Tenants at an apartment building in Raytown will end their four-month-long rent strike this month, after coming to an agreement with their landlord.
The tenant union at Bowen Tower, a 10-story building on Raytown Road, began its rent strike in October last year, in response to scores of unaddressed maintenance issues, rent increases and a lack of responsiveness from their landlord to fix those problems.
For Elijah Brink, who has lived at Bowen Tower with his dad since 2024, the strikes end is a relief.
“I’ve been restless for victory,” Brink told KCUR on Thursday. “Our union’s been restless for victory.”
Over the course of four months, tenants have withheld more than $110,000 in rent payments, according to regional tenant union KC Tenants. The union spent the past month negotiating an agreement with the California company Alta/CGHS Real Estate Investments, which owns the building.
The agreement includes two-year lease agreements, reductions in rent, eviction protections and a schedule for major repairs to be completed by March. Union members say the agreement meets key demands, and allows them to end the strike and resume paying rent in February.
Alta/CGHS Real Estate did not respond to KCUR’s request for comment.
“If we didn't form our tenant union, I think all of us would have been dust in the wind,” Brink said, crediting KC Tenants with organizational help and advice. “Nobody would have known what was actually going on over here.”
Planned repairs include pest and bedbug extermination, mold- and water-damage remediation and a new security system installed by the end of February. Alta/CGHS Real Estate also agreed to complete heating, ventilation, and air conditioning repairs and building-wide plumbing upgrades by the end of March.
Brink said bedbugs are still a problem for him and his dad but, he said on Thursday, the tenant union will hold the landlord accountable according to the agreed-upon timeline.
According to the union, the new rent and utility rates will decrease tenants’ monthly costs, and those rates will be set in place for the next two years. The Bowen Tower Tenant Union has agreed to pay 35% of the rent withheld during the strike, excluding what was settled in eviction court and legal fees.
“We hardly even have actual code enforcement, as far as housing laws go, so this is a monumental victory for Raytown,” Brink said.
Unlike in Kansas City, Raytown does not have many local protections for tenants, and there is no tenants bill of rights. Instead, Raytown has a Residential Rental Dwelling Maintenance Program that requires landlords to get permits for rental housing, and have the units inspected every two years.
At a press conference in the Bowen Tower Community Room on Thursday, tenant union members celebrated their victory.
“We fought for our homes, and we took ultimate collective risk by launching and sustaining a rent strike,” said Tina McDonald, a resident of Bowen Tower for six years.
“Everyone at Bowen Tower, whether they joined the rent strike or not, will benefit from this agreement,” McDonald said. “We know as tenants, we all go up together and we all go down together.”
‘No matter what happens, I can take a stand’
Residents of Bowen Tower began organizing with KC Tenants last May. By that point, tenants said they had been dealing with flooding in their apartments, water shutoffs, heating and cooling problems, pests, and other problems they said largely went ignored or unfixed.
After attempts to negotiate improvements with Alta/CGHS Real Estate failed, union members voted to go on strike in October.
Alta/CGHS Real Estate Investments has more than 100 assets across the U.S., according to the company’s website. Its strategy involves “creating amenity rich communities, attracting a stronger tenant base, and focusing on markets that show strength in employment opportunities and future development.” The company also claims its practices include identifying “neighborhoods of higher demand and lower supply.”
In response to the rent strike, Alta/CGHS filed evictions against 27 Bowen Tower residents, according to the union. In some of those cases, judges ruled in favor of the tenants, and ordered $45,758 in rent debt cancellation. The company also filed lease nonrenewals against seven residents.
Brink and his father at one point had received both.
Now, Alta/CGHS has agreed to end all current eviction cases and rescind any lease nonrenewals.
Brink said the victory, won over the course of several months, shows the power of the tenant union.
“It allows me to be a voice for the voiceless,” Brink said. “And I think that a lot of people in this country are searching for that right now.”
“This whole experience has shown me that, in my life, no matter what happens, I can take a stand. I can fight back,” he said.
