Organizing WORKS! ACORN wins amendment to strengthen London’s draft renoviction bylaw!

Today, ACORN members and allies held a rally outside London City Hall to demand a stronger renoviction bylaw to protect tenants in the city, with London Free Press and Global News tagging along to cover the story. At the rally, members shared their stories of renovictions and highlighted the glaring holes in the draft renoviction bylaw coming to committee later that afternoon – primarily, that the draft bylaw doesn’t include requirements for landlords to house or provide a rental top up to tenants who were displaced by renovictions. Members also spoke out about how the current bylaw wouldn’t protect the tenants currently already experiencing renovictions in the city.

Following the rally, members filed into City Hall to fill the council chambers ahead of the Community and Protective Services Committee meeting, where councillors would be receiving public feedback on the draft bylaw. At the meeting, ACORN members and allies spoke about the devastating impact these renovictions have on communities, and the urgent need for the bylaw to be strengthened so tenants are protected from being displaced. A whopping TWENTY delegates came forward in support of strengthening the bylaw, while only three landlord delegates showed up to try and stop it. We have POWER IN NUMBERS!

After hearing so many tenants’ stories, along with the the testimonies of ACORN leaders and allies describing the systemic issues at play that necessitate strengthening the bylaw, councillor Sam Trosow put forward a motion in support of ACORN’s recommended improvements, which was immediately seconded by Councillor Hadleigh Mcallister! The motion directed city staff to report back on amending the bylaw to include alternate accommodations or rental top-ups to tenants being displaced by renovictions – AND – report back on adjusting the bylaw to allow it to apply to tenants who have already received N13 notices before the bylaw passes!

Councillor Trosow opened up discussion of the motion by pointing out how much he learned from the delegations: “Every time I think I understand this issue fully… I hear something new, I hear a story, I hear how it touches a family, I hear how it touches a neighbour, I hear how you come across somebody you know, and they’re no longer well housed.” Sam continued by also noting “We are never going to be able to solve the homeless problem if we keep creating more homeless persons. We have to stop the supply of new homeless persons, and I think this renoviction bylaw, especially if we can strengthen it a little bit with these amendments, we’ll go a long way to doing that.”

Following discussion, the motion was put to a vote… and passed unanimously!!

HUGE shoutout to each and every ACORN member and ally that stepped forward to speak today about this issue and help us show our power in numbers! This is a fantastic step forward on the campaign, and we hope everyone can join us again at a future City Council meeting where the motion will be discussed by the full council.