THE GROUP’S FIRST action was a collective letter that announced the formation of their association and demanded a meeting with their landlord. The letter focused not just on the rent increases, but on the landlord’s attacks against the building’s communal life: “Our children used to be able to play outside in the common areas, now they are forbidden…. We never had armed security, now we have a rent-a-cop who routinely interrogates us, despite knowing who we are.”15 It took months for Botz to agree to meet. When he finally arrived, as tenants recall, he stood cross-armed by their courtyard wall and insisted on his rights to collect market-rate rent. As he’d later reiterate to the press, he had no plans to “coddle” tenants who’d already “ been subsidized for thirty-two years.”16 Management retaliated by ignoring the maintenance requests of households who’d organized.