Read our report to learn more about social housing in California.
Our 2024 report with a coalition of organizations, “Building our Future: Grassroots Reflections on Social Housing,” talks about what social housing is, profiles local campaigns in the Bay Area, Los Angeles and the Inland Empire, and how tenants and allies are winning social housing across the United States.
Across California, tenants are organizing to win social housing. Tenants Together supports social housing efforts locally, statewide, and even nationally with organizing, advocacy, and education.
Social housing is housing that is high quality, permanently and deeply affordable for everyone, including for low-income households.
Social housing is publicly or collectively owned, and is under democratic community control. Resident associations, tenant unions, and surrounding communities play key roles in managing it.
Social housing is insulated from the market and publicly-backed. It is not a source of profit.
Social housing refers to more than an individual building or housing complex: it is a system of laws, policies, and institutions that helps make housing affordable and accessible for everyone.
How are we winning social housing?
A few ways Tenants Together works to make social housing a reality:
In 2023, Tenants Together co-sponsored and passed Senate Bill 555 (Wahab), the Stable Affordable Housing Act, which tasks the California Department of Housing & Community Development (HCD) to recommend to the Governor and Legislature how to build and buy over a million units of social housing.
We support campaigns across the state to win local funds for social housing via local and regional bonds and taxes.
We support the Community Acquisition & Preservation Program (CAPP), which if enacted by the State Legislature will create the first-of-its kind state housing program dedicated to acquiring housing where tenants are at risk of displacement and converting it to social ownership.
We support tenants organizing to win their buildings from slumlords and corporate speculators and convert them to community land trusts (CLTs) and tenant-owned cooperatives.
