Opinion | Brooklyn Neighborhood Tenants Organize For Better Living Conditions

Southeast Portland apartment complex tenants decided to form a tenant union after months of fighting what they described as unaddressed maintenance issues and lacking communication from property management.

Brookland Apartments tenants reported a host of property issues shortly after opening, including inadequate heating, frequent fire alarms and nonfunctional mailboxes, according to interviews with multiple tenants. In one case, a tenant said he found himself temporarily homeless and out of work because of an alleged error by the professional property management company Meritus Property Group.

A coordinated organizing campaign led by tenants and assisted by Portland Tenants United, or PTU, pressured Meritus to discount rent and address issues tenants said were making the living arrangements untenable.

“There was a very, very jarring lack of care, it seemed, from the property management in terms of communication, in terms of maintenance requests and several other things that were just being largely unaddressed,” tenant Hunter Buen said.

Mounting problems

Fire alarms, which multiple tenants said went off randomly and sometimes multiple times per day, were the most blaring issue.

Tenant Gabriel Ortiz said the frequent erroneous alarms posed a safety issue because he and other tenants couldn’t distinguish between a false alarm and genuine danger. Ortiz said he stopped responding to the alarm because of the frequent disruptions.

“I don’t respect (the alarm) anymore because I already know it’s a false alarm,” he said. “But the day that it is a real alarm, that’s the day I die.”

Rachel Winn, Meritus assistant property manager, had a different characterization of how often the fire alarm went off. Winn told Street Roots the fire alarm went off only five times between when the building opened in fall 2023 and January, including three due to “faulty equipment.”

What tenants described to Street Roots as a faulty fire alarm system was the tip of the iceberg for Brookland’s problems.

Tenants began moving into Brookland Apartments in fall 2023, but they said Brookland did not have U.S. Postal Service, or USPS, mailboxes set up until this February.

Ellie Oudeans, another Brookland tenant, said she had to send her mail to a relative’s house while other tenants paid for P.O. boxes.

A communication error reportedly left at least one tenant briefly homeless.

When Ortiz signed a lease at Brookland, he said Meritus scheduled a weekend move-in date. However, with Meritus’ offices closed on weekends, Ortiz said there was no one to let him into his apartment. His lease already ended on his previous apartment, leaving him to sleep in his moving truck. As a professional mover who used his own truck, the error also left Ortiz out of work.

“I brought that to (Meritus’) attention, and they just didn’t care,” Ortiz said.

After a few days, Ortiz said Meritus management arranged a new apartment for him, saying the apartment he initially leased wasn’t available.

Ortiz asked Meritus for financial compensation for the lost income and trauma of the situation. Ortiz said Meritus denied his request.

“If I had money, enough money to make my voice louder for you to respect it, or if I had a social status that you have to respect, you would have respected my situation,” Ortiz said. “We as a people need a place to live. That’s one of our human rights. And I feel like I’ve been violated that right.”

Winn said the tenant was responsible.

“To our knowledge, one tenant did not appropriately schedule their move-in date and as a result may have had a timing issue with their prior residence,” Winn said.

Ortiz provided communications to Street Roots documenting Meritus received his requested scheduled move-in date through Livly, the property management software Meritus uses. Ortiz also provided a subsequent email showing Sept. 9, 2023, as the start of his lease and said a Meritus employee later called to confirm the date and time.

In a letter to Meritus Property Group management in February, tenants also listed a lack of immediate weatherizing maintenance, theft issues, poor security, maintenance delays, and inconsistency in rent and utility payment processes.

In a single January day, tenants reported three false fire alarms, icy walkways and stairways, non-functional elevators and a lack of sufficient heating.

There was “a constellation of multiple very unfortunate things that actively endangered tenants at the time,” Buen explained.

Winn said her employer was not responsible for issues with the mail system and denied any heating problems.

“Brookland is receiving normal mail service. However, there was a delay in the USPS providing their equipment to the facility,” Winn said. “The building is new as of September 2023 and, as a result, has heating systems that are to current code and have been inspected by city inspectors as to their functionality.”

Buen said the lack of functioning mailboxes was likely USPS’ fault, “though Brookland is responsible for failing to inform tenants until after move-in about the issue,” he said.

Collective action

After repeated attempts to reach Meritus leadership to resolve the issues at Brookland, Buen said he turned to his fellow tenants.

“It felt like we were talking to a brick wall for a very long time,” Buen, a Musicians’ Union Local 99 organizer, said. “So a couple of weeks into my tenancy there … I thought, ‘Well, I know that collective action works, so I should start talking to some people.’”

Applying his labor organizer skills, Buen began talking with his fellow tenants, including Ortiz, about organizing a tenants association.

“Because the building-wide issues were so pernicious, it was very easy to get people on board at that point,” Buen said.

In December 2023, Buen and Ortiz contacted PTU. Organizers helped Buen, Ortiz and other tenants organize a building-wide meeting in late January, eventually leading 19 current and former tenants to sign the letter demanding action from Meritus.

In the letter, tenants demanded Meritus address the following concerns and requests:

– Fire alarm issues

– Mailbox issues

– Weatherizing the building ahead of winter weather events

– Compensation for alleged prior thefts

– Financial recompense for Ortiz and other tenants who became homeless due to delayed move-in dates

– Inadequate maintenance staff

– Poor communication system with property management

– Discount rent by $200 per month for each current resident

Raising hell

Though the tenants said Brookland has taken steps to remedy some concerns, other issues remain unaddressed.

Meritus held a town hall in late February to hear tenants’ concerns, eventually agreeing to prorate rent for 10 days between November and January to address the fire alarm disruptions.

Meritus has since fixed the fire alarm issue, tenants said, but Buen, Ortiz and Oudeans said they remain without proper heating. Ortiz has yet to receive financial restitution.

“I’m firmly of the belief that if we had not raised as much hell as we had … I really don’t think we would have gotten a penny from the company,” Buen said. “For most of us, issues are actively being solved, but there’s still a lot more justice to seek.”

Skye Hawthorne, a PTU organizer, said the Brookland Tenants Association shows the tangible power of tenant organizing.

“I think that (Meritus) was intimidated by the fact that it was not one person, that it was a group of tenants organizing together,” he said. “That’s part of what’s so important about organizations dedicated to building mass organizing initiatives among tenants because I feel like there’s more awareness that you can do this stuff in labor, and there’s a lot less awareness that tenants can organize.”

Ortiz hopes the Brookland Tenants Association inspires other tenants to organize.

“You should take the steps to ask for the minimum from the people that are offering a place to live because we are the reason they even make money,” he said. “We, the people, are the reason why infrastructure is even necessary. Otherwise, it’s just a building that doesn’t work.”•

Aurora Biggers is a labor reporter turned organizer and communications director for IUOE Local 701.

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This article appears in May 8, 2024.