The LOS ANGELES TENANTS UNION is a tenant-led, tenant-funded movement demanding safe, affordable housing, universal rent control, and an end to landlord harassment, mass evictions, and displacement. They strengthen tenants’ political power through education, advocacy, and direct action.
I have contributed to LATU in various ways over the last 8 years I've been living in Los Angeles, mostly by designing print and social media graphics to promote campaigns and fundraisers.
FOOD NOT RENT SOLIDARITY FUND
I made the following graphics and helped write the website and social media copy for LATU's #FoodNotRent campaign, which invited tenants of LA to go on rent strike and demanded that the city government cancel rent for the duration of the COVID-19 crisis. Contributions to the #FoodNotRent Solidarity Fund were dispersed to LATU members on rent strike who requested financial support for food and basic necessities. More aid and protection from LATU meant that more tenants could join the strike; more tenant participation amplified our demands for rent cancellation and made our landlords less likely to retaliate against or evict us.
As of January 25, 2021, the campaign raised over $97,000 for our most vulnerable members.
I drew and inked the line art and typography for the first illustration, which is based on an image of a young boy at a #FoodNotRent protest at Mariachi Plaza in Boyle Heights. I then scanned the analog art and completed the rest of the rendering with a halftone brush in Adobe Photoshop.
For the second graphic, I combed through hundreds of pictures of LATU members at various protests over the years and chose ones of people making various kinds of noise with their mouths. I had to manipulate many of them significantly (editing out objects on top of the figures, compensating for bad image quality, making sure important text was legible) to make them work for the design.
BUMPER STICKERS
In 2018, I designed this bumper sticker for the LATU Media Team. I completed this project in Adobe Illustrator. The hand-drawn lettering was inspired by linocut and copper-etched political posters of the 60s and 70s. The slogan, which translates to "The fight for housing has no borders," communicates LATU's commitment to secure housing rights for all, regardless of nationality or immigration status. Such a commitment is especially important in Los Angeles, where so many undocumented tenants are at the mercy of slumlords who threaten to report their status.
PROP 10
The following video — a LATU media team production — promoted California's Proposition 10 (the Affordable Housing Act). Prop 10 would have repealed the Costa-Hawkins Act of 1995, which prohibited cities from expanding their existing rent control ordinances. In Los Angeles, this has meant that, for the past 20+ years, landlords have had free reign to set rental prices for apartments built after 1978. Costa-Hawkins also allowed landlords to raise the rental price to any amount following a tenant vacancy; as a result, they have had an incentive to pressure long-term tenants who pay below market rate rents to move out in favor of tenants who can pay higher rents. To push tenants out, landlords have resorted to harassment, deportation threats, dubious evictions, and "buyout" scams. With new vacancies, rent has often increased to levels unaffordable to lower-income renters, contributing to displacement and the gentrification of working-class communities.
The Yes on 10 campaign — funded almost entirely by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation and endorsed by the ACLU, the Democratic Party, and housing rights advocates of every stripe — simply and straightforwardly argued that Prop 10 would restore the power of local communities to address the affordable housing crisis on their own terms. However, the No on 10 campaign — funded by real-estate investors and endorsed by chambers of commerce and apartment associations (i.e. housing industry trade groups) — underhandedly argued that Prop 10 would make the affordable housing crisis worse. Based on the consistently-debunked and borderline-nonsensical premise that Prop 10 will discourage new housing construction and drive up rents, the campaign adopted the slogans "Stop the Housing Freeze" and "Save Affordable Housing," both of which successfully confused voters who simply want housing security and lower rent.
In the face of a $60 million misinformation operation, disseminating LATU's sharp, well-substantiated analysis was not going to suffice; we needed to directly counter the manipulative and deceitful narrative of the opposition. So, members of the LATU media team decided to expose the contradiction at the heart of the No on 10 campaign: the impossibility that housing industry profiteers — the very people responsible for the housing crisis in the first place — would spend millions to ensure that rents stay low.
This video was the result of a collaborative effort between five people. I was most involved in the writing and storyboarding processes; I emphasized the need for emotionality, clarity, polarization ("Whose side are you on?"), and direct intervention in the No on 10 campaign narrative. I also helped direct the kids on the day of the shoot.
The following graphic is a door hanger promoting Prop 10. I completed this project in Adobe Illustrator.