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Dear friend,
After spending the night outside of City Hall, St. Pete residents gathered on Thursday to ask City Council to put rent stabilization on the ballot.
Here’s Nick Carey’s appeal to city council:
- “Since last year, we’ve been asking you to give us the chance to vote on rent control. I know of at least ten people who have been within days of eviction. My mentor no longer lives in St Petersburg.
- We had 25 of us sleep outside of City Hall all night last night (in protest) because we just want a chance to decide for ourselves.
- So often we talk about the values of democracy.
We don’t get to practice it fully.
- Residents of this city are having to make decisions every day about what bills they pay and what they don’t. They’re having to make decisions that impact their ability to stay in their home.
- We are more than qualified to make decisions about the risks and benefits of rent control.
- We know it’s legally possible and we respect the city attorney’s opinion, but we just want to point out that there are respected legal minds across the state and across the country that have differing views. There are good faith Arguments for how we could defend it and we need y’all to have the courage to let us choose what is best for ourselves. Thank you.”
Thanks to Nick and others organizing, City Council narrowly voted to declare a housing state of emergency. The next step is to vote August 11 on language that will appear on the November ballot, letting the voters decide if they want to enact rent stabilization.
You’re encouraged to attend the St. Petersburg City Council Meeting at 1:30 PM on Thursday, August 11 at St. Petersburg City Hall (175 5th St. N) to demand that City Council allow voters to decide on rent stabilization.
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