Chinatown Struggles with Gentrification

I was walking in Chinatown the other day, and a group of people yelling and waving banners drew my attention. As I listened closely to what the protesters were saying, I realized they were all screaming for adequate and affordable housing. The issue of gentrification has come up before, especially when you're a participant of Chinatown Youth Initiatives, which focuses on issues and events affecting and relating to Chinatown, but to see so many voicing their concerns for their lives and their community was sort of a shock to me.

Chinatown has always had a history of suffering and poverty, but it has always been an upward journey, however slow and unbearable. Now, as the city plans to redevelop the Lower East Side and launch a Business Improvement District (BID), tenants and families are forced back into one-room apartments and poor living conditions. Many in Chinatown already live below the poverty line, and as the BIDs require a three to five percent tax hike on private property and small businesses, the quality of life will only continue to deteriorate.

Recently, I had a discussion with a friend about the man-made waterfalls that now line the Lower East Side, and I was a bit disappointed to hear, "It's art. We just don't know how to appreciate them," as a response to my claims that they were a waste of $15.5 million. But while these waterfalls are a part of a plan for upscale high-rise development to attract more tourists, the property tax it entails would push small business owners out of Chinatown. I believe that such art, which does not benefit the community as a whole, does not deserve such appreciation.

Claims that the BID and redevelopment will only benefit Chinatown have been met with fierce opposition from the people whose lives revolve around the community. Chinatown is the hub of Chinese heritage and culture in New York City, and to redevelop and invade it is to erase our past and replace it with skyscrapers.