Remember the Renters’ Commission? The City passed legislation to create it a few years ago amid some tepid protest from those of us who felt it would, yes, simply be a City funded platform to organize for rent control. Of course, the Commission dutifully recommended on April 1 (seriously) that the City needed rent control. Not long after Councilmember Sawant held a press conference and the press just as dutifully as the Commission made its recommendation, showed up to cover it. You can see the glow of their lights in the featured image. Here’s the first couple paragraphs from the coverage in the Capitol Hill Seattle Blog.

Building on recommendations from the Seattle Renters’ Commission, City Council member Kshama Sawant announced two measures Monday aimed would alleviate some of the burden for Seattle renters. The first is a proposal to enact a Seattle rent control ordinance. The second, the Economic Evictions Assistance Ordinance, would look to protect tenants against substantial rent increases.

“We have two choices,” Sawant said at a Monday morning press conference at City Hall to announce her planned proposals. “One, just sit on our hands and expect that some day, in the distant future, the Democratic establishment will gather the courage to break from the real estate lobby and finally stand with us. We’ve done that kind of waiting for 40 years.”

“Or we can begin the fight here.”

What can I say? Here’s some comments I made back when the idea of a renters’ commission was proposed:

So the point of my headline is that it has never has been in doubt that the Renters’ Commission would recommend rent control, that Sawant would build off of that, the press would turn on their cameras and bloggers would take dictation about the “crisis,” and much of it would be paid with taxpayer dollars.

This is why we need support to build a resistance to the coming wave of poorly researched “reports,” stories, and press releases about the urgent need to protect tenants from landlords, jobs, and economic growth. More supply means moe choices for renters, less means higher prices and more pain. Rent control and more regulation of the value exchange between tenants and people renting their property won’t help.