An infestation of mice and cockroaches at her apartment at the Quinnipiac Gardens complex in New Haven prompted Jackie Sewell-Freelove to start thinking about forming a union with her fellow tenants.
“I got tired of living like that – I’m paying too much money for rent,” Sewell-Freelove said. She started meeting with organizers and ended up forming a tenant union with other residents of the complex.
Sewell-Freelove was on hand Tuesday afternoon as New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker signed the state’s first ordinance that recognizes tenant unions and gives them a role in the city’s Fair Rent Commission process.
The new legislation gives the tenant groups power to take part in talks with landlords seeking to raise rents at properties containing 10 or more rental units that share a common location and ownership. Tenants at newer complexes and those owned by nonprofits like Yale would be eligible to join the unions, city officials said.
“There are no other municipalities in Connecticut that have anything like this,” Elicker said. “So it’s a really significant step that we’re taking today, and I’m really proud to sign it. In the end that legislation is going to ensure more fairness and due process for tenants like those in Quinnipiac Gardens.”
Elicker stressed that the measure is aimed at property owners who neglect properties and endanger the health and safety of tenants.
“I just want to make clear this is not anti-landlord by any means,” Elicker said. “This is about ensuring that people have safe, clean places to live, which is the law.”
Fair Rent Commission Executive Director Wildaliz Bermúdez said the measure can help address tenant concerns at a time when a good proportion of the city’s housing stock is owned by out-of-state mega-landlords and rents are rising across the region. The commission will register tenant unions and allow them to take part in its investigative process around rent hikes.
The measure also expands the criteria considered for rent hikes from nine to 13.
“We really look forward to amplifying tenants and landlords coming together at the same table, to be able to have an equitable and well-maintained housing stock,” Bermudez said.
Elicker, who spoke passionately about the need for more affordable housing throughout the state at an economic forum last week, said he didn’t think the new measure would discourage development in New Haven.
“If we have healthy, clean housing, New Haven will be increasingly a place that many people want to live,” Elicker said. “I don’t anticipate there being any reluctance to invest in New Haven. Any reasonable person looking at this would say, ‘Good job for New Haven to hold people accountable.’”
Contact Liese Klein at lklein@newhavenbiz.com.
