TU History

Seattle Tenants Union Formed: Concerned tenant volunteers formed the Seattle Tenants Union (STU) in response to widespread substandard housing conditions and lack of decent, healthy, affordable housing.

TU Incorporation: In 1977, the loose-knit coalition of volunteers incorporated into a non-profit organization. The first paid staffing was provided through the Americorps VISTA volunteer program. STU provided services through an educational hotline and organized at buildings and region-wide for broad policy change to address housing injustices. The TU was funded largely through membership donations.

Rent Control Initiative: STU led efforts to pass an initiative to institute rent control in Seattle. The initiative was overwhelmed by opposition from the landlord lobby, which raised $400,000 to defeat it. Landlords used the opportunity to successfully lobby state legislators to push through a statewide prohibition on any local rent control, which still stands today.

Seattle Just Cause Eviction Ordinance: In response to the rent control initiative loss, tenants and homeless advocates fought for protection from arbitrary evictions. The displacement of 250 households by the building of the Convention Center downtown put displacement and homelessness in the spotlight. The Just Cause Eviction Ordinance was passed by the Seattle City Council and stands today as one of the most vital tenant protections for Seattle tenants. The Ordinance outlaws arbitrary evictions and defines just cause for termination of tenancy in Seattle.

Education Program Expansion: In 1981, the City of Seattle began to provide funding to support the Hotline and outreach and education work of the STU. The Hotline was open 9am to 5pm Monday through Friday. Regrettably, this funding source was lost in 2007 due to budget cut backs, significantly reducing capacity and has since not been renewed.

Downtown Housing Maintenance Ordinance: In response to widespread abandonment of housing in downtown Seattle, this legislation made it a responsibility of owners to keep their buildings habitable and continue to rent out viable housing in downtown and lower First Hill neighborhoods. It also included provisions for financial assistance to owners to ensure units where habitable.

Housing Preservation Ordinance (HPO): Passed to help stem the loss of downtown affordable housing units, many of which were single room occupancy units (SRO’s). The HPO included a requirement that prior to change use or tearing down housing, owners either replace lost units elsewhere or contribute to a fund for low cost housing. The HPO also instituted relocation assistance for tenants who were displaced as a result of redevelopment of their homes.

Rental Housing Inspection Program: Substandard housing conditions throughout the city were the fuel for the campaign to create a program of systematic housing inspections. Property owners paid taxes to cover the cost of the program. Landlords sued and RHIP tax was found unconstitutional by the State Supreme Court.

Seattle Tenant Relocation Assistance Ordinance: This ordinance requires that landowners applying for building permits for demolition or change of use give tenants 90 days’ notice and financial assistance to move.

Seattle Condo Conversion Tenant Protection Ordinance: Requires developers to offer right of first refusal and provide relocation assistance to tenants facing conversion of apartments to condominiums.

Seattle Rental Agreement Regulation Ordinance: One way leases required a tenant to stay 6 months or a year in order to get their deposit back. The Tenants Union fought for a law that made these kinds of restrictions on month-to-month tenancies illegal in Seattle. The new law also required that landlords give tenants a summary of landlord-tenant laws.

Security House Preserved: The elderly and disabled tenants at Security House organized to save their affordable housing from being sold off as a hotel in downtown Seattle. The campaign preserved their homes and instigated a campaign to ensure that any publicly funded purchaser must maintain federal subsidies.

Thurston County Tenants Union (TCTU): When 20 units of housing were facing demolition, Olympia activist Pat Tassoni and other tenant leaders organized to save them. TCTU provided tenant education, organized tenants for building improvements and housing preservation, and built a coalition of tenants working for social justice.

Section 8 Tenants Organizing Project: STOP was formed in response to a crisis in the growing number of project based Section 8 buildings that were canceling the subsidies that made the units affordable to very low income tenants. STOP educates and organizes Section 8 voucher tenants and tenants in project-based Section 8 buildings, working to affect change in housing policy at the local level and preserve the long term affordability of Section 8 housing.

60 Day Notice on Rent Increases: The Rental Agreement Regulation Ordinance was amended in 1998 to require that Seattle landlords give 60 days’ notice if they increase a tenant’s rent 10% or more in a 12-month period. This campaign was led by tenant leaders from the Qualman Building and the Biltmore on Capitol Hill.

Affordable Housing Funding Policy Reforms: Changes internal policies of the WA State Housing Trust Fund, King County Housing Opportunity Fund and Seattle Housing Levy to require that developers who receive funds must maintain existing federal subsidies.

Federal Budget Advocacy: In collaboration with national tenants’ rights and housing organizations, mobilize membership to impact budget and policy decisions at the federal level through phone campaigns, local meetings with elected officials, training and advocacy in Washington D.C., and media advocacy.

Avalon Ridge Civil Rights Victory: African American mothers who used Section8 to pay rent came together when they all received eviction notices. Through grassroots organizing and a class action lawsuit, the TU and the tenants won not only individual compensation and a moratorium on the evictions, but also established an important legal precedent that canceling participate in the Section 8 program can have a disparate impact on mothers of color.

Statewide Section 8 Tenant Protection Legislation: This state law requires property owners to provide notice to tenants, state and local jurisdiction one year prior to cancellation of federal subsidies, and to provide tenants with information about their rights. This was the TU’s first statewide legislative victory.

Federal Right to Organize Legislation: This law guarantees tenants’ rights to distribute information, go door to door, meet and organize to address concerns. It also requires owners and HUD to respond to and consider tenant input in key project decisions.

Seattle Right to Organize Ordinance: The TU won law that offers tenant protections against retaliation, guarantees tenants’ rights to distribute information, talk to their neighbors and meet to address concerns.

Oxford Apartment Preservation: The tenants at the Oxford faced rent increases and displacement when the owner sold the building and cancelled the Section 8 subsidy contract without proper notice to tenants. The tenants organized with STOP, won support from the community and elected officials, and with the help of legal services negotiated a settlement that protected all current residents, and maintained 15 units as affordable for another 15 years.

Seattle Third Party Billing Regulation Ordinance: This Seattle ordinance requires landlords to disclose information regarding third party billing practices and establishes city administered billing dispute process.

Benson East Tenant Ownership Project: The 32 families at the Benson East in Kent, WA were facing displacement when the owner planned to cancel the Section 8 contract and sell off all 16 buildings. With the support of STOP, the tenants organized, formed a new non-profit organization, and partnered with a developer to purchase the complex. The tenants, who conduct all meetings in four languages, no have legal and day to day control over the management and operations of the complex, and continue to take an active role in promoting tenants’ rights and tenant ownership.

Park Apartments: Tenants at this rundown complex in the suburban city of Auburn were subject to self-help evictions overseen by local police, unfair fees, utility shut offs and dangerous housing conditions. They organized a tenants association and forced the city to prevent police from overseeing illegal evictions, and force the landlord to make major health and safety repairs.

Statewide Tenant Relocation Assistance: This “slumlord accountability” law requires negligent property owners whose property is shut down by a government agency to pay relocation assistance to displaced tenants. It also allows local jurisdictions to provide relocation assistance and collect penalties from property owner. See A Victory Over the Slumlords.

Statewide Source of Income Discrimination Campaign: Multi-year campaign to expand fair housing protections to include source of income used to pay housing costs including Section 8 vouchers or public assistance. This law was not passed statewide, but Source of Income protection continues to be one of the Tenants Union’s priorities. See Access to Housing Organizing for more information on current work.

Douglas Apartments: The tenants at the Douglas lived for years with dangerously substandard housing conditions. Organizing efforts in past years brought short term improvements, but the slumlord owner aggressively intimidated tenants, including calling immigration enforcement, and conditions quickly deteriorated again. In 2006 the Seattle Housing Authority (SHA) announced it would purchase the property using eminent domain. While the purchase was potentially good news, SHA has a track record of major developments in the Rainier Valley, the city’s most diverse and poorest neighborhood, which are not affordable to very low-income people. The tenants organized through the Justice in Southeast Seattle project and won guaranteed relocation assistance, the right to return, an independent panel to review any rejections of current tenants, and a redevelopment plan that includes housing affordable to very low income people and units open to tenants regardless of immigration status. These victories are particularly important because the Douglas is in the Rainier Valley just blocks from a new light rail station, and faced near certain displacement from gentrification.

Section 8 Voucher Grievance Hearing Reform: Hundreds of Section 8 voucher tenants in Seattle were being made homeless by an unfair and illegal hearing process at Seattle Housing Authority (SHA). Over 90% of hearings went in favor of SHA, and the one hearing officer employed by SHA categorically refused to consider the tenants documentation, civil rights laws or domestic violence protections in his decisions. With the support of STOP an attorney from Northwest Justice Project, the recommendations made by STOP to improve the Section 8 program and protect tenants’ rights in grievance hearings were fully adopted by SHA. SHA agreed to hire a panel of legally trained hearing officers who will consider all relevant evidence and legal arguments to ensure that tenants are no longer terminated unfairly or capriciously. Significant improvements were made in SHA policies around domestic violence, language access and disability issues, and several tenants have had their vouchers reinstated as a direct result of STOP organizing. STOP served as a national model for organizing led by Section 8 voucher holders.

Improve Landlord-Tenant Laws: In partnership with other tenant advocacy groups, the TU successfully advocated for comprehensive changes to the Landlord-Tenant Act that resulted in critical, long-overdue improvements for Washington State tenants. You can read all the changes in SHB 1266.

Downtowner Tenants Association: STOP organized with tenants in the Downtowner Apartments who were facing displacement because the landlord planned to opt out of the Section 8 program. Tenant leaders formed a tenants association and were able to secure low income housing and preserve the building as affordable. Downtowner tenants also took their concerns directly to HUD and were able to set national precedents in affordable housing policy.

After a 5 year campaign — and almost 20 years for the TU — the Seattle City Council unanimously voted in the Rental Housing Registration & Inspection Program, a bill that will dramatically shift the power imbalance between landlords and tenants and hold the slumlords in our community accountable.