Coalition to Protect Chinatown/LES
Chinese Staff and Workers Association * National Mobilization
Against Sweatshops * Action by Lower East Side * Lower East Side
Anti-Displacement Project * Asian American Legal Defense and Education
Fund * Hunter College Community Plannin Department * St. Mark's
Church * Judson Memorial Church * Chinese Restaurant Alliance,
Inc. * American Chinese Voters Alliance, Corp.
For Immediate Release: July 14, 2008
Contact: Kai Yang (212) 334-2333/ (917) 858-8082
Mabel Tso (212) 966-5932/ (917)658-1129
Celia Correa (212) 358-0295/ (973) 919-7081
**PRESS ADVISORY**
LES, Chinatown, and East Village Community
Members Demand Manhattan Borough President Vote Against Racist
Rezoning Plan and Hold Public Hearing
Tuesday, July 15, 2008 @ 12:30PM
In front of 1 Centre Street (by Municipal Plaza);
Manhattan
Community members from the Lower East Side, Chinatown, and East
Village Community will be demanding that Manhattan Borough President
Scott Stringer vote to stop the East Village/LES Rezoning Plan
and hold a public hearing. Several thousands of community members
have signed petitions demanding to stop the racist rezoning plan
and replace it with one that includes and protects the entire
community district. These petitions will be delivered to the Borough
President on Tuesday.
The current NYC Department of City Planning rezoning plan protects
only the predominantly wealthy and white areas north of Houston
in the East Village, while leaving the Lower East Side and Chinatown
open to demolition and high-rise luxury development. It offers
added height bonuses and tax breaks encouraging developers to
demolish and develop luxury developments on Delancey, Chrystie,
Avenue D, and Allen Street, without requiring a single unit of
low-income housing to be built. In effect, this plan will create
a wall of luxury high-rises around Chinatown and the Lower East
Side; it will divide and isolate the community, making it even
more vulnerable to displacement. Those displaced will be the small
businesses, working families, and people of color in the community.
On Tuesday, representatives from local small business associations,
workers organizations, faith-based organizations will be speaking
to demand the Borough President vote against the plan and meet
with the Coalition to Protect Chinatown & LES. The Borough
President has thirty days since he recently received the East
Village/ LES rezoning plan to put in a recommendation.
