Apartment Residents Told to Take Down American Flags

This is an outrage! The American Tenants Association supports the Oaks Apartment tenants who want to fly "Old Glory". Please check out this story which appeared today in KATU News:

By Melica Johnson KATU News and KATU.com Staff
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ALBANY, Ore. - At the Oaks Apartments in Albany, the management can fly their own flag advertising one and two bedroom apartments - but residents have been told they can't fly any flags at all. Jim Clausen flies the American flag from the back of his motorcycle. He has a son in the military heading back to Iraq, and the flag - he said - is his way of showing support. "This flag stands for all those people," said Clausen, an Oaks Apartment resident. "It stands for the people that can no longer stand - who died in wars. That's why I fly this flag."But to Oaks Apartment management, Clausen said, the American flag symbolizes problems. He was told to remove the red, white and blue from both of his rides, or face eviction. "It floored me," he said. "I can't believe she was saying what she was saying. "Even long-time residents like Sharron White, who has flown a flag on her car for eight years, has been told to take it down. White said management told her that "someone might get offended." "I just said to her 'They'll just have to get over it,'" White said.

Residents we talked to who had been approached to take down their flags all told us the same thing: that management told them the flags could be offensive because they live in a diverse community. Attempts to find out for ourselves why management would ban flags were unsuccessful. KATU wanted to talk to management at Oaks Apartments, but no one has returned our calls. The woman we were told had made the decision said she was "not going to answer any questions. "The mother of one soldier fighting in Iraq put up a poster in her son's apartment window when she learned of the ban. Her son's roommate said he'll risk eviction to make sure it stays.

Another Oaks Apartment resident, Judith Sherer, doesn't have a car. Instead she carries an American flag around the complex to protest the ban, and wonders if the flag pin she wears is next to be "singled out." "If I put it on and I walk outside, what's going to happen?" Sherer muses. "Am I going to be confronted by a manager about this? "We're told the ban includes sports flags and even flag stickers on cars.

Good News for California Tenants!

Governor Schwarzenegger recently signed two pieces of legislation benefiting California tenants.

The first, SB 290, sponsored by Sen. Mark Leno, makes the 60-days' notice requirement for tenant evictions permanent. This means that any tenant in the state who has lived in his or her rental for one year or more cannot be evicted with less than 60-days' notice in "no cause" evictions. And it means that tenant groups don't have to mobilize every couple of years to renew the legislation. However, this does not affect tenants protected by local "just cause" ordinances; those tenants cannot be evicted without cause.

The second bill, SB 120, sponsored by Sen. Alan Lowenthal, protects tenants in foreclosed or soon-to-be-foreclosed properties against utility shutoffs when the landlord or lender fails to pay utility bills. In particular, tenants in single-family homes now have the same protection as tenants in multi-family units. Utility companies (gas, electric, water, heat) are now required to give tenants notice that the utility is to be cut off for nonpayment, and to provide a procedure for the tenant or tenants to establish a payment account without having to pay the former landlord's arrearages.

Tenants in single-family homes in outlying communities were often forced to pay the former landlord's water bill to keep the water on. The new legislation also allows tenants who pay the bills, when these costs have been included in the rent, to either deduct the cost from their rent payments or sue the landlord for the cost of establishing service or paying the bills. And it prohibits utility companies from requiring large deposits if the tenant can show that she pays her rent on time. (Utility companies were frequently requiring both payment of the arrearages and a large deposit to keep utility service.) Utility services are required to establish and publicize procedures for tenants to deal with these situations; notice of those procedures should be delivered along with any shutoff notice.

We would hope that they also publicize them in their newsletters and on their websites as well.You can read SB 290 here and SB 120 here. And you can read more at the Tenants Together blog.

Why Does The Government Hate Renters?

As you may know, it's been the American Tenants Association's position to allow residential renters to deduct a portion of rent payments in a fashion similar to that afforded homeowners' mortgage interest payment deductions. Washington Post business page blogger Ezra Klein makes some great points in support of phasing out the home mortgage interest deduction altogether.

Here's what Mr. Klein had to say:

"I'm looking into buying a place myself, and a big part of the incentive is the tax preference: The fact that my mortgage uses pre-tax money while my rent requires post-tax money is a huge difference, particularly over time. And what will boost me into that lush future? Well, the fact that I make a fair amount of money for someone my age. The fact that my grandparents put away a bit of money to help with my eventual down payment. The fact that my earning potential looks likely to rise, which reassures my bank. The government is in effect giving me a cash reward for being pretty well-off.

That's a rather dumb way to apportion resources. More to the point, it's not necessary. The economics and emotional rewards of owning a house are compelling enough without the mortgage deduction. If you want to give low-income homebuyers additional help, that would make a lot of sense, particularly given the long-term importance of assets in bolstering financial security. But giving it to everyone who buys a home of any size is simply a regressive attack on renters. Ripping the deduction out right now would be too disruptive, but you could certainly phase in a cap on future home purchases."

Here's the link to Mr. Klein's blog post:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2009/09/why_does_the_government_hate_r.html?ref=patrick.net

Renting: The New American Dream

"It's time to accept that home ownership is not a realistic goal for many people and to curtail the enormous government programs fueling this ambition". So says University of Pennsylvania professor Thomas J. Sugrue in an outstanding article in the latest weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal. Here's the link to the full article:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204409904574350432677038184.html