start talking a little bit about the organization maybe you can give me a little bit of history metropolitan tenants organization was founded about twenty five years ago at the roots of our organization we were working  other grassroots organizations to pass a law for tenants rights so we spent a few years organizing you know for around a lot of the residential a more tenant ordinance when harold washington came into office that's when it was passed so harold washington was very much on board with the passing of this ordinance and very much a supporter of this it was actually i believe it was one of the first things he did when he got into office was passed that ordinance and that ordinance is a unique and unique law in comparison to the other places not a whole lot of places actually have a specific place where tenants can go to say hey these are my rights this is what my landlord can do when it comes to landlord entry this is what they can do when it comes to you know repairs leases things like that  true in particular requires a lot of that type of stuff a step by building code but the beauty of the ordinance i think one of the one of the most great things is that it allows the tenant to actually hold their landlord accountable without taking them to court so if they're not making repairs or they don't have heat in the winter time they can actually you know take a certain action i'm going through a process and of the landlord violates the law and includes attorneys fees as penalties because you know as we all know tenants don't have a lot of money in terms of you know being able to access these resources and it allows them attorneys to be more inclined to take a says when tenants need you know it's very interesting as i'm listening to you talk and i'm thinking about well we're really in this housing crisis there's a lot of people who in the past were  were homeowners who are having difficulties now with their mortgages who are in foreclosure who are losing their home and probably a lot of people who have been home owners until just track with that yet and we you know we hear some feedback from from folks who this is new to them you know they were former homeowners you know another thing that you know speaking up foreclosure  you know almost i think a little somewhere under fifty percent and it's close to fifty percent of the people at this point being affected by foreclosure are tenants so you've got old homeowners becoming tenants and you've got organize with tenants around safe and affordable housing and accessible housing and a piece of this in the foreclosure crisis is we've been working very hard both we counsel people on the laws that exist and we also have worked with foreclosure convening committee with the city to help improve the laws there's recently a vacant property ordinance passed prior to that there was a law that was  passed both at the state level on one hand at all levels actually federal state and city have had laws and foreclosures passed to protect tenants in the state and the federal laws are the ones that they actually have more time then if they want to say they want a month to month basis they would have actually more time than a normal landlord would would have to give them you know in particular that's an important thing because you've got a lot of people impacted by this at once you don't want you know whole communities to just be put out and thirty days so these tenants will have a minimum of ninety days and they will actually have tab their leases you know honored if they are take if the properties taken over by a bank or something like that and what we i think even want to see is for banks to have a reason to come in and evict people you know it's it's this you know the logic behind what's going on is really crazy right because we've got foreclosed properties we've had all this loss of affordable housing over the years from before this crisis happened through gentrification through even the plan for transformation affordable housing has been just lost and lost and lost now it's needed more of an average yet we have places going to vacant so you know if a bank is going to put somebody out you know we think that they should really have a reason to do that your you  know communities are are really being hurt by this they're just they're being obliterated to some extent especially when you talk about places like inglewood and in different communities that really have very high they get property and we get a lot we get feedback on and on on different tenets that are needed and when it you know we can counsel people and that's my role and i'm more and more on the hotline and how i'm going to supervisors so i hear all these individual cases but i connect those to the organizers when there are situations where it's bigger buildings there or it's just not responding and different things like that because it's going to take collective effort it's going to take collective effort when you've got a landlord who just not doing anything in there just being stubborn they're not going to care as much of one person does something but from that so so then we have we have this building organizing will go out to buildings and then from that stems are  broader organizing where you know we get we're getting the vacant property ordinance passed we're focusing on different laws that affects tenants at the broader scope you know pushing for affordable housing increases not cuts you know things like that  practice to have better practices when it comes to tenants and the holding of property and to not just leave you know properties that the wayside you know that the teary at the community  but it requires the banks to actually register with the city if they have a bank of property they pay they pay a fee when they do that and there is a fine attached if they fail to do that between twenty five hundred and five thousand dollars property and what what's this about like for the person who's watching and going ok what's the problem here let me see if i understand a little bit because of foreclosures and because of a lot of problems that people are having with real estate right now it seems to me that there are an increased number of people who are just up and leaving that you know we hear about this in different neighborhoods where you know the middle of the night the you all come as they put their stuff in the truck and a and they don't know they're there they're not interested in staying there because they don't have heat or water or what happened anything so that one way or the other however you look at it you end up with an empty building cracked in a neighborhood and if i'm understanding correctly a lot times those buildings are not in the past we're not secured nobody was cutting the grass nobody was doing anything and then of course the situ x a lot of time aside from rodents and things like that you would also attracts i understand a lot of times they turn into drug houses they can be where prostitution is occurring and then i started reading and hearing about a lot of crime that was going on crime in terms of you know people being dragged the assaults component here where people are unwilling participants and so you know that the grass was growing very high they were finding all kinds of things and you know hit in the grass  myriad of disasters waiting to happen yet so if you guys came in with this ordinance and said wait a minute you know ok it's one thing to evict people it's one thing is people end up leaving the property but what's happening to the neighborhood in general is having such a wide spread of clay that something something urgently needed to be done correctly set the table yet all right get fixed ah so that what happened so what's the  so the banks if if they go and they turn over and they you know somebody a landlord loses the building they got tenants there they come in if they decide to go ahead and evict everybody and now they've got this vacant people have been in there and stolen pipes stolen whatever you know and now nobody wants to buy it well the bank is going to get a fee for that and so the incentive is you know look you you need to if you're go so the bank has some financial incentive to say you know what why don't i leave the tenants in this property why don't we you know actually house people instead of putting them out and actually have some homes for people  vacant property you know i mean it's it's it's senseless it's completely senseless so you know give the banks some incentive to to to you know make this a better community and you know or across the boards that the banks must register the property they have to pay a fee when they do sell up of twelve hundred fifty dollars and if they fail the register that they can property and they will get fined twenty five hundred to five thousand dollars to the is there any kind of stipulation they're keeping the grass cut or people to know that and so once an ordinance like this gets passed right then it's important to get the word out yet again that's what we're doing right so we want to let people know that if they have been paying their rent that they should have the opportunity to stay and what else do you want people to know so there's another key thing to keep in mind is that tenants tenants find out about the foreclosure for close properties and the there was a lot more scare around it and there was you know a concern of the sheriff showing up to evict to not you know you're in a lot of feedback i'm not saying you know it hasn't very important thing if a if it's at the process where it's about to foreclose and or it's foreclosed upon and the new owners take it over the new owner way want them out and say you know what we'll give you five hundred dollars if you're out by two weeks well if they don't understand you're right about how much time they have and then they have the right to stay there on the same lease terms for ninety days or to the end of their lease whichever is longer that then they may be excited to be like well you know what man i gotta get out of here let me go ahead and take this money and and run but really it's a buyout you know in the tenant doesn't always realize that you know they are buying you out so i would encourage that tenant and certainly if they want to do that and that's convenient for them hey they want some money to understanding of who currently owns that building because if the landlord does own the building then they still have the right to get rents and if they're you know if they stop paying their rents because they the limits in foreclosure they right to get rent so even if the bank silver you want to put that money aside if they don't come and collect it hey great you got some money to move because in the event that they do and sometimes and this is where is it just varies you know sometimes you'll get you'll get a situation where they send in a property they send in a management company designed leases with everybody and to take over the property and to continue you know tendencies well you definitely want to make sure you're painting right there and so on but there are others where the property interests just where is the author yeah and that's where we want to you know those situations are key for organizing you know if we have a situation where you know we've got a building full of people whose  it's been abandoned by the landlord you know we will send one of the nicer is out there to make sure that whoever is the property holds the property at the moment has that the responsibility for the property at the moment banks are responsible once they you know once they take over the property they're going to be the responsible to uphold those terms and those leases you know they may not want to be landlords by you know that that's where this is put them and that is sort of where this is put them and i think a lot of banks have turned out to be in the real estate business that you know they were going to be lovers but they weren't going to be so clearly involved in the real estate is what's come up you know let's face it that's not their specialty it's not what they're especially good at it's not what they want to be doing and so sometimes i think things still go the way the way that we would like them you know or we would hope that they would go so that by having this this ordinance at least it also gives the public in general understands their rights and can complain if they don't get what they're entitled to right that you are right is there anything else that you want to be sure that we get to know today we're learning a lot i just want to be sure that you're everything in terms of you know of your neighborhood you feel ownership of your building of course the contents of your of your apartment or whatever it is that you're renting you know belongs to you but there's also an investment that's just inside the four walls but outside the four walls as well right yeah i mean tenants need to just they need to be aware that there is this ordinance and this ordinance allows them you know certainly gives them rules in and how the property in even if they're not a lease sometimes tenants will call and think well we don't have a lease i don't have any rights well yes you do you have or sponsibility has to pay that rent just like the landlord has responsibilities to keep up the property and you know when the economy's currently deteriorating and everything is impacted by that and tenants are impacted by deteriorating conditions tenants are impacted by evictions when it comes to  evictions they need to know that there are resources out there to try to help them extend their stay in the event that they need it and you know that's that's you know going back to the organizing that's why we need to make sure we're pushing for this  affordable housing and funding people need it people need it desperately right now it is not a time to cut something like that you know in terms of in terms of conditions people have rights and in the event that they the landlord doesn't want to to uphold those rights even when they act as an individual to assert them that's when cummings collectively together is very important because it's going to push them it's going to push them there they're much where we're fighting for so many different groups you know and just you know you're advocating for this or advocating for that and there's always something i'm thinking that everybody lives somewhere you know that even if you're the home owner if this is going on in your neighborhood or the building next door turns into a crack house that's going to affect you and this is really really widespread and really affects everybody and so we want to we want to really focus on tens of thousands yet and all these things are very connected to you know our fights our struggles you know we may be fighting for tenants but you know the folks fighting for jobs are just as important thing and that's what keeps tenants house yeah yeah so that's really a whole chain of  very good well it's been a pleasure talking with you know some that you're here today thanks for joining us thank you for having me i'd like to thank my guests rebecca for joining us perspective us like the u s as a community service of canned t v if you're not for profit organization would like to use canned v services please call us at three one two seven three eight fourteen hundred and ask for nonprofit services tune into perspective and let the us for local issues and concerns every thursday at eight thirty pm here