Community Lands / Tierras Comunitarias

A joint program between CPC & our sister organization - Fideicomiso Comunitario Tierra Libre (FCTL)

What we’re fighting for

Housing is a fundamental human right. Everyone deserves not only to have a roof over their heads, but also to be healthy and safe in their home.

People also deserve to have agency over their housing, including the ability to form and nurture lasting relationships with their neighbors, community members, and with the land they live on.

Person holding protest sign with Spanish text about community rights

Our History

New Formations

In 2019, theFideicomiso Comunitario Tierra Libre (FCTL) was formed. In 2020, on the heels of other institutional nonprofits sunsetting crucial organizing programs due to budget cuts, FCTL received it’s determination letter and was officially established as a 501c3 to move land out of the control of greedy corporations and into the hands of organized community members - a continuation of land and housing justice work that had been under way since 2018.
In 2021 FCTL and CPC partnered to form their joint Community Lands/ Tierras Comunitarias program focused on organizing for land and housing justice in East LA.
Coalition Power

In 2021, in response to the housing inequities exacerbated by the pandemic, CPC helped form the Keep LA Housed (KLAH) Coalition. During the pandemic, the coalition helped establish emergency tenant protections that helped keep many tenants from losing their homes during the height of the crisis. Emphasizing the success of tenant protections in keeping Angelenos housed, they then established a proposed Tenant Bill of Rights, and to date have won many of the outlined protections, including protections around Just Cause, Nonpayment, Anti-Harassment, Relocation Assistance, Code Enforcement, and Right to Counsel.
CLTs FTW!

Also In 2021, FCTL within the Los Angeles Community Land Trust Coalition successfully advocated for the Community Land Trust Partnership Program that secured $14 million for acquisition and rehab across all five Los Angeles Supervisorial Districts. The policy explored the Community Land Trust (CLT) model to address long-term housing affordability challenges and systemic racial inequities for immigrant, working class, communities of color. Most importantly, this program created pathways to collective ownership models and ensured that housing is permanently affordable for our communities.
Measure ULA

In 2022, we won Measure ULA - a one-time tax on mansions that sell for $5 million or more that will generate ongoing revenue to help reduce homelessness, support low-income seniors, make housing more affordable, and protectrenters! CPC and FCTL held down the Eastside Caucus, which contributed to the recruitment of almost 1,000 volunteers that engaged 30,000 voters. This win was made possible by collective grassroots community organizing!
Simmons Rehabilitation

In 2024, after years of deferred maintenance by previous owners, FCTL - in partnership with Little Tokyo Service Center (LTSC)- completed rehabilitation of the Simmons building, an 11-unit community land trust property in East Los Angeles. Today, its tenants have a safe and stable home and are actively engaged in community governance projects, including managing a community-run garden.
This project marks the first property acquired under the Los Angeles County Community Land Trust Partnership Program.

What we’re up Against

Our communities are being gentrified because people cannot keep up with the skyrocketing cost of rent! Places that have been home to families for generations are converted into business opportunities for those who are already wealthy. As a result, many families are forced to live in illegal, uninhabitable conditions because they fear the only alternative is living on the streets. The COVID-19 pandemic did not create these inequities, it magnified and exacerbated them.

This is happening across the country on land that was stolen from Indigenous peoples, now sold privately to increase profits for an elite few rather than being cared for and cultivated in support of the community.

People at a protest carrying a colorful cardboard house with the text "Housing is a human right" and a yellow banner reading "Tierras Comunitarias en Manos Comunitarias."

How we can transform

In order to keep housing truly affordable and accessible for everyone, to ensure communities have control of not only their housing but also the land it sits on, we need to organize tenants, and we need to invest in alternatives to for-profit housing.

Organizing (mutual aid, tenant associations, governing capacitation)
Alternative housing models & policies (CLTs, Social Housing, TOPA)

Organizing:

Organizing allows us to build networks of mutual aid and defense against eviction and displacement, it helps us build power, and it teaches us how to work together in practices of self-governance.

Two-story Mediterranean-style building with arched balconies and banners, surrounded by trees and a fence.

Photo of the Simmons building - owned by Fideicomiso Comunitario Tierra Libre, FCTL and Little Tokyo Service Center (LTSC).

This building was rehabilitated by FCTL & LTSC after years of neglect by former owners. Today its tenants have a safe & stable place to live, and are working on community governance projects, including a community-stewarded garden.

Alternative Housing Models:

Community Land Trusts (CLT) are non-profit organizations that treat land as a common good. Individuals, cooperatives, or organizations may own the structures that are on that land, and the community land trust helps to steward the land in collaboration with the community to ensure it is cared for in ways that benefit the community.

Social Housing can be government owned, tenant-owned, or owned by nonprofits (such as community land trusts). It is permanently affordable because it is not on the speculative (for-profit) market. It can never be sold for profit, and therefore is not subject to market fluctuations. Social housing is also community-controlled, meaning those living in it play a large role in collaboratively deciding how it is managed.

Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA) is a proposed law that guarantees tenants have the first opportunity to purchase their building if and when an owner decides to sell.

Current Updates

A large group of people posing together indoors, some holding drinks, others making peace signs, with a festive and joyful atmosphere.

Photo of Measure ULA campaign volunteers at an election watch party in 2022 when we won the #MansionTax to help fund Social Housing (among other things) in LA.