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Digression, Repression: The RGB Is Now in Session!
by Dave Powell
On June 15, the Rent Guidelines Board held its annual hearing on proposed rent increases for over 2 million rent-stabilized tenants. At the RGB’s request, the Great Hall at Cooper Union was filled with members of the Police Department’s Intelligence Division, and a handful of uniformed officers from the nearby 9th Precinct milled around in the lobby. To the casual bystander, the heavy police presence might have seemed excessive for a public hearing filled largely with senior citizens. Indeed, Brooklyn Councilmember Steve DiBrienza blasted the board for treating tenants like “terrorists.” But the police presence would speak for itself as the hearing went on.
The hearing began with testimony on single-room-occupancy units (SROs). Tenant after tenant told horror stories of living in SROs that were converting to tourist hotels—most often by illegal means. Colby Lenz of the Westside SRO Law Project presented photographic evidence of the difference between rooms rented to tenants vs. those rented to tourists—in the same hotels. One set of photos pictured pristine floors and fresh linen. The other showed torn floors, holes in walls the size of basketballs, and lead paint chipping from the ceiling. As has been the routine in recent years, not one hotel owner came forward to testify.
When it was time for testimony on rent-stabilized apartments, RGB landlord member Vincent Castellano took every opportunity to run the clock, by asking landlord lobbyists redundant questions after their testimony. RGB Chair Ed Hochman added a time-waster of his own. He engaged elected officials, many who testified in support of tenants, in largely irrelevant conversation. He made a specific point of asking each elected official “What specific legislation have you sponsored than has dealt with the housing crisis?” This questioning might have had a place at a candidates’ forum, but here appeared to serve only one function: wasting precious time. Although over 120 tenants signed up to testify, less than 20 actually got to speak.
As usual at RGB hearings, emotions ran high in the crowd. Tenants yelled out loud during some testimony, as with one landlord whose main complaint was that most of his tenants had lived in their apartments “for more than ten years.” Like a schoolyard bully with a gang of older brothers, RGB public member Edward Weinstein took the opportunity of the police presence to intimidate the crowd. “I want that one removed,” he said, pointing at one tenant activist in her 60s, “yes, her.” Two tenants were removed in such a fashion. But at tenant number three, Weinstein hit a rock.
Jeanie Dubnau, a longtime activist with the Riverside Edgecombe Neighborhood Association and City-Wide Tenant Coalition, unfurled a banner that Weinstein took offense to. “You have forfeited your right to be here,” he declared as he pointed her out to the police. But unlike the two tenants before her, Dubnau refused to move. The police surrounded Dubnau, but hesitated, obviously embarrassed at the prospect of ejecting a nonviolent person. The crowd broke into chants of “Let Her Stay!” and “Shame!”
Uniformed officers rushed in to back up the Intelligence Division cops, and a half-dozen tenants gathered around Dubnau. Three officers lifted her up and barreled up the aisle towards the exit. En route, one officer crashed into Bill Mordente, a tenant from Queens. The officer grabbed Mordente, pushing him to the floor and landing on top of him. Mordente was scooped up and brought to the lobby in a submission hold, where both he and Dubnau were placed under arrest.
A small crowd followed the two arrested tenants into the lobby. Adele Bender, a tiny tenant activist from Queens, was among them, as was I. I noticed that two Intelligence Division officers had cornered her. Though visibly upset, Bender was not in the proximity of the officers making the arrests, nor was she making any gestures that normal people would consider threatening. I walked over to her and put my hand on her back. Suddenly, a uniformed cop three times her size barreled past the two plainclothes officers and grabbed her wrists. When I suggested to the officer that his actions were a little harsh, I became arrest number four.
I was the only tenant arrested that night under the age of 60. I mention that not because I believe seniors are frail and unable to handle themselves, but to let everyone know that it is not just young people who were targeted for bogus arrests. The RGB has no bones about not only having tenants arrested at a public hearing for no reason, but senior citizens to boot!
We were held overnight at the Ninth Precinct, while a large portion of the crowd from the hearing stood vigil out front. Back at the hearing, things had more or less broken down, with Weinstein lecturing the crowd on his commitment to public service and how tenants before him deserved no respect. Three of us were released the next morning, but Mordente was “put through the system” and taken to Central Booking. He was released later that night, after being held for 24 hours.