in The Boston Globe on June 16, 2014 by Lawrence Harmon

THE DIFFICULTY of finding and holding onto an economical rental unit in Boston is enough to make a grown man cry. Not just any man, but Stephen Key, a Hall of Fame member of the World Martial Arts Federation. Key, 53, has shown the skill and courage needed to reach grandmaster status in kung fu. Yet he shed tears last week while describing his efforts to keep a roof over the head of his wife and three children on Norwell Street in Dorchester after government-sponsored mortgage giant Fannie Mae foreclosed on his former landlord and moved to evict the building’s tenants.

in Dig Boston on June 17, 2014 by Chris Faraone

Sometimes the best way to make a point is to commit a defensible crime. And so earlier this month, more than a hundred Boston residents and allies occupied a vacant, foreclosed home on Norwell Street in Dorchester. Once there, organizers settled in a family that had previously been booted from another house, and also built a pop-up pirate radio station with a rooftop antenna to broadcast their message: The housing crisis isn’t over!

in The Boston Globe on June 12, 2014, by Paul McMorrow, Globe Columnist

MASSACHUSETTS PICKED a fight with the federal government and the companies behind half the country’s mortgages last week. Attorney General Martha Coakley’s decision to sue Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the nationalized mortgage giants, is a preemptive strike meant to defend the state’s tough foreclosure prevention laws. It’s also a serious uphill slog. Chicago was the last government to take on Fannie and Freddie, and it lost the fight badly.

In The Boston Globe on June 11, 2014, by Jacqueline Tempera

A coalition of community groups protested outside a foreclosed Dorchester home Tuesday and called for more affordable housing in Boston.

The group, made up of seven nonprofit organizations, took to Norwell Street for the second time this week. Over the weekend, the group attempted to move a homeless family into the vacant house, only to be driven out by law enforcement officials, said Darnell Johnson, a coalition spokesman.

in Sampan Newspaper on June 10, 2014, by Right to the City and the Boston Tenant Coalition

Stop evictions and rent inflation—hear the call of the renter nation! Chants echoed down the street as Right to the City and the Boston Tenant Coalition held a rally and press conference June 10, announcing the release of The Rise of the Renter Nation, a national report on affordable housing. Today’s press conference in the Four Corners neighborhood was one of nine actions taking place in cities across the country.

in The Boston Globe on June 8, 2014, by Claire McNeill

By Dave Goodman

BOSTON/Dorchester – The vacant two family house on Norwell Street in Dorchester stands as a reminder that the foreclosure crisis continues to haunt Boston. But starting on Saturday morning and continuing throughout the weekend, the house will be filled with the sounds of activists and media makers as Jamaica Plain based advocacy organization, City Life/Vida Urbana, occupies the property and commences a pirate radio broadcast of the proceedings.

IT WAS A QUIRKY, OLD PLACE, BUT IT WAS HOME TO BINLAND LEE AND HER 13 HOUSEMATES. IT WAS ALSO BLATANTLY ILLEGAL, FROM BASEMENT BEDROOMS WITHOUT PERMITS TO THE UNIT WITH ONLY ONE WAY OUT — WHERE BINLAND HAPPILY LIVED AND WHERE SHE DIED WHEN FIRE STRUCK LAST SPRING.

This story was reported by Globe Spotlight team reporters Jenn Abelson, Jonathan Saltzman, Casey Ross and Todd Wallack, and editor Thomas Farragher. It was written by Abelson.