RESOLUTION NO. 240269

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Sponsor:  Councilmember Johnathan Duncan

RESOLUTION - Honoring KC Tenants for five years in Kansas City.

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WHEREAS, KC Tenants, the City-wide tenant union, was founded in the east side of Kansas City on February 17, 2019, by ten tenants impacted by housing insecurity; and

WHEREAS, KC Tenants recognizes that 48% of Kansas City residents are renters; and

WHEREAS, over the last five years, KC Tenants has grown into a multigenerational, multiracial group of over 10,000 poor and working class people throughout Kansas City, and has become the biggest and most powerful tenant union in the country; and

WHEREAS, KC Tenants recognizes that the people closest to the problem are the experts of their own lived experience, building a union of neighbors who have each other’s backs and take action alongside their community; and

WHEREAS, KC Tenants has been a force of good in Kansas City through winning policy protections, winning material fixes, supporting tenants who call the union’s hotline, and keeping tenants in their homes during the height of the pandemic by preventing thousands of evictions; and

WHEREAS, KC Tenants has supported building unions to protect tenants from mismanagement and poor living conditions in every region of the City; building unions which have turned on the heat at North Lawn in the Northeast, relocated tenants after a pipe burst at the PB Lofts Downtown, engaged in collective bargaining at Parvin Estates in the Northland, turned on the AC at Gabriel Towers in the East Side, and secured $2.7 million for Heart Village Mobile Homes residents displaced from their homes; and KC Tenants has also protected our tax dollars from subsidizing landlords who perpetuate mismanagement and poor conditions; and

WHEREAS, KC Tenants has championed policies that create and extend tenant protections, including a Tenants Bill of Rights, a tenant’s Right to Counsel during evictions, a Ban on Source of Income Discrimination, an Office of Language Access, and tenant representatives on the Housing Trust Fund board; NOW, THEREFORE,

BE IT RESOLVED BY THE COUNCIL OF KANSAS CITY:

That the Mayor and Council hereby honor KC Tenants for their five-year anniversary; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that this Resolution be spread upon the Minutes of the Council in testimony thereof and that a copy hereof be presented to KC Tenants, with the appreciation of the Mayor and Council for KC Tenants and looking forward to working with them for years to come.

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