As all eyes were turned toward the big-ticket races in the House and Senate on Tuesday night—as Georgia, Florida, and Texas tiptoed toward history and then hit retreat—activists in cities around the country had their sights set on their own hard-fought prize: a suite of housing initiatives that had the ability to bring relief to millions of renters. Indeed, the mid-term elections were a critical test for this country’s growing tenants’-rights movement, which has emerged as a vibrant political force in recent years as renters and their allies work to combat exorbitant housing costs, rampant gentrification and widespread homelessness.

On August 24, the tenants of two buildings near the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles received letters from their landlord notifying them of a rent increase of over $800 a month. The increase was not a result of repairs or tax increases but rather, the letter said, of the upcoming election in November.

A supply of housing sufficient to meet urban needs in California will not be built for decades, if ever, and right now building doesn’t seem to be helping much. Many of the newer rental buildings carry high-end prices, while stock of affordable housing is actually falling.

Given that, rent control is an easy and off-the-shelf policy tool that many people are familiar with — one that does help some renters and doesn’t appear to cost taxpayers money. “It is the best anti-displacement tool around,” said Stephen Barton, co-author of a recent report that called rent control a key measure toward stabilizing California’s housing market.

Sacramento would cap rent hikes at 5 percent under a measure that qualified Thursday for the 2020 ballot as city residents grapple with soaring housing costs. City officials said Thursday that a petition drive, backed by rent control advocates and labor unions, has gained enough signatures — 44,000 — to qualify for the city ballot in two years. The signatures were independently tallied and analyzed by county voting officials. The “Sacramento Community Stabilization and Fair Rent Charter Amendment” would limit rent increases as well as restrict landlords’ ability to evict renters. It also establishes an elected rental-housing board tasked with monitoring and enforcing rent controls.

California is currently in the grip of an extreme housing affordability crisis. This fall, California voters have the chance to pass Proposition 10 and repeal the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act, which would return to local communities the ability to expand rent control and limit skyrocketing rents. In National City, residents will get to vote on a measure in November to control arbitrary rent increases by limiting them to no more than a 5 percent increase per year, coupled with just cause to prevent unjustified evictions. Repealing Costa-Hawkins and placing reasonable limits on how much landlords can increase rents each year is an easy, fair and necessary way to help tackle the current affordable housing crisis.

A year ago, Norma Sanchez and Ambrocio Carrera were on the verge of losing their East Oakland home — staring down a massive rent hike and with no hope of affording a new place close to their jobs or their three sons’ schools. Now, thanks to an innovative strategy gaining traction in the Bay Area, not only did the family stay put, they’re on their way to owning that home. “It’s very emotional,” Carrera said in Spanish. “It’s something that, in the beginning, you don’t believe. But here we are.”

Supporters of a new ballot measure meant to control rent in National City submitted more than 3,500 petition signatures at City Hall Thursday. The coalition of tenants and community leaders say the rent control ordinance is needed to stabilize growing housing costs. San Diego County's average rent is approaching record highs according to statistics from several national companies.

SACRAMENTO -- Hundreds of people from around California took to the streets of Sacramento Monday, advocating for rent control in their state. Activists with the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment marched through downtown Sacramento and right into the lobby of the Senator Hotel on l Street. It's the building where the California Association of Realtors has their offices.

How do you get a landlord to endorse a proposal to limit rent increases? Yong Her, a 39-year-old bookkeeper, was one of 40 or so organizers who considered the question on a recent afternoon. The group had gathered in a conference room here to discuss strategies for getting people of various backgrounds, incomes and occupations to sign a petition to put a rent-control measure before Sacramento’s voters.

For Fernando Nadal, the fight to bring rent control to Sacramento is personal. The retired nurse says he and his wife were evicted from their retirement community by a property manager who, among other things, claimed that a small gathering of acquaintances and journalists to discuss his son’s fatal drug overdose constituted having “a party” inside his rental unit.

One morning in February, tenants of an East Oakland fourplex, along with about a dozen activists, drove in several cars to an office park near San Jose to confront their landlord, David Lawver, about recent rent hikes of more than $1,000 per month.

East Oakland residents took local officials on a “trash tour” of the city last weekend to highlight the differences in public services delivered to different parts of the city.

Residents in an apartment complex in Concord claim they are being pushed out by poor living conditions and high rent increases. On Monday, KRON4 spoke with the affected families who took their concerns to City Hall. They are families who say they’re living in poor conditions, facing no-cause evictions and unfair rent increases. Stopping by City Hall in Concord, they dropped off papers to have city inspectors tour their apartments and force their landlord to make repairs to problems that the tenants say have long been ignored.

A ballot initiative to lift California’s statewide restrictions on rent control has hit a key milestone, with 25 percent of the signatures it needs to qualify for the November ballot, the California Secretary of State’s office confirmed. Organizers vowed to take their fight directly to the voters after a bill to repeal the restrictions died in its first committee hearing this year at a raucous January meeting attended by over 1,000 people on both sides of the contentious issue.

"All you have to do is say rent control and you don't even have to ask them to sign the petition now, they want to sign the petition now," Ava Nadal said. It's all part of a larger effort to repeal the Costa-Hawkins Housing Act, a California law on the books for more than 20 years, which limits where local governments can enact rent control.

Renita Barbee, 52, has begun packing up the belongings in her rented South Los Angeles home. She was trying hard to hold her composure as she told her story the other day. But at times, her eyes filled. “When I found this place, I fell in love,” said Barbee, who moved into the three-bedroom, two-bath brown stucco home four years ago with her husband, daughter and mother

A wealthy Piedmont investor snapped up single-family homes during the foreclosure crisis that ravaged Oakland’s flatland neighborhoods. For years he barely raised rents, then he doubled them at once, sparking tenant protests.