With a rally set for Saturday, a new coalition on LI sharpens its focus on tenants' rights

A new coalition of tenants, advocacy groups and faith-based organizations has joined together to advocate for tenants' rights, announcing their formation with an inaugural rally Saturday in both Nassau and Suffolk counties as they seek to empower residents facing substandard housing conditions and skyrocketing evictions.

"Basically, throughout the year, I’ve been knocking on doors throughout Long Island, starting in Hempstead, making my way through Suffolk County, with other folks" to get insight into the concerns of low-income tenants, said William Bailey, a senior organizer on Long Island for New York Communities for Change and the impetus behind the new coalition called Housing for All Long Island.

"At these doors you meet tenants from all walks of life, tenants being discriminated against because of who they are, what their color is, what their nationality is," Bailey said. "Some have to choose between feeding their kids or paying the rent. Landlords are quick to put tenants out after the eviction moratorium" ended in January.

Eviction filings have increased by about 1,100 in Nassau so far this year over all of last year, and by more than 2,000 for Suffolk.

Bailey said some tenants face abhorrent conditions.

"Gun violence is at an all-time high. Tenants are afraid in buildings [where there's] no security. Landlords are not doing what they’re supposed to do," he said.

Bob Eilbott, a representative of New York State Poor People's Campaign, Long Island Region, accompanied Bailey on the door-knocking in places like Hempstead Village, Freeport, Amityville and Brentwood. The people's campaign is one of more than a dozen advocacy groups listed as coalition members.

Some of the stories Eilbott said he heard were "frightful." He recalled meeting a woman who said she couldn't get the in-home help her disabled child needed because "people were afraid to go into her building to service her needs. In other buildings, we saw mold. We saw people on drugs sleeping [on the floor in hallways]."

"Our goal, long term, was to build a tenants organization, a tenants union where people could act in concert with one another to fight unscrupulous landlords," Eilbott said. "What we really and truly want to do is bring the attention of the issues to elected officials."

Nia Adams, an organizer with the Long Island Progressive Coalition, said her organization was participating because of "record inequities across a variety of justice issues. Those gaps are widening. Housing is a mental health issue. It is an economic justice issue and it is a public safety necessity."

Housing for All Long Island seeks passage of proposed State Senate bills that would prohibit the eviction of tenants or nonrenewal of leases without "good cause," and another that would establish a state office of civil representation "to provide access to legal services in eviction proceedings."

There were 127,586 eviction filings in New York State this year as of Monday, up from 69,282 in all of 2021, when New York's eviction moratorium was in effect. And 25,625 eviction warrants have been issued by the counties in the state so far in 2022, up from 5,227 in 2021, according to the statewide eviction information dashboard maintained by the New York State Uniform Court System.

The tally of eviction filings for Nassau so far this year was 3,097, up from 1,979 in all of 2021. In Suffolk, there were 5,134 so far in 2022, up from 3,023 in all of 2021.

The number of warrants for eviction issued in Nassau were 1,716 so far this year, up from 203 last year. In Suffolk, there were 1,720 eviction warrants issued in 2022, up from 754 last year.  

Housing for All's rally is to begin Saturday in Suffolk County at 9:30 a.m. at 450 Moreland Rd., Commack. Then, Bailey said, "We’re going to drive from Suffolk County all the way to Nassau, to walk starting in Rockville Centre."

The march is scheduled to step off at the Rockville Centre Long Island Rail Road station at 10:45 a.m., then arrive at the Freeport station by 12:30 p.m.; then arriving at the Western Beef Supermarket on Nassau Road in Roosevelt by 1:35 p.m., then the Hempstead LIRR station by 3:05 p.m.; and concluding at the Nassau Legislature building in Mineola at 4:30 p.m.

Bailey added: "The whole goal is for tenants to wake up," and to show "our collective power" to politicians. "This is the start."

By Olivia Winslow

olivia.winslow@newsday.com@newsollie