Pittsburgh residents testified at a special City Council hearing  to express their opposition to the City’s security budget and the passage of special ordinances in preparation for the G20 summit taking place later this month. Listen to my Free Speech Radio News story on it.

With temperatures reaching the high 80s, Philadelphia’s pools are a popular destination for the city’s youth and adults alike.   However, Mayor Michael Nutter’s budget decisions have delayed people’s swimming plans in 27 neighborhoods across the city, where pools are closed for the year.  Residents from these neighborhoods, along with a broad coalition of community activists, are demanding that the city open all of

By Andalusia Knoll

Taking on Goliath: Natalia Evangelista and Ricardo Ramón, with 3-year-old daughter Abigail, are two of hundreds of El Barrio residents fighting eviction efforts by corporate landlord Dawnay, Day. Photo : K. Cyr

By Andalusia Knoll

When Ricardo Ramón and Natalia Evangelista immigrated to th United States from Santa Inez, a small, arid farming town in the southern Mexican state of Puebla, they didn’t imagine that they would be fighting displacement again. “We have the same problems we left in Mexico,” said Ramon. “There, they fight for a place to live. Here, we do the same.”Ramón, 25, and Evangelista, 23, are just two of about 380 tenants, organized with the Movement for Justice in El Barrio (MJB), who are fighting off efforts by their new landlord to evict tenants from 47 rent-stabilized and rent-controlled buildings in East Harlem, also known as El Barrio.Since the 47 buildings were bought by Dawnay, Day Group, a privately owned British bank that manages $10 billion in worldwide assets and has real-estate holdings in Europe, India and Australia, tenants have faced widespread harassment and have been falsely charged for services that they never received.