#defendourhoodz

[defendourhoodz]

Defend Our Hoodz is joining United Neighborhood Defense Movement!

After five years of organizing fiercely against displacement and gentrification in Austin, as of July 1, our organization is evolving in its fight to build an even stronger and bigger movement in the struggle to defend the homes and neighborhoods of the working class.

We are proud to announce, that as of today, June 30, 2020, we are joining the United Neighborhood Defense Movement (UNDM), a new national housing struggle organization committed to fighting for the interests of the working class in all manifestations of the housing struggle. We will organize the people to improve our living conditions and defend against displacement in the form of evictions, mass displacement, and the process of gentrification.

UNDM is not a coalition, but a single organization. That means that Defend Our Hoodz - Defiende El Barrio will no longer be an active organization - it will become the Austin chapter of UNDM, alongside work in other cities across the US.

While we are immensely proud of the work and organization we have built as Defend Our Hoodz, we are looking forward to becoming UNDM alongside other tenants and organizers from across the country, and to see this movement grow even bigger.

All of our existing work and campaigns will continue uninterrupted - from our ongoing fight to defend Riverside from luxury development, to combating slumlords in East Austin, to being on guard for the next gentrifier insult to our community - but it will all be part of a national organization that will only strengthen our ability to fight back against landlords, developers, and politicians in our city and across the US. UNDM represents an even stronger version of the work we have been involved in.

The housing struggle can not be limited to just one neighborhood, or one city, or even one state - it must be united across all of these in order to take on the forces that keep us living in slum conditions and threaten us with evictions and displacement on a daily basis.

Defend Our Hoodz grew primarily out of the fight against gentrification in Austin, especially after the demolition of Jumpolin. While it was one of our focuses, we always knew that we had to look beyond just one demolished piñata store, or one street, but understand that the bigger system of capitalism is at the heart of the housing struggle.

Our analysis and understandings have only gotten stronger, and we encourage you to read our about page on UNDM’s website that lays out the politics that will guide our work. It will help anyone who is interested in becoming a part of UNDM or starting their own chapter in a city understand what guides us.

UNDM is hitting the ground running with a few chapters across the US, including Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Charlotte, and San Marcos. We know we will grow further from these, and part of that will be through a national conference later this year to come to greater national unity, and struggle further over our politics and Democratically elect leadership. If your organization wants to attend or get involved, email us at undm@protonmail.com

We will never forget Defend Our Hoodz - and of course, Austin will never forget us! We know that we have helped lead the fight to defend our neighborhoods in ways that have shaken this city and made ruling class landlords, developers and politicians tremble. Those enemies are still right to be nervous - because this transformation does not mean the end of the work that has threatened them - but actually signals a shift into an even greater threat to their hold over our communities - a United Neighborhood Defense Movement ready to take them on!

Long Live, Defend Our Hoodz, Onto New Struggles!

Tenants and working class communities across the country,

join the United Neighborhood Defense Movement

to defend our homes, neighbors, and neighborhoods!

You can learn more about UNDM via our website - www.undm.org, our facebook page(https://www.facebook.com/United-Neighborhood-Defense-Movement-111244063971737/), our twitter @unitedhoodmvmt and instagram @unitedneighborhooddefensemvmt

[witchatx-blog]

"The fight against gentrification is also the fight against racism, fascism and capitalism." @defendourhoodz #defendourhoodz #defiendeelbarrio #endcapitalism #witchatx

[m1ctlant3cuhtli]

WHY DO I FEEL THIS IN MY FUCKING SOUL?! @defendourhoodz do you feel this too? (at Austin, Texas)

[defendourhoodz]

Austin Rent Strike! Don’t Pay Rent In April!

Capitalists are laying off workers during the economic crisis accelerated by the COVID-19 outbreak, with many tens of thousands having lost their jobs this month in Austin. Meanwhile, our bosses further exploit those of us who still have jobs, forcing us to work even harder or cutting our hours. Not to mention, the state is spending trillions of dollars to aid monopolies, while leaving workers to fend for ourselves.

The working class is bearing the brunt of the economic freefall, but landlords still expect us to pay rent so they can maintain profits during a crisis caused by their own class. It’s time to come together with our neighbors, family, and friends, and fight back. Tenants must unite against the landlords and bosses that exploit us and the state that keeps this rotten system going!

WE DEMAND

IMMEDIATE RENT STOPPAGE! This means landlords won't accumulate back rent that we're expected to pay later.

STOP ON ALL UTILITY BILLS! We should not be charged for utilities while the government is mandating people stay inside our homes.

FULL WAGES REGARDLESS OF CIRCUMSTANCE OR IMMIGRATION STATUS! We demand more than the reduced wages from unemployment benefits, or having our pay cut at work.

The working class makes everything. But, in crisis, capitalists want to leave us homeless and penniless. Join the working class and refuse to pay your rent on April 1st.

Email us at defendourhoodz@gmail.com to get involved!

NO RENT WITHOUT WORK OR WAGES!  IF THEY DON'T PAY, WE DON'T PAY!

[defendourhoodz]

EVICT THE LANDLORDS | DISPLACE THE DEVELOPERS | FREE THE LAND (summary)

View the full zine here:  https://issuu.com/defendourhoodz/docs/digitalgentrificationzine

WE ARE STRONGER TOGETHER!

Serve the People - Austin and Defend Our Hoodz - Defiende El Barrio -Austin have joined forces  to write a zine articulating the dangers of rapid gentrification and its destructive effects on the working class' way of life.

We challenge the exploiters’ definition of gentrification as the inevitable growing pains of a "prosperous" city. We view it as an intentional scheme to accommodate development and fill the pockets of all involved: city officials, greedy developers or the planners behind "CodeNEXT."

Before it’s too late, we must let go of our trust in these gentrification collaborators. We are the ones who ultimately must take back our homes, our culture, our communities, and our hoods.

BEYOND CONDOS AND COCKTAILS - ENVISIONING A WORKING-CLASS CITY

We share the working class' historical vision of the future that must be carried out in the streets and homes of our communities today. This is a concrete vision that reverses gentrification, that provides dignified housing without landlords, where safety is built together without brutal cops and where we have secure access to food, education, nature, art and everything else we need to flourish as human beings.

We must fight against the enemies' vision, a system that decides land's value can increase 1000% in 5 years. Austin must not turn into a slew of mixed-use developments - full of luxury condos, dog parks, yoga studios, and expensive bars and restaurants.

We are the ones who must take control by seizing the materials, reclaiming ways to produce them, or finding new ways to provide for our communities. We know that can’t happen overnight, because the people still have to accept their role in shaping the future. This is why we put out the call to Fight Gentrification with Revolution!

FROM VISION, TO ACTION, TO VICTORY

Unlike the ruling class, we do not have fundamental reasons to fight one another, but at the same time we do not have the connections, money or institutions to employ violence like them. We must build unity and choose tactics, direct action, dual power and a strategy to coordinate our efforts, as well as use our superior numbers to our advantage.

To defeat our enemies, we must study their character and behavior. To find allies, we must join sites of struggle and rally around the working class oppressed. To gain long term wins, we must not invest in short-term promises - but rather put energy into building our own infrastructure.

Our tactics and strategy must combine to give our movement power that our enemies cannot take from us. To end all oppression, we must continue to live the story of the working class and reach for the tipping point where we overthrow the violent system of capitalism.

TOGETHER, WE ARE UNSTOPPABLE, ANOTHER CITY IS POSSIBLE

Defend Our Hoodz - Defiende El Barrio and Serve the People - Austin united to write this paper because we have clearly seen how we compliment each other’s work, from sharing our labor and resources, to at times literally defending each other from violent forces of reaction. We have built unity through struggle, in the arena of ideas and in the streets.

A real anti-gentrification movement cannot simply choose to be unified because we are supposedly all against gentrification, it must unify on agreed-upon goals and ideas. A major principle is no police or police collaboration. Some may view our basic principles as "purist," or "commandist," but it's an uncompromising set of guidelines that help us steer towards a strong and united revolutionary path.

We are demanding an end to gentrification, not simply to reduce it. We embrace the urgency of our people’s struggle and make it our battle cry. We can no longer let the forces of exploitation choke the life and blood out of our communities. We believe in ourselves and in the masses. Together, we will break the invisible hand of the market with the unified force of the organized working-class.

DOWNLOAD THE FULL PDF

[defendourhoodz]

No More Rubber Stamps for Gentrification! Tell City Staff ‘No Domain on Riverside’!

As tenants at Ballpark and Town Lake Apartments organize to defend their homes, the rezoning application threatening to turn their land into a new ‘Domain on Riverside’ slowly but surely makes its way through the city’s review process. In other Austin battles against redevelopment, communities have typically used this period of bureaucratic evaluation to prepare for the city commission hearings, the legally-sanctioned venue to voice dissent against rezoning cases.

City staff are often treated as impartial employees just doing their job, but they are an integral piece of the tsunamis of redevelopment that are flooding out our communities. Which is why today, Defend Our Hoodz and tenants from the Riverside area visited city offices to tell them to say ‘No’ to the rezoning application that will allow developers to build their luxury monstrosity on Riverside.

The City of Austin does its best to appear as if it is against gentrification. It adopts phony Strategic Housing Blueprints and starts do-nothing Anti-Displacement Task Forces to direct attention away from its clear collaboration with parasitic developers. But the city is not controlled by developers, nor is it an ignorant accomplice in gentrification. It can only be described as an active partner in the hostile removal of working people from Austin.

We know that Nimes Capital, Presidium Group and their gang want to flip Ballpark & Town Lake into a new Domain to make money, and we know that the people of Riverside want to protect themselves from this vicious upheaval. What does the city want?

Since 2006 with the East River­side/Oltorf Combined Neighborhood Plan, the city has had its eyes on southeast Austin for rampant development. This plan proposed to densify Riverside and Oltorf by rewarding developers with incentives if they flipped properties in the area. Planners promised that by encouraging an abundance of new housing construction, there would be more affordable homes for all.

As the plan went into effect, it became clear that the redevelopment was not intended for working-class Austinites and students already in the area, but exclusively for the rich. Apartment complexes that housed working people were ripped down to be replaced by luxury condos, with the most notable example being the assault on Shoreline apartments in 2009. In that rezoning case, the city gave the developers permission to build beyond the constraints of city code in exchange for the developers agreeing to pay relocation assistance to the nearly 200 working class households living there. When the developers failed to uphold their end of the bargain as tenants were forced to leave with nothing, the city stood by and did nothing. Gentrification in the ‘41 has steadily escalated since then, especially with the arrival of the tech software giant, Oracle, to the area.

The truth is that the city has no reason to resist developer schemes and every reason to cooperate with them. Austin is one of the fastest growing cities in the U.S. and the city government wants to keep it that way, even at the expense of the working people who live here. A wealthier, larger tax base means more funding for city departments, increased salaries, and beefier resumes. We see no excuse to spare city staff from the righteous anger of a community they could give the green light to destroy.

And that’s why Defend Our Hoodz, along with Riverside tenants, went directly to city staff today to demand answers and make sure they know the consequences of their rubber stamping. They can’t hide behind the bureaucracy when they make decisions that reshape entire neighborhoods.

While some of us showed up right at their offices, we are calling on Ballpark & Town Lake Tenants, Riverside residents, and all of our supporters to waste no time before the commission hearings and to protest the city’s review of Ballpark’s rezoning application now! Scott Grantham, the case manager in the Planning and Zoning Department, is overseeing the review, and can be reached at:

Scott.Grantham@austintexas.gov

By phone at 512-974-3574

Let him know that we are demanding staff recommend denial for the case and that we won’t give them any peace until they do. We see them for the collaborators they are and we won’t stand by as they push through a rezoning application that endangers our hood!

Defend Ballpark! Defend Riverside!

No peace for those who approve gentrifying projects!