Housing Crisis

After high school, I continued my education at UC Santa Barbara, where a worsening housing crisis has affected the community over the past few years. 

This crisis hit me personally in March of 2023 when my housemates and I received a notice. 

A company bought our apartment complex and every tenant, nearly 1000 of us, would be promptly removed to make room for renovations. 

I was shocked, I walked outside and saw the same notice on every door. 

At that moment, all I could think about were my neighbors and their newborn daughter. I thought about the people in the building across from us, who were low-income and couldn't speak English. I thought about my neighbors living there for the past 20 years. Not knowing what else to do, I spent the rest of the day writing a song to process my emotions. 

I wasn’t planning on doing anything with it, until a friend convinced me to release it to raise awareness for the issue. At first, I wasn’t sure, because the song was so personal to me. But after giving it some thought, I realized they were right. 

So to garner more support, I released it, titled "Eviction" by my stage name "jomch," and then recorded a music video in the complex with captions explaining the situation. 

I shared it across social media platforms and streaming services to reach thousands of people within a few days. As weeks passed, I joined my neighbors to become active in the fight against these renovictions. Eventually, we decided on a date to go to the Santa Barbara Board of Supervisors and share our stories.

On the day of the meeting, I delivered a speech. I told them that for many residents, finding alternative housing will be nearly impossible due to the higher cost of living. I urged them to take action to prevent renovation-based evictions in our community. I reminded them that we were not just numbers on a spreadsheet, but people with hopes, fears, and dreams. Following the meeting, the Board of Supervisors actually passed legislation to close the legal loophole that allowed "renovictions." 

But this policy only prevents it from happening in the future, it doesn't stop this current situation. Since then, hundreds of families, students, and long-term residents had to move away, some out to other places in County, others entirely away from the community they called home. I still think about these families and residents today, and I hope they're okay. We didn't get the outcome we wanted. 

However, it lit a fire in my heart to prevent something like this from happening again and to use my voice to advocate for the people who need it the most. This story is actually a huge catalyst in me applying to law school this past year, and I am now on my way to attend in the fall– hopefully to pick up some skills to allow me to come back to this issue in the future. 

To embrace Padayon in this context, I learned that the best thing to do to keep going is to remember "why." In each of these three experiences in advocacy, I decided that my “why,” was always stronger than any challenge I faced.  

This lesson taught the value of prioritizing what is most important to me. That being said, determining what is not worth it for me is just as important. If I ask myself if something is important enough, and the answer is no, then that's a sign for me to reevaluate the proper boundaries and make space for what matters most. For this idea, I want to ask you– what matters the most to you? What is something worth "pushing through" for? On the other hand, what are some things you don't find as necessary, and what would you rather do instead?