Zoning Chinatown
To help the New York ethnic enclave recover from Sept. 11th, the state launches a business development effort, but at what cost?
At Fortune Furniture, a family-owned business with a 10-year history in New York’s Chinatown, traditional hardwood chairs are placed next to modern futons. It’s a merchandising trick that owner Steven Tin uses to keep up with the times.
Tin, 50, grew up in Chinatown, the largest Chinese ethnic enclave in the United States. Over the years, he has seen his old neighborhood expand further out to the Lower East Side to accommodate what he calls the “new immigrants and yuppies” looking for housing in Lower Manhattan’s limited real estate market. The ability to adapt to his surrounding community has been crucial for his business, which like others in the area, was almost brought to financial ruin after the Sept. 11th terrorist attacks.
After the World Trade Towers collapsed near Chinatown, Tin lost 50 percent of his business. Since then recovery has been slow.
“I’m really involved in the community, so I get a lot of referral business. Other businesses may not have that,” he said.
To encourage economic recovery from the 2001 terrorist attacks, New York Gov. George Pataki and legislative leaders in January declared Chinatown an Empire Zone (EZ), a tax-free business zone. Businesses are now eligible for a laundry list of incentives including a 10-year exemption from state sales tax and special reduced utility rates.
The news came as a welcomed surprise for Tin who hopes the EZ designation will help the community build itself back up.
“Any help from the government is good. Chinatown faces a lot of problems,” he said. “I am positive about it. I have an open mind.”
But other business owners see the EZ designation as a seal of ill fate for Chinatown and its residents. Signs of gentrification have already arrived in the forms of a McDonald’s and a Starbucks embedded in an ornately Chinese architectural façade. Some fear that the new tax-free designation lays down a welcome mat for big businesses.
Phillip Seid founded the Original Chinatown Ice Cream Factory 28 years ago with his brothers and now runs it with his daughter, Christine. The colorful shop at 65 Bayard Street attracts a cult following and has earned many critic’s awards for its Asian blend of gourmet ice cream and sorbet. But even with the success, Seid, 56, is worried about the future of his shop.
“Small businesses like these,” he said between heavy sighs, “very few survive.”
He too grew up in a Chinatown of a different time where a family could open a restaurant and sustain a living by just catering to their community members. Now businesses have to draw in heavy traffic in order to just stay afloat. He expresses concern about the money that is coming into Lower Manhattan and how he may be squeezed out.
“The real estate is going up like crazy. Small time businesses like mine can’t keep up. I think when our lease is up we’re going to have some problems,” added Seid.
Chinatowns like the one in Washington, D.C. underwent revitalization efforts and emerged as a community much less for Asian Pacific American residents than a playground for consumers. And the danger of New York’s Chinatown losing its soul for profit is very real, according to Peter Kwong, professor of urban affairs at Hunter College.
To revitalize an urban area like Chinatown, the city usually looks to encourage more business development and tourism by investing in beautification and remodeling efforts. But to Kwong, “improvement” is a relative term with many consequences.
“These changes are a mixed bag that people are not thinking about,” he said. “When thinking about these changes, people need to ask the question: ‘At what cost?’”
The cost here may be the authenticity of New York’s Chinatown, which unlike other enclaves of its kind is a place where people live, work and play. Approximately 150,000 people currently call Chinatown’s packed 32 square blocks their home.
“It’s an organic hole,” said Kwong. “You encourage tourism, you have to invest in making the streets safer, cleaner, building new attractions, but that does not help the people who are living there.
“Tourism is not always good for ethnic communities,” he said.
But many agree Chinatown needs help. It had been suffering a slow decline even before the terrorist attacks. Reports cite that almost one-third of Chinatown workers lost their jobs after Sept. 11 and the median household income is about $38,000, according to the most recent U.S. Census figures.
“The Empire Zones are useful economic tools to rebuild economic viability,” said John Wang, president of the Asian American Business Development Center. “Empire Zoning attracts business to come or expand.”
Every community goes through transformations, but some worry that these so-called improvements will change the very nature of Chinatown and make it economically out of reach for its APA residents.
“Authenticity is not how a storefront looks. Authenticity is if Chinese people are still patrons,” said Kwong. “[The revitalization efforts] maintain culture, but not the people.”
Print This Article-
Email This Article