We are deeply saddened by the passing of Michael McKee, tenant organizer, strategist, and a steadfast friend to Chelsea. Mike wasn’t just a statewide tenant leader; he was our neighbor. His organizing took root in the apartment houses and walk-ups of our community, where he turned frightened tenants into informed associations and kitchen-table meetings into durable power.
From that Chelsea base he called home since 1966, Mike helped build the modern tenant movement: organizing with Met Council on Housing and the Brooklyn Tenants Union; founding the New York State Tenants & Neighbors Coalition; creating the School for Organizers to train the next wave; and later stewarding the Tenants Political Action Committee so that tenants’ voices mattered at the ballot box as well as at the bargaining table.
Mike was one of the organizers of the Chelsea Gay Association which existed 1978 thru 1983.
In 2023, CRDC was proud to honor Mike with the Tom K Duane Award, for his decades of service to our neighborhood and city. True to form, he used that moment to talk less about himself and more about the work ahead: transparent negotiations, enforceable commitments, and public processes that leave tenants stronger than they started. He reminded us that housing policy is ultimately about organizing and counting votes, block by block and bill by bill.
Mike’s legacy lives in the tenants he trained, the laws he helped shape, and the organizing culture he insisted on. Mike was practical, principled, and rooted in community. Chelsea is better because he made it his home and his proving ground. May his memory be a marching order, and his life a reminder that rights are not granted; they’re won, guarded, and re-won by people who refuse to give up.
We extend our deepest condolences to Mike’s husband Eric Stenshoel, to his loved ones, and to the tenant community he helped forge. We will honor him the way he taught us: by organizing, building coalitions, and winning concrete protections for the people who call Chelsea home.
From his husband Eric Stenshoel: His ashes will be placed in the columbarium at Saint Peter's Church, 619 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, November 2. The service will include the Durufle Requiem. All are welcome.
The memorial celebration of Michael's life (and a fundraiser for Tenants PAC) will be held from 4:00 to 8:00 p.m. on Wednesday December 3, also at Saint Peter's. Details will follow in due course.