Tenants of Curtis Arms Apartments in Providence’s neighborhood of Olneyville announce that they have formed the Curtis Arms Tenants Union with supermajority support. They demand that their landlord, the California-based real estate corporation Standard Communities, agree to negotiate a collectively bargained lease in good faith.
“I’ve lived here at Curtis Arms for 10-plus years,” said Joanne, a Curtis Arms Tenants Leader and Organizer. “I’m so excited that we formed this union so everybody could speak up about what needs to be done in the building and our demands. I want to thank every one of you for coming out nd speaking out.
“We’re organizing this union for many reasons: We need more security in the building. The previous ownership used to have security here, but it just didn’t work. They weren’t consistent with it. They didn’t get anything done that needed to be done. And it just failed - twice. The security people got fired twice.
“We’re constantly dealing with people coming in and out of the building 24-7, sleeping in hallways and other places in the residence where they aren’t supposed to sleep at all. While we’re sorry that most of them who come in here are homeless - we feel really bad- but this is our house. We have to protect it. We have to protect our family. We have to protect the disabled. We have to protect the veterans. We have to protect the kids. We have to protect everybody.
“One of our main concerns is we need constant, 24-hour security, morning, noon, and night. We need a constant, consistent manager who cares about all of us and doesn’t ignore the things that need to be done.
“Our previous manager was ignorant of the issues that needed to be done. We weren’t trying to make her retire, and we didn’t want her out. We just wanted our needs and demands to be met; that’s it.
“When we tried to contact her, she kept the door closed 24-7. She had two-way mirrors on the door so you couldn’t see her at all. You had to make an appointment to see her, or even to talk to her. For work orders or any other thing, you needed an appointment. You could not touch her. You could not talk to her. You couldn’t even see her. And then every time you did talk to her, it was only four or five words: ‘I’ll get back to you.’ ‘I’ll check in.’
“Nothing was ever done. When we started this union, she told us not to. She told us that we were going to get kicked out - evicted - for doing this, and that none of us should be doing this.
“We have an unsafe building. We find needles; we find weapons. Children find needles and weapons. We need a building manager and security who care and stay consistent.
“Lastly, the building’s falling apart. It’s been falling apart for years; we all know that. This morning, we had another small pipe burst after another one burst a couple of months ago. People living on the first floor have giant fans everywhere, drying things out to deal with their repairs, but it’s not doing anything. There’s a smell of sewage. There’s a smell of black mold in the building.
“We’re also dealing with mice, bugs, and leaks all across the board. It isn’t the fault of the building maintenance guy, whom we respect and love very much because we care about him. He tries as hard as he can, but he’s only one person in a building with over 106 units, and he needs help. This is a multi-million dollar building. Where’s the money going? Where’s our help? It’s not just this building. It’s other buildings where managers aren’t doing their jobs, and everything isn’t getting done properly.
“This is why we did this: so we can get the help we need for all the buildings, not just the building we live in. Management hasn’t held up its end of the deal - what they said they were going to do, as long as we pay our rent every month.
“All they cared about was us paying our rent. We need things to change, and this is our time to change it now. We know Standard Communities and Wingate have refused to put anything in writing with our sibling unions at Etta James and Charles Place, and that’s not okay. We’re not going to tolerate that. We need to sit down and negotiate a contract that holds management accountable for not holding up their end of the bargain. We need to cooperate to improve things here, and we’re ready to unite and come together to win so that all of our demands are met.
“We’re so happy to have a union now that will give us a voice to stand up together and improve our lives. Just because we’re in Section 8 housing and we’re in low-income housing doesn’t mean we’re beneath anybody at all. We have to stand up together and do this now. And this is our chance.”
Curtis Arms Tenants Union is the newest chapter of the statewide Rhode Island Tenants Union (RITU). It is also the second RITU chapter representing tenants of a building owned by Standard Communities. Tenants at Charles Place, a 200-unit complex in Providence’s North End also owned by the California-based corporation, unionized in June of this year.
“I’m also glad to welcome Curtis Arms into the family,” said Freddie Jackson, vice president of the Charles Place Tenants Union. “The more people that we have in our union, the greater our power will become. By organizing across multiple buildings, we are seeing a pattern of neglect and abuse from both Standard Communities and Wingate. We are dealing with the same issues: flooding, elevators breaking down, hot water issues, infestation- you name it- and it’s happening.
“We are dealing with these issues, but the landlord is raking in $2,000 to $2,500 per month off federal subsidies.
“By joining together, we’re sending a message that we won’t tolerate these conditions anymore. We are coming together as a powerful force to deal with the real problems: defrauding the government for funds and income discrimination. We’re dealing with the income discrimination. If you live in certain areas of Providence, you get whatever you need. But if you live in another place, you don’t get doo doo. A whole lot of the people affected by this are Black, brown, and white working-class citizens.
“Organizing isn’t for the faint-hearted. We’re in it for the long haul. This fight isn’t fizzling out anytime soon. In fact, we’re going to keep growing, keep building, and we won’t let working-class people keep getting priced out of their homes.
“We’re living in America now, one of the greatest countries in the world. It’s a shame for me, I’m saying this personally, for me to go downtown and watch people eat out of the trash can. That shouldn’t happen. We’re living in America where middle-class people are becoming homeless, which is a shame. We recently got a response to our demands at Charlesgate and our siblings at Etta’s. The landlord refused to negotiate a written agreement with us.
“They sent us word salad letters with a lot of nothing in them. Other than that, they’re willing to meet with us four times a year. Every year we sign a lease. The contract promises that we will pay our rent. We sign the lease for safety, security, and for perfect housing. Not for rodents, infestations, nor any of that stuff.”
Tenants demand that Standard Communities, the property owner, address serious concerns. Tenants face poor living conditions, including frequent flooding due to substandard plumbing and ongoing rodent infestations that are inadequately addressed. They are demanding that the landlord hire additional maintenance staff to ensure the building’s needs are properly addressed. They are also facing frequent mistreatment from property management, including systematic neglect and discriminatory treatment. Tenants also call on Standard Communities not to retaliate against tenants for exercising their legally protected right to organize.
“Every time working-class people form a union, whether it’s a tenants union or a workers union, we’re putting the ruling class on notice,” said Jair Perez, an organizer with the Rhode Island Tenants Union. “We’re telling them we’re watching and getting active. They might have laws and the means to repress us. But we can always out-organize them. As Malcolm X once said, ‘We’re not outnumbered. We’re out-organized.’ When we unionize, we start to out-organize and outpace.
“Let’s put the landlords and corporations on notice. And for all tenants in this state and country, we either lock in or we get locked out. Those are our options.
“It’s time to organize. We organize now for the people of Curtis Arms.”
Standard Communities is a privately held national housing owner and developer co-founded by Jeffrey Jaeger and Scott Alter. With headquarters in NYC and LA, Standard Communities owns over 28,000 units of affordable housing across 23 states. Based on the size of its portfolio, SC was ranked 6th in the AHF Top 50 affordable housing owners of 2025 and 2026. SC acquired Curtis Arms Apartments, a 106-unit elderly and disabled affordable housing complex, in 2018, and promised over $6 million towards “large-scale rehabilitation” of the property. Currently, SC has at least $32,000 in violation fees. An inspection of the property on February 5 noted four violations in just one unit. This past April, SC purchased another apartment complex on the West Side of Providence, bringing their total footprint in Rhode Island to over 800 units across six properties.
“It’s ridiculous. The conditions are horrible,” said Curtis Arms Tenants Union leader Shonnie Martinez. “The manager just left on Friday without notice, and another pipe burst. I feel so bad for all my neighbors who live downstairs and have to deal with the constant flooding and water issues.”
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