Residents and housing advocates from western Massachusetts took a trip to Beacon Hill this week, looking to make their voices heard on housing issues in the Pioneer Valley. Before taking the trip, some spoke with WAMC.
It was already 80 degrees early Tuesday morning as a group gathered outside MGM Springfield. Amassing a pile of snacks and bottled water to take with them were members of the group “Springfield No One Leaves,” preparing to board a Boston-bound bus.
Rose Webster-Smith, its director, says a rally was on the itinerary, as was speaking in support of legislation that’s up for a hearing – “An Act enabling cities and towns to stabilize rents and protect tenants”
“It sets a base rent, it sets a cap on rent increases to five percent as, right now, landlords can raise the rent as high as they want, and across Western Mass., we have seen rent increases of more than 50 percent or higher,” she tells WAMC. “That's not sustainable for people that are already paying 50 percent more of their income. It also gets rid of no-fault evictions, or no-cause, because there's no point in having rent control if the landlord can still evict you for no justifiable reason.”
Among the senate bill’s supporters are State Senators Adam Gomez, Paul Mark and Jo Comerford.
It’s not the first time the bill’s been filed, but as advocates point out, it comes amid a series of pro-housing rallies in the Pioneer Valley – many in response to skyrocketing rent raises.
Two weeks ago, No One Leaves was in Easthampton, joining residents who say out-of-state ownership groups have jacked up rents anywhere from 35 to 40 percent in some cases - sometimes higher, according to the Daily Hampshire Gazette.
Christina Haramut says there are also owners who have embraced six-month agreements, opening the door for more frequent rent raises.
“One practice that Hurricane Properties is doing that’s very concerning for us is, they'll put people on six-month leases so they can raise their rent every six months, and people don't know this … it's misleading,” she said.
Meanwhile, in Ludlow, residents at the West Street Village Mobile Home Community have been fighting a move to increase rents there by as much as 140 percent. In that case, tenants recently notched a victory in the courts, says Webster-Smith.
“Thankfully, through their hard work - they were protesting out here before their court cases, filed into the court, sat respectfully [to] watch the hearings - the judge just issued a decision rolling back a $300 rent increase, so their lot fee’s going back to the $207, but that took organizing and being public-facing to say, ‘not in our communities.’”
Other members making the trip have been fighting their own housing battles.
Kimberly Gauthier of East Longmeadow says as she undergoes treatment for cancer, the inherited home she and her daughter have been living in is being pushed toward a foreclosure auction.
Including funds from Social Security Disability Insurance, Gauthier is able to gather $1,700 a month – not enough to stay in a local one-bedroom apartment and keep up with bills she says, or weather rising rents.
“We need something to help us, otherwise, they're forcing a whole new homeless situation out there that they're not ready for,” she said. “Cancer patients, disabled people, everyone on the street now - because they can't afford an apartment, based on the social security disability they are collecting from our government.”
Also making the trip – members of the group Neighbor to Neighbor. Jeremy Pemberton is an interpreter for the group and is also dealing with the tight rental market.
“I'm 26-years-old - I'm looking for an apartment myself and everything and it's really hard right now. I'm on the verge of being homeless, so, this is a good opportunity for me to speak my piece about it and hopefully, share my experience with other people that are going through a similar situation.”
Opponents of the bill include MassLandlords, the "landlord trade association for Massachusetts," the group's website states.
The group set up a page specifically for Tuesday's hearing, touching on rent control's history in the state - repealed via ballot initiative in 1994. The group contends rent control lowers "assessed values and real estate tax revenue," while also potentially creating "unevictable professional tenants."
The group also claims it assembled 86 pages of written testimony ahead of Tuesday's hearing.
Supporters acknowledge it’s an uphill battle to get the bill passed. Webster-Smith says the legislation takes different factors into consideration. She says it also exempts owner-occupied units from the rent control policy.
The big target, she and others say, are larger rental companies that tend to roll in from out of state, buying up properties while calling them “investments.”
“Let's be real, if you own eight or more units, you have a business and so no, that doesn't call for an exemption: it is a business, it is a profit margin - you have a profit and loss statement, you most likely have a registered LLC and it's not our small landlords that are driving the rent up, it's the corporate landlords out there, using AI technology … to set these prices right,” she said. “And so, we're not trying to do anything that's going to hurt our small mom and pop landlords. As a matter of fact, we appreciate that they're the ones keeping the rents low.”
The Joint Committee on Municipalities and Regional Government hearing the groups hoped to attend was slated to start at 1 p.m.
A stream/recording of the meeting can be found here.
