March on City Hall: Cecil Tenants Prepare to Tell Their Stories

The L.A. City Council will hear public comment about real life at the Cecil. Will this be the start of real action by the City? And an elevator update.

In some form or another, Advocacy is part of my job as a priest. Advocacy often looks different depending on for whom and what I am advocating. The last year or so at the Hotel Cecil has been a constantly morphing advocacy environment. It’s different every day, sometimes every minute. Before I get to the advocacy, a disappointing update.

I was hoping that this newsletter would have started out with the amazing news that the elevator in the building is in full working order. The technician was there on Thursday to make the repairs. Thursday afternoon and Friday, I would have been able to write such a post. I was in the area on Saturday, so I stopped by to say hello. I was about to head upstairs to check in on a few people and our new security team said I would have to hoof it. After nearly a month of no working elevator, for only two short days, the tenants lived with a modicum of dignity — in the midst of rampant other indignities.

This brings me to the advocacy part. A lot of Cecil tenants feel like they have no voice, or their voices just aren’t being heard. The Los Angeles City Council resumes this Tuesday, July 30 after their summer recess. This is the perfect time for the tenants to share their stories — real and unvarnished — with the decision makers in the City.

The city’s public comment period, even restricted to one minute per speaker, is a powerful tool that is used to begin the conversation about issues facing our city. And the Cecil is issue-plagued. The tenants deserve more than what they are experiencing.

Every voice matters in the fight for housing justice and housing equity. City leaders have a murky picture of what is going on across Skid Row-Main Street. The City Council is going to hear the unadorned truth about living at the Hotel Cecil. Its really about time for this truth-telling.

Dear readers, you are invited to march with us! Your support and solidarity with the Cecil tenants will give us strength in numbers before the City Council. I hope that you will get to meet some of the remarkable people who call the Cecil home.

The work I do at the Hotel Cecil is supported by your generosity. Beyond the advocacy work, we also help break down barriers that residents are up against that prevent them from getting meaningful work and building new lives as housed people. Please consider a monthly or one-time gift to support our ongoing advocacy and support for tenants at the Cecil.