Union of Tenants

Table of Contents

Tenants Run In Municipal Elections

Protect Our Unhoused Neighbours

Upcoming Campaigns and Demands:

o Fighting to Repeal Unjust By-Laws: No Camping, Trespass Notices, and the Encampment Protocol

o Encampment Support & Emergency Food Relief

o Research and Policy Development

Book Club

Next Meeting: February 21, 2023, at 7 pm ET

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Tenants Run In Municipal Elections

The Katarokwi Union of Tenants (KUT) made a call to the tenants of Kingston to come out and run in the municipal election and impose a tenants’ agenda. Five tenants answered that call and decided to run under a common Peoples’ Platform for Kingston. These tenants included Ivan Stoiljkovic who ran for mayor, as well as Alexandria Liu, Jacob Wynperle, Sebastian Valliancourt, and Keaton Zanderberg who all ran for city council.

For many years, municipal politics has been the game of the wealthy, and even though none of the KUT candidates was elected, we showed that tenants can and must participate in municipal politics, and we made sure that the landlords and their representatives who did get elected can no longer ignore our demands.

Candidates on the Peoples’ Platform for Kingston put forth a program that centred the well-being of the community and minimized harm to the unhoused and working class of this city. We insisted that homelessness be eliminated through social-rent-geared-to-income housing, we insisted cost-of-living relief programs be implemented including free food supply, free transit, and subsidized childcare, and we insisted upon an end to the ongoing genocide of Indigenous peoples which has been carried out by the Canadian state including Kingston municipal governments. We demanded lifting up the vulnerable populations in Kingston because we understand that the struggles of tenants and the homeless are inseparable.

We also insisted that the unhoused members of our community could participate in municipal politics, whether or not they have IDs—and we made sure once they got to the polls, they were able to exercise their democratic right to vote despite elections officers trying to prevent them from doing so. Generous volunteers drove our unhoused neighbours to the polls, and most, if not all of them, put in a vote for Alexandria Liu and the Peoples’ Platform.

Our powerful platform resonated with Kingstonians to the extent that even landlords and their representatives such as Mayor Bryan Patterson made promises to address the housing crisis and create affordable housing during their campaigns and at the new council.

We did what career politicians like Mayor Patterson thought was impossible—we took power into our own hands and proved that tenants, working class, and poor people can do politics, and we can do it better than the establishment—and over 2500 people resonated with that message on election day.

In the 1969 Kingston municipal elections, the Association for Tenants Action ran a slate of candidates that resulted in the appointment of members Joan Kuyek and John Meister to the council. They introduced a rent control motion as a part of their tenant advocacy. Fifty-three years later, tenants once again had the chance to vote for their own representatives and together, we broke through the jargon of the political class. Together, we forced our opponents to face the real issues in our city. And now we have to hold those we elected accountable by educating ourselves about municipal politics, creating concrete policy alternatives, and fighting for them by organizing the working and poor people of Kingston under a common demand: TENANTS UNITE! HOUSING FOR ALL!

Protect Our Unhoused Neighbours

On January 6th, the City of Kingston issued eviction notices to those who reside in the encampment outside of the Integrated Care Hub (ICH) at 661 Montreal Street—giving them until January 11th at 5 pm to leave, or risk being removed by force.

In response to public resistance efforts, Kingston City Council voted 8-5 to postpone the eviction of the encampment until March 21st. Mayor Paterson and Councillors Osanic, Oosterhof, Boehme, and McLaren voted against the delay, wishing to evict our unhoused neighbours into the freezing cold with no support system in place—effectively voting for their death and suffering.

Although the decision to postpone the eviction is good news, we must take note that while we’ve won this battle, we are still losing the ‘war’. The mayor and council have refused to live up to their promises of implementing affordable housing solutions by suggesting they don’t have the money, and further suggesting that housing is a provincial issue rather than a municipal one. This attitude was echoed by Ryan Boehme, one of the mayor’s lackeys representing the Pittsburgh district, who went as far as to call city councillors “pothole politicians,” playing on the common misconception that municipal politics lacks the money and power to affect the changes that citizens and voters demand.

This suggestion is false, and it is part of a larger pattern which seeks to erode our democracy at the municipal level—other examples are Doug Ford’s Strong Mayor Bill, which allows the Mayors of Toronto and Ottawa to veto by-laws that have been voted through by council. It is no coincidence that these are two cities which have similar issues with housing affordability and mayors who refuse to live up to their promises to create actual affordable solutions —at least we can see where the provincial government’s interests are in regard to the housing crisis.

Although our unhoused neighbours at 661 Montreal Street are safe from eviction, for now, we must mobilize against the city and make them live up to their promises for actual solutions.

The first order of business must be to immediately end the harassment of unhoused people by repealing the by-law which bans camping in public parks, repealing the by-law which labels homeless encampments on public property as trespassing, and repealing the city’s encampment protocol. This protocol allows by-law officers to clear any homeless encampment, no matter the size, thus enforcing the by-laws mentioned above. Interestingly, the protocol does not, however, enforce the city’s responsibility to provide housing and services to the poor and unhoused peoples of Kingston; instead, their well-being is thrown by the wayside while they’re pushed further and further to the margins of our city.

Encampment protocols, which are in place across Canada, violate both U.N. article 25 which identifies housing as a human right, and—as several lawsuits have determined—they also violate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedomssection 7, which guarantees the “life, liberty, and security” of every person. Due to this fact, the KUT calls for the working, poor, and unhoused people of Kingston to fight against this flagrantly anti-democratic policy which enables violence against the most oppressed peoples in our city. You can start by writing a letter or calling your city councillor or the mayor’s office and demanding they repeal the encampment protocol. The mayor's phone number is 613-546-4291 ext. 1400, and his e-mail is mayor@cityofkingston.ca.

More permanent solutions to the housing crisis itself are also fairly straightforward, such as the mass implementation of rent-geared-to-income housing, and the increase of city funding for the ICH. This funding would allow the ICH to move locations and expand its services which have saved over 1300 lives from drug overdose—even City staff member Lainie Hurdle, who wrote the anti-democratic and murderous encampment protocol, said “To be quite frank, I think probably the only option at this point would be a larger ICH where individuals could be within the building rather than outside in tents.”

While it is important to watch, understand, and criticize Kingston City Council and other levels of government, it is even more important to organize the working and poor people to defend themselves against attacks from the state. This latest encampment eviction, like those before it, was averted, not due to the compassion and decency of the politicians who have taken credit for it, but by the mobilization of unhoused people and their working-class allies through several grass-roots organizations which drafted petitions, wrote to politicians, and vowed to physically defend the encampment in case of the eviction proceeding as planned.

It must be understood that the most essential part of defending our unhoused neighbours is physically showing up to defend them, and that is exactly what the Katarokwi Union of Tenants did—organizing a community BBQ that served 100 meals to the residents of the encampment the day of the planned eviction, and we’ll be back on March 21st, to prevent the city from moving forward with the stalled eviction date.

If you’re interested in our fight, get in contact with us to prevent more death and despair. Help us tell the city that poverty is not a crime, and we won’t let them punish our neighbours for being poor. Enough is enough, it’s time for action!

Campaigns and Demands

Fighting to Repeal Unjust By-Laws: No Camping, Trespass Notices, and the Encampment Protocol

In Kingston City By-Law # 2009-76 titled ‘A By-Law To Provide For The Regulation Use Of Parks And Recreation Facilities Of The Corporation Of The City Of Kingston’ in section 5E it is stated that “No person shall create a nuisance or disturb other people” in city parks.

And further, in section 11, it states “Camping and the use of any camping equipment is prohibited in all City parks, with the exception for the following

- group camping as authorized as part of an organized Special Event; or

- camping in designated campsites at Lake Ontario Park by registered groups or individuals arriving by bicycle or other modes of active transportation.”

To better enforce the by-laws against unhoused peoples, the council passed the City of Kingston Encampment Protocol in 2020, which is a policy aimed at ensuring the above by-laws are enforced specifically against unhoused peoples. It should be understood that those who are unhoused camp on public land not because they want to, but because they are left with no other choice—they must live within close proximity to the services at the Integrated Care Hub (ICH) which they need to stay alive. Since the city council and mayor have thus far refused to provide any actual affordable housing solutions, the KUT demands that we take immediate action against the harassment of our unhoused neighbours. Our demands are as follows:

1. Repeal the Encampment protocol

2. Amend By-law 2009-76 sections 5e and 11 to exclude unhoused individuals from prosecution under this by-law, in accordance with the state’s failure to provide safe affordable housing to the unhoused, not any failure of the individuals themselves

3. Increase the ICH’s funding, allowing it to relocate into a larger building which includes 100 rent-geared-to-income housing units

The government must meet these demands at a minimum if they wish to help the most oppressed and vulnerable people in our city.

Clean Up the Pests

Private rental dwellings in Kingston have a chronic pest infestation problem. Due to years of no or limited regulations, landlords have kept their properties in disrepair while jacking rental prices up at every opportunity their prices up any chance they get. As a result, people are forced to live with bedbugs, cockroaches, rodents, and other unsanitary and unsafe pests.

The KUT demands that the city of Kingston bolster and expand the property standards department, rehire the property standards officers which were laid off during the pandemic, and introduce a new protocol enforcing by-law #2015-15 section 4.27 which states “[rental] buildings shall be kept free of rodents, vermin and insects at all times.”

The KUT demands that this protocol include strict punishments for landlords who do not comply, up to and including fines and expropriation of property. This may sound extreme to some, yet Ontario cities exercise their rights under the Expropriations Act regularly for road infrastructure and other public works. We demand only the same level of public interest for the basic human right of shelter as is extended to the rights for vehicles and industry.

Encampment Support & Emergency Food Relief

The KUT and its volunteers and allies help to provide the ICH encampment with hot meals several times a week, providing around 100 servings at a time. Over the winter months, our unhoused neighbours must struggle to simply survive in the cold weather, so the KUT and its members feel that this is the least we can do to support our fellow citizens. The KUT is committed to providing food to our neighbours as a response to the Kingston City Council's utter failure to take care of its own people. You can volunteer to both cook and/or serve food any time! Just sign up on the schedule posted on our Facebook page Katarokwi Union of Tenants, or reach out through our Instagram @kcunionoftenants, or our email katarokwitenants@gmail.com

Research and Policy Development

An important part of what we do at the KUT is draft policy alternatives to stop the ongoing oppression and exploitation of our working, poor, and unhoused neighbours.

While we believe it is always important to critique government decisions, our goal with the use of critique is to encourage community members to think beyond the temporary, band-aid solutions to homelessness currently being promoted and funded by the city. KUT does not believe that the goal should be to modestly increase the comfort of homelessness in winter months; rather, we believe that the goal should be the establishment of long-term projects that work towards the elimination of homelessness.

This includes keeping a watchful eye over the municipal government, researching and surveilling the past and current conduct of the city and its related institutions, speaking with and making delegations to city councillors, and drafting alternative policies which put people and the planet before profits.

If you’re interested in this work, please reach out to our Facebook page Katarokwi Union of Tenants, our Instagram @kcunionoftenants, or our email katarokwitenants@gmail.com

In order to cut through the government’s propaganda it is important to educate ourselves about the causes and effects of this housing crisis and how to fight it. Join us in reading and discussing Dr. Doug Yearwood’s 4 part article Why The Rent Is Too Damn High.