COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — After Damon Blanchard heard his landlord planned to nearly double the cost of rent, he encouraged fellow Bexley Commons tenants to unionize and protest what he called “unconscionable” price gouging.

Blanchard, 46, has lived at Bexley Commons on the city’s East Side for 16 years. Accustomed to paying $450 a month for his one-bedroom unit, Blanchard said the updated $800 rent with a $150 premium, which went into effect in November, costs him $950 a month – or 70% of his total income.

“It was emotionally distressing – it still is. You don’t know what you’re going to do,” he said. “I’ve been able to pay my rent by myself for 16 years. Now, with this sudden increase, I have to get assistance.”

Although Blanchard said nearly 70 fellow Bexley Commons tenants signed a petition he circulated demanding a rent reduction, that number has dwindled to fewer than 40 tenants – not because people rescinded their signatures, but because they were evicted, he said.

Blanchard said his motivation behind the Bexley Commons Tenants’ Union, which has not been formally recognized by property management company Vision & Beyond, was to create a network of neighbors and inform them of legal and financial resources available for those struggling to pay rent or facing eviction.

“People are scared – they don’t know what to do when it comes to fighting back,” he said.

While tenant organizations have historically sought to remedy maintenance problems or quality of life issues, tenants in Ohio are increasingly organizing against soaring rent prices – an issue that Spencer Wells, community manager of the Rental Housing Information Network in Ohio, said hasn’t always been a central component of tenant unionizing.

Although the longstanding notion “If you don’t like it, move” has been a recourse for residents faced with rent increases, Wells said that’s no longer a realistic solution.

“The last two housing recessions, 2008 and now 2020, have really shrunk the availability of affordable units, so tenants are less able to pick up and go somewhere else where they’re in a better situation,” he said. “And that has prompted the increase in organizing around rent issues.”

For central Ohio residents like Blanchard who live on month-to-month leases, sudden rent increases hit them especially hard, according to Chris Kelly, a social worker with Legal Aid Society of Columbus.

In month-to-month lease agreements, Kelly said a landlord is only required to provide 30 days’ notice about plans to increase rent, which he said is “certainly not enough time” for residents on a fixed income or strapped for cash.

“We get a lot of folks here who are on disability and they make $750 a month, and now their rent’s $800 – that’s just impossible,” Kelly said.

Under Ohio law, tenants have the right to negotiate with their landlord about the terms and conditions of a rental agreement, Wells said.

But, with the exception of federally assisted housing complexes like Section 8, landlords are not legally required to engage in the collective bargaining process, which often leaves tenants with no choice but to find a way to pay the rent or leave, Wells said.

That was the case for Blanchard’s landlord, Vision & Beyond, who he said refused to negotiate rent prices with Bexley Commons tenants on the grounds that an increase was needed to afford upgrades and developments to the building.

“Based on my advice, the management refuses to engage with a fictitious ‘tenant’s union’ to discuss any issues,” an attorney for Vision & Beyond told Blanchard in an email.

“They don’t have to listen, they don’t have to bargain with us,” Blanchard said. “What they say goes, or hit the bricks.”

Vision & Beyond did not respond to requests for comment.

Tenants’ organizations have been operating in Ohio for decades, but Wells said they’re often short-lived efforts that halt once a landlord complies with demands, compromise is reached, or, in the case of the Cleveland Tenants Organization, funding for the union runs out.

The Cleveland Tenants Organization, which formed in the 1970s and relied heavily on financial assistance, disbanded in 2018 after the group’s funding sources “convinced themselves that it was time to do something different,” Wells said.

“And I think they regret that now,” he said. “As I look around in Cleveland, there are a dozen orgs trying to recreate this organization.”

As tenants increasingly ban together to protest rent increases in Ohio, Wells encouraged those seeking to organize a union to “get ready for a long haul.”

“These are issues that have been around for a long time, they get better, they get worse, but more people are not ready for a struggle that’s going to last for a good part of their lives — but that’s what’s at stake,” he said.

Although Blanchard said he hopes he can get a Section 8 voucher – which, as a federally assisted housing program, could guarantee him greater federal protection from sudden rent increases — Kelly said applicants might have to wait upwards of months before they’re approved.

As he waits for more rental assistance money to come in, Blanchard said he’ll continue to contact local politicians in attempts to urge them to enact stronger tenant protections in Ohio.

Blanchard’s biggest concern now, he said, is receiving a 30-day eviction notice.

“I planned on moving when I wanted to move, not when somebody was forcing me to,” he said.