Tenant organizing community to fight rental abuses

When Ohio transplant Rebecca Quirke, 38, moved into a $1,400-per-month Billy Frank Jr. Street rental home in November 2021, she wasn’t prepared for the multitude of unpleasant — and unlawful — surprises.

Familiar to many veteran Bellingham renters, but not a newcomer, were a range of local rental quirks: a smattering of mold on her bathroom ceiling, a mural of a gigantic squid painted on the living room wall, cockroaches in the fridge, rodents in the walls, windows that had been painted shut and $500 electrical bills during the frigid winter months due to the aging structure. 

Her complaints mirrored those of hundreds of other renters and foreshadowed an innovative and growing local movement led by tenants, against landlords.