“Freeze the Rent! Melt the ICE!” 

Written collectively by Arman Amin, Monica Furman, Liz June, Ash Marinaccio, Karina Ordóñez, and Nuriel Vera-DeGraff

“Freeze the Rent! Melt the ICE!” Organizers, and leaders from the New York State Tenant Bloc, West Side Neighborhood Alliance, CAAAV Organizing Asian Communities, and the Met Council on Housing chanted at a rally at Joan of Arc Park ahead of the fourth Rent Guidelines Board (RGB) hearing at Symphony Space in upper Manhattan. The activists were calling for a rent freeze for the city’s 2.4 million rent-stabilized tenants. Performers from the Dominican Carnival Dancers, Drummers from CAAAV, and the DSA Choir supercharged the crowd’s energy. In Manhattan, New York City’s most expensive borough, rent stabilization protects against rising rents and evictions, even as the average rent has soared to $5,345.

“I have lived in Chinatown for 31 years. Since I moved in, the building has changed hands more than ten times. Landlords profit each time while nothing ever gets repaired,” said Shuzhen Liu, founder of the Chinatown Branch of CAAAV. “To the landlords, the building is just a tool for making money, but for tenants, this is our home. We are the ones who make this city. Rent hikes only reward landlords’ bad behavior: Gambling on our homes and skimping on repairs. The Rent Guidelines Board must act in the interest of the majority and freeze the rents for 2.4 million tenants in this city: No increases on all leases.” 

Liu founded the Chinatown branch of CAAAV because of the abuse she experienced in 2001, when a landlord tried to force her out in a buyout. “Chinatown is nothing without Chinese people who are living here. I can’t move to other neighborhoods because this is my home, where everyone speaks my language and where we go to school and get groceries. This is where we place roots here as working-class immigrants, and I can’t leave.”

The Manhattan RGB hearing focused strongly on artist housing. “[Artists] make New York worth living in,” said Kate Biernat to the RGB, drawing cheers from the crowd. “New York City’s creative sector generates $110 billion in local economic impact and drives a tourist industry worth $74 Billion annually. And Broadway alone contributes $14.7 billion to New York City. Broadway attendance outpaces all 10 professional New York sports teams… including the Knicks,” Biernat explained. 

Biernat, a performing artist who has called Manhattan home for 17 years, talked about how rising rent hinders her ability to cover the costs of being a musical theater performer. “60% of artists make under $25,000 per year. More than half have no financial safety at all – including myself.” 

Rent stabilization exists to protect the working people of New York. According to a 2025 CSS policy brief, 37% of very low-income NYC households live in rent-stabilized housing.

Many tenants agreed that a rent freeze was not enough instead, calling for a rent rollback. Emma Rehac, director of the Youth Alliance for Housing (YAH), and rent-stabilized tenant in Washington Heights explained, “The rent guidelines board … needs to stop prioritizing the pockets of landlords — their incomes are not in crisis. What is in crisis is people’s basic need to shelter. A rent freeze might stop further harm from happening, but in order to provide real relief to New Yorkers and ensure that the people who make the city run can stay in their homes, we need a rent rollback.” 

JP Biamby, a Harlem resident of over twenty years, was swayed by other testimonies to change his demand from a rent freeze to a rent rollback. “After hearing the testimony of other tenants and how bad they need it, you know, I realized that having a rent rollback would actually balance the scales a little bit,” Biamby mused. “[The landlords] have been getting increases for years without providing adequate maintenance.” 

When asked what would happen if the rent were to increase, Biamby gravely declared, “I’m considering leaving New York, okay? Period, end of story. I mean, it’s just gotten to the point where I’m tired of fighting a system that rewards commercial landlords who are making tons of money, while, you know, leaving the tenants to foot the bill.”

Elisa Martinez, part of the West Side Neighborhood Alliance and community organizer with Housing Conservation Coordinators, rent-stabilized tenant in Washington Heights echoed Biamby’s concerns.  “I love Washington Heights, but throughout the course of so many years, I’ve seen so many of my family members and friends be priced out of the neighborhood, and so I want to make sure that it’s a neighborhood that continues to have that same fabric and community, and that it’s able to thrive.”

A handful of elected officials were present for the hearing, including Councilmember Gale Brewer (D-Upper West Side), Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal, and Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who testified, “The rent is too damn high,” reiterating most of the studies cited by other tenants. “The data says many properties can absorb a rent freeze,” while tenants cannot absorb a rent increase. 

Brewer spoke about the soaring rents her constituents pay on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. “The market is often carrying the cost, so there’s no reason to have an increase.” This prompted her to ask the board for a rent freeze. She also said she plans to increase the number of city inspectors for buildings when asked about landlord accountability, saying she hopes the city will “have more money for inspectors because we don’t have people watching the bad guys.” 

“I lived in my apartment with my two children and was paying $2,000 a month — the majority of my income,” a tenant named Gladys told the board through a Spanish-to-English translator. She was recently evicted and is now forced to rent a small room away from her family. “The rents continue to climb, and the quality of life for New Yorkers continues to decline,” she added. 

Pilar de Jesus, who works for the legal service provider TakeRoot Justice, expressed, “Housing shouldn’t be about capitalism, it shouldn’t be a business, it’s a human right. At what point do [landlords] pay for the harm that they’re creating? People are getting arrested for not paying the train $3, but here we have landowners whose business practice seems to be to do criminal activities towards tenants that are paying their rent and run this city — because those tenants are teachers, they’re mothers, some of them are police officers, they’re EMS workers. They’re the people who keep this city running, and it’s not fair. They deserve to get money back to save on their rent as well.”

During their preliminary vote last month, the Rent Guidelines Board signaled support for tenants’ demands by including a 0% range for both one- and two-year leases, marking the first time in history the board has proposed freezing rent on two-year leases, a core plank of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s campaign promises. 

“For the first time, [the Rent Guidelines Board] has proposed a rent freeze on all leases, and I think that we can use this momentum to pressure them for a rent rollback. I think a rent freeze is the bare minimum, given the incredibly increasing costs of living, and I think that we deserve better,” said Cara Polte, tenant organizer and cofounder of East Harlem Tenant Union, a rent-stabilized tenant in East Harlem. 

In 2025, New York’s tenant movement outorganized real estate, corporate, and MAGA interests to put a rent freeze on the ballot and elect a mayor responsive to tenants. The Tenant Bloc collected 20,000 signatures from rent-stabilized tenants, who pledged to vote for a rent-freeze mayor, and 1 million New Yorkers voted for that demand. 

The final vote on the Rent Guidelines Board to determine rent adjustments for stabilized apartments is scheduled for June 25, 2026, at El Museo del Barrio in Manhattan. 

This article was coauthored by members of DocBloc’s Artist as Citizen Journalist Initiative which brings together theatre artists and journalists to share in civic reporting and the growing need for community-based storytelling.The ACJ initiative tests a hybrid model of reporting and performance, positioning theatre artists as civic witnesses and collaborators in local journalism. To learn more visit docbloc.org or connect on Instagram @docblocprojects.