Tenants, Reunite! For Anti-Eviction Bill

(Hartford) New Haven’s tenants union leaders are back at the state Capitol for the second straight year to push for limits on landlords’ ability to evict tenants — and they’re hoping this session goes better than the last.

That’s the latest in the legislative push for a bill that prevents landlords from evicting tenants without first providing a ​“just cause” — like nonpayment of rent, violation of a lease or to make major renovations. Currently, Connecticut landlords can serve a notice to quit for most tenants at the end of a lease without providing any cause, though some senior citizens and people with disabilities are already protected from this. 

A similar bill was introduced last session and passed out of the Housing Committee before stalling in both chambers due to a lack of support from state lawmakers.

Around 100 tenants and advocates from across the state, including East Rock/Downtown Alder Eli Sabin (himself a renter), joined the Connecticut Tenants Union (CTTU) in Hartford’s Legislative Office Building Thursday morning to lobby for the bill. They say it will ​“rebalance” power between tenants and landlords.

“I think that if this was to pass, New Haven would change in one very significant way, by having a lot more of its tenants empowered to speak up about the conditions they’re facing,” CTTU organizer and New Haven renter Peter Fousek told the Independent. ​“I have directly seen that fear of reprisal and retaliation via no-fault eviction compels residents to not speak out about egregious conditions and [housing code] violations.”

For Yale graduate student Sophia Wang, a ​“just-cause” requirement for evictions would have prevented her from having to temporarily move to New Jersey when her lease on an East Rock apartment ran out in February 2022. 

Wang says she paid her rent on time and would have even accepted a small increase, but her landlord (who she ended up suing in small claims court over the unit’s security deposit) made it clear that he wanted her gone, so she moved out, forcing her to commute to work across three states for several months.

While the state Capitol was packed with ​“just cause” supporters on Thursday, Republican legislators remain opposed to the bill. In a statement to the Independent, ranking Housing Committee State Sen. Rob Sampson described ​“just-cause” evictions as ​“an assault on personal property rights … a fundamentally un-American proposal.”

The committee’s other ranking Republican, State Rep. Tony Scott, criticized the proposal (with the caveat that the bill’s exact language hasn’t been released) as government overreach into the landlord-tenant contract and a move that would ultimately discourage landlords from providing more housing.

“If it’s what it was last year, there were definitely some big problems with the bill, and that’s why it didn’t get even called onto the House floor,” Scott said in a phone interview Thursday afternoon. ​“We acknowledge that there definitely needs to be more affordable housing in the state … but these kinds of burdens that you’re placing on the housing providers, they’re going to be less apt to want to be in this industry, and I’ve heard from housing providers, that they’re going to sell off some of their stock.”

New Haven landlords also rallied against the bill last year. Twenty New Haven-area landlords submitted letters opposing the legislation, arguing that it violates property owners’ ​“basic rights.”

But in the eyes of lifelong New Havener Sabin, who stood off to the side during the rally holding a sign reading ​“JUST CAUSE to prevent discriminatory evictions,” the legislation is necessary to protect people in a city where over 70 percent of residents rent.

“There are so many families in New Haven who are working two or three jobs just trying to keep a roof over their heads, and this bill would create new protections to make sure they can stay in their homes,” Sabin said. ​“I think stability in our community is so important so we can build relationships with our neighbors, and have real communities that last.”