Homes and cities belong to those who live in and take care of them

Anfang Juni 2011 fand in Hamburg Recht auf Stadt Kongress statt. Mehrere Tage gab es Diskussionen, Workshops, Filme u.v.m. Einer der TeilnehmerInnen war Juan Haro vom Movement for Justice in El Barrio, das 2004 in East Harlem gegründet wurde. 2006 wurde die Initiative von der New Yorker Village Voice zum Best Power to the People Movement gewählt. Juan Haro präsentierte die Initiative, die aus einem Häuserkampf entstanden ist. Tags darauf führten Elke Rauth und Christoph Laimer für dérive ein Interview mit Juan Haro, das hier in leicht gekürzter Version zu lesen ist und mit der Vorstellung der Initiative beginnt.

Juan Haro: We began to organize in December of 2004. Initially it were single mothers who founded the organization. They basically all lived in buildings owned by one particular landlord, who was trying to displace them from their community. His name is Steven Kessner. He owned 47 buildings in the neighborhood. So the movement was born to organize and fight against displacement. And these fearless mothers came together in the lobby of their buildings and began to do a little research. They found a list of all buildings owned by this guy and they began to organize door to door, building by building, block by block. And as they pursued this, they found that there were many other tenants who, just as themselves, were willing to unite and fight. So then the group just organically grew. About maybe six months later there were about 200 members, all living in these buildings. They decided to form an organization and decided upon its name collectively.
Most of the organization‘s members are immigrants and so the great majority of them doesn‘t speak English. They are Spanish speakers, monolingual Spanish speakers. Nevertheless, they began to meet building by building. The way our organization is structured is that we are building committees. Each committee decides their strategy collectively. For example, at that point in one building a committee of tenants decided to sue Steve Kessner and take him to court and in another building another committee decided that they rather do a march while another group would decide to bring in the press to do a media tour and show the bad conditions they were facing. So it was a multi-pronged strategy. Steve Kessner retaliated by harassing and threatening the tenants but this did not stop the members from continuing the fight. It was a long and very intense battle.
About two years later the local newspaper The Village Voice named Steve Kessner one of the ten worst landlords in New York City. He would always refuse to speak to the press. Yet, he decided to grant an interview. In that interview he said that Movement for Justice in El Barrio was his only headache but that he was going to help to construct East Harlem and that he wasn’t going anywhere. But two and a half months later he basically left. For the members that was a great victory because it was the first time in our members’ lives that they had ever joined forces. They realized that together they were able to achieve this and that they could achieve whatever they wanted to achieve as a community. That was one of our initial battles against this individual. But he is only one of many.

dérive: Last night in your lecture you emphasized that the movement runs without hierarchy. Could you tell us how the organization works in detail?

Juan Haro: Our organization has no president, our organization has no leader. We currently have 65 committees in 65 buildings. In order for community residents or tenants to join the organization they must work collectively within their building and form a building committee or a tenant association. That is the only criteria. If someone has a problem, those tenants who are already members of the organization will support them and door-knock in that building and try to identify which problems they have and if they are willing to fight. Meetings are convened in the lobby of each building and if it is a new building the meeting is promoted. At the second meeting, the only requirement is that the majority commits to pursue the fight collectively. At that second meeting tenants vote to join the organization but also identify who or what their target is and how they are going to fight against that target.
The rest of the committees will then support them, the organization as a whole will support whatever decision comes out of that committee.
In terms of broader decisions we have general meetings or general assemblies where everyone comes together to make a collective decision. For example, the decision of coming to Germany (Recht auf Stadt Kongress, Hamburg) was made at an assembly or if there is going to be a broader march event is decided by everybody.

dérive: In the video about your movement there is a scene that shows how the residents of the neighborhood vote on the street about the issues that are important for them. How did that work and what came out of it?

Juan Haro: Since the beginning we practiced self-determination. Decisions are made by the community itself. After about two and a half years there came a point when our members decided that it was time to tackle yet another issue beyond housing. At that point we had a general assembly. There was some discussion as to how we were going to make that decision, how we were going to become a multi-issue organization, how we were going to pick these other issues. At that point the members felt that although we were growing, and I think at that point we might have had around 300 members (currently we have about 700 members), they couldn‘t truly represent everybody because obviously there area lot more tenants in the neighborhood than 300.
So we decided to develop what we called la consulta del barrio. Consulta means consultation, community consultation. So we organized la consulta del barrio. It consisted of a ballot. At a series of meetings the members identified six issues, the most pressing issues they were facing. They left a seventh blank for any other issue. We built this ballot-box and in the heart of East Harlem, on 116th and Lexington, we installed it. We spent a couple of weeks promoting la consulta del barrio. We would engage people, usually in the evening when they were coming home from work and we would ask them to participate and let us know what their top three issues were. The top three of the problems which were identified as part of this consultation process were: lack of minimum wage jobs, the exploitation at the work place and the maltreatment by the Mexican consulate and immigration laws. Shortly thereafter as the final phase or stage of the consulta, we organized three townhall meetings in the neighborhood, one per issue, to basically engage people‘s enthusiasm around each issue. That was the final stage to finally determine which one was the top issue.
The top issue in terms of votes but also in terms of these townhall meetings turned out to be problems caused by the Mexican consulate. In the neighborhood there are lots of immigrants and lots of them are Mexicans. There were lots of problems. For example, you are an immigrant in New York and you don‘t have papers, however, in order to navigate the city or in order to access any service (e.g. go to a hospital, register for school, rent housing) you need some sort of ID. Since the US Government won‘t give you an ID, immigrants are dependent on their Mexican consulate or embassy to issue what is known as matrícula. Matrícula is a form of ID which is given to you as a Mexican national.
An ID is something many people might take for granted but for someone who is undocumented, it is a vital part of their daily life. What was happening at that time was, that in order for you to actually aquire an ID or a matrícula at the Mexican embassy or consulate, people would literally have to camp there. They showed up in front of the consulate at 6pm the night before to spent the night there and when the consulate would open on the next day at 9am, there were hundreds of people waiting. The consulate would give tokens out only to a small number of people. If you were lucky enough to get a token, then you would be seen. So for an immigrant, who is undocumented, who is working ten, twelve hours a day, six, seven days a week, it is very tough to take any time off work. Because if you do, you risk getting fired. This was very tough for many people and ended up being the most pressing issue, something which the mainstream commercial media and/or society may not have easily identified.
So anyway, the consulta del barrio, this entire process, was a laity one. It took about six months in order to identify these issues and this is why some people thought we were crazy. People in New York, other groups, were like, «Hey, you guys have members. Why don‘t you just figure it out in meetings?« But our members thought this wasn‘t the way we should practice. As a community it was equally powerful at the same time because no one had ever been asked this sort of question. So here is an organization made up of neighbors asking their fellow neighbors, «Tell us what your problems are because we want to tackle them. We want to tackle the most pressing problems. But in order for us to determine that, your voice counts!« This is the way we believe democracy should be practiced. We have local city councillors who are there to represent the district etc. But, you know, it is a farce. The City Councillor has never consulted the community in this way or anything close to that. They make their decisions without consultation. We consider ourselves to be an organization that is practicing self-determination and autonomy and this is one example of how we do it.

dérive: Did you already have any ideas how to solve this problem back then or any tactics how to pursue your new goal?

Juan Haro: Well, it is interesting because this was a process of six months and throughout this process we used a lot of the media. We were surprised that the local commercial media became somewhat interested in this consultation process. I don‘t know if you noticed in the video but there were some newspaper articles about the »democracy in el Barrio«. Some of the mainstream media actually came out and documented the process, which surprised us. There was a lot of press and media coverage around the process and so the consulate knew that we were pondering targeting them. So soon after the actual decision to target them and to take this on as an issue was made, the head of the consulate was replaced by someome else, who actually put an end to these long overnight lines etc. We ended up taking all of the information we had gathered at the consulta and we had a press conference where we put out our findings around the Mexican consulate. We achieved really quick victories. Part of it was coincidence, part of it wasn‘t. In the end we never launched a permanent campaign around it. At this point we have maintained our focus around displacement, housing and gentrification.

dérive: In the video there was a slogan on a banner saying the neighborhood should be for those who live there and who look after it. I think it is also a Zapatista slogan. Did you have a broader debate about it? Because in a way it questions the existing ideas and laws of property in the US, I guess.

Juan Haro: We believe that our homes, our community should belong to those people who take care of the community, who take care of our homes and who live there. As well as we say that the land should belong to those who cultivate it and not for any other purpose. That is truly what we believe.
We have been able to build relationships with organizations beyond East Harlem and we have learned from organizations. There is, for example, an organization in Mexico called The Community Front in Defense of Land, which is based in Atenco. We have created brotherhood and sisterhood with this organisation. They are also part of the Zapatista‘s La Otra Campaña. They are in a rural community and the Mexican Federal Government had a plan to build an international airport in Atenco. So the community fought, organized themselves, simple, humble people like ourselves. They actually won. They beat the federal government and their plan was cancelled. It was an incredible victory, very well known throughout the world. But two years later (Anm. Redaktion: 2006) the government avenged this victory by attacking the community. The police came into Atenco and attacked the community. Approximately 30 women were raped. A couple of hundred community members were incarcerated, became political prisoners, and two youths were killed. This was a horrible attack.
At that point we had been in existence for approximately two years. We had just joined La Otra Campaña when this attack happened and so this was a major learning experience for us, to see how severly a government could repress a community that is organized. An international campaign to liberate the political prisoners and against the impunity was launched. We were able to see parallels to this community: They were defending their land and they were victorious and confronted with this really horrible repression. The other campaign has a slogan: «An injury to one is an injury to all.« We basically began to build a relationship with this organization, breaking down borders through video messages. We had a number of protests in front of the Mexican consulate in New York City demanding liberation of the political prisoners and we actually got a chance to visit Atenco. So in the end several leaders of their organization were sentenced, one of them to 112 years. But because of the international fight all have been released. This experience has been very enriching for us in terms of learning how other communities have effectively struggled.

dérive: That actually brings me back to your core demand for housing and real estate. You also faced a fight against an international investor where this network idea came in and was very useful.

Juan Haro: We started organizing at a local level and our focus has always been at the local level. But then this police attack around Atenco transpired. Around the same time a multinational cooperation from London called Dawnay Day Group purchased dozens of buildings in East Harlem and they declared to the London Times that their plan was to increase our rents tenfold.
We had experience in organizing at the local level. They were a huge multibillionaire conglomerate, they had property in different continents. So when they leveled this threat at our community we began to organize and we decided that we needed to go beyond East Harlem, beyond New York. We needed to take them on beyond borders.
So we launched the international campaign In Defense of El Barrio. We sent a delegation to different countries in Europe where they owned property. Since their international offices were in both London and Scotland we went ahead and travelled there as well. Our objective was to inform the people of these countries about what was happening to us, generate support and build allies. We asked them to support our struggle and to help us take on this company. This was also a very intense battle. It became international. After about three years the company fell apart.
They aggressively pursued the plan. But in the end none of us has been displaced from our homes. So every single member that has joined the organization has been able to retain their home. Those are really concrete solutions that we have been able to achieve together. But beyond that, for us it is also an achievement to be able to build community. Many of the tenants in these 65 buildings had not known each other before joining the organization, which is basically the way it is in society where everyone is very individualistic and does not really communicate. This is the way it was in East Harlem. Now we have hundreds who are creating their own community, making decisions collectively, celebrating victories together. To us this is part of it. It is an entire cultural resistance that’s born. We have children, we have young people, who have never been taught anywhere in any of the institutions what it is to fight for dignity. It is happening on the ground. The parents, the young, the children go to the meetings, make decisions, march together, protest. This is an entire different culture of resistance. Community and resistance that has generated a culture of its own.

dérive: How does your struggle for housing fit into the bigger picture of fighting for a better society?

Juan Haro: We fight for dignity. We fight obviously for dignified housing. But beyond that, we are very conscious since the very beginning that our community is diverse. Our community in East Harlem is made up of people of color, Latino, Asian, Black. It is obviously co-gendered, the majority of our members are women. It is also a community that consists of a transgender community, gays, lesbians, many immigrants. We realize that those from above and the capitalist system itself benefit from the divisions that exist not just in East Harlem but throughout the country and throughout the world. These communities are marginalized communities because of their gender, because of their color, because of their sexual orientation. And the fact that racism, transphobia, sexism and xenophobia exist, really benefits those from above. They wish to keep us divided.
So we believe that the only way to effectively combat and to create the change we want is to unite. For us it is not just about being able to retain our homes. It is about proactively combatting these forms of repression. On an everyday basis, when we organize in a building, there are times when someone will express their prejudice towards another neighbor. We believe it is important to challenge that, to address that. We know that discrimination exists on all levels of society. But we believe that we need to put an end to that in order for us to be able to come together, united as an entire community and then to be able to practice self-determination, autonomy and to achieve what we want together. Our struggle is for the liberation of all marginalized communities and for dignity.

dérive: At the lecture you have been asked if you see yourself as a part of the Right to the City network. You do not use this term yourself. Is there any particular reason for avoiding it or why you think this concept does not fit so well for your specific context?

Juan Haro: There isn’t. Our organizing is very organic. We do not have a label or we don’t like to say »We are Right to the City.« We don’t use the jargon. That’s it. It is really simple.

dérive: As you said before, it is of great importance for immigrants to get an ID but how important is it for them to get a legal status in the US?

Juan Haro: Most of our members are immigrants. They work ten to twelve hours, six, seven days a week. Most of them work either in restaurants as back of the house, like they call it in the restaurant industry, which means cooking and washing dishes. That could be considered as the hardest type of work. The other sector in terms of the workplace is construction work. Thirdly, there is domestic work. Those are the top three industries for immigrants that are undocumented in New York City. Many of our members work in these types of jobs. They work lots of hours but get no overtime pay. Many of them are exploited, they do not get paid minimum wage. This sort of abuse is common throughout the United States, beyond East Harlem, beyond New York.
Furthermore, there are obviously threats about deportation which happen throughout the country. For the community as a whole this is a very important issue, the major problem that we face. It is interesting because in our organization we have lots of immigrants. You can imagine it is very moving and inspiring, that work these long shifts. Many of our members have children and they have little time after work because they work these long shifts They come home, they are tired and they want to spend a little time with their family because they barely have an entire day off. And they choose, on top of all that, to struggle to fight for justice. This is something that could be very inspiring to people in terms of time. When members are asked, «What is your greatest challenge with the organization?« people are surprised because that is what they say. «We don’t have a lot of time«. For them this is a natural response. «We wish we had more time to do more, in terms of the organizing, in terms of the fight«. Anyway, I know I deviate a little bit. It is a really serious problem. The problems immigrants face are multifaceted.
Our members have experienced firsthand what it means to be forced out of their native country, expelled from their country due to economic reasons, having to go to a different community where the language spoken is different, a foreign country, having to adapt to a different culture. Now that we are in East Harlem in New York City, we are being threatened with displacement once again. That’s why we say we fight against global displacement. Our fight is against global displacement because we know that forced migration is also a form of displacement. We know that we have brothers and sisters, comrades in Mexico and in South Africa^[1]. Here in Germany they are facing something very similar. So our fight goes beyond our neighborhood. Our fight is global.

Weitere Informationen:
http://movementvsdawnayday.org
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Fußnoten

Christoph Laimer ist Chefredakteur von dérive.

Elke Rauth ist Obfrau von dérive - Verein für Stadtforschung und Leiterin von urbanize! Int. Festival für urbane Erkundungen.

Juan Haro ist Mitglied des Movement for Justice in El Barrio, das 2004 in East Harlem gegründet wurde.