After trying to get an appointment for months, Rene AlexZander and four of his neighbors went to Los Angeles city councilmember Paul Krekorian’s office in December 2021. There, they met with Krekorian and members of his staff to discuss an unprecedented proposal: that the city acquire their building through eminent domain.

Krekorian heads up the committee that is currently reviewing the proposal. “I’ll never forget it,” AlexZander said of the meeting. Krekorian’s deputy chief of staff Matt Hale “looked at me and said, ‘We have to consider what’s best for the taxpayers.’ And I said, ‘We are the taxpayers!’ I called him out. I said, ‘What you’re saying right now is very insulting to us. You try to make us seem as if we’re not significant, when we really are.’”

AlexZander is a twenty-year tenant of Hillside Villa, a 124-unit affordable housing development in Chinatown, Los Angeles. The olive-green building with bright red wrought-iron balcony railings built in 1988 sits in view of several imposing new luxury apartment towers, a reminder of the recent wave of gentrification that has swept the area. For more than three years, AlexZander and his fellow tenants have waged an extraordinary fight to not only remain in their homes but to convince the city to purchase their building using eminent domain, a solution they argue would prevent displacement and create permanently affordable housing.