Open Letter to His Holiness, the Pope,

The people of Chinatown and the Lower East Side represent one of the last working class and low-income communities of color in New York City. Our neighborhood was planned and built as a bastion of affordability and we have been fighting to protect and grow our community in the face of massive displacement pressures. We are appealing to you  because we know you are an advocate for the poor, an advocate for justice.

We are facing a crisis in our neighborhood. In this community, families––families with children, families taking care of the elderly––are being pushed out of their homes. Since our Mayor, Bill De Blasio, took office, homelessness has reached an all time high and the disparity between rich and poor is growing every day. Rents are skyrocketing, along with property taxes, and our schools, senior centers, community programs and other services are being drained of funding and closing down. Small businesses are closing down. Public land is being used to build luxury highrises. Public housing is being sold and falling into disrepair.

Why is this happening? Because our community has no protections in place against luxury development. Because our city government is refusing to hear the demand of the people of this community to pass a rezoning plan to protect our neighborhood from luxury development and its attendant displacement. Because our government gives property-tax breaks to luxury developers to build in our backyard via the 421-a tax giveaway.

Chinatown and the Lower East Side have united to fight for the city to pass a rezoning plan, the Chinatown Working Group Rezoning Plan,  that will protect our community from displacement. The city is refusing to pass the plan, saying it is “too ambitious”. A similar plan was passed in 2008 to protect the mainly white and wealthy East Village. Why is our plan too ambitious when theirs was not? This is racist.

Your Holiness, we need your help. Support the people of Chinatown and the Lower East Side who are coming together to save our community. Please tell our Mayor to stop financing luxury developers to push us out of the community we’ve built. Tell him to heed the people and pass the Chinatown Working Group Rezoning Plan. We hope you will join us in this fight and we invite you to join us on Friday, September 25th, as we march from the Lower East Side to City hall.

Sincerely,

The Coalition to Protect Chinatown and the Lower East Side

All around Chinatown and Loisaida, posters are going up in the windows of homes and businesses: we will march!

“The Department of City Planning is calling for rezoning proposals in neighborhoods across the city. But community groups that have drawn up a detailed plan in one neighborhood are having a hard time getting the de Blasio administration to accept their vision for the future.”

>> Read the whole article here

Community Activists Rally Against Racist Luxury Tower on LES Waterfront – DNA Info

Protestors Fight New Luxury Tower Being Built on the LES – Gothamist

Protests Voice Outrage Over Extell’s ‘Building From Hell’ Coming to LES – Bowery Boogie

Have we had enough of high rents? Enough of tall luxury condos, subsidized with tax-payer $$, jacking up property taxes? Enough of seeing our affordable stores like Pathmark shut down?Enough of our school programs and senior centers being cut?

It’s time to march to City Hall to tell Mayor de Blasio that we’ve had enough of the racist Tale of Two Cities! It’s time to assert control over our community!

Our community has worked for 7 years on a Chinatown Working Group Rezoning Plan to protect our homes, schools and small businesses. The plan puts height restrictions on buildings to discourage big, tall luxury developments. This will help keep property taxes—and our rents– from shooting up. The plan also prevents the City from selling our NYCHA buildings and using our land to build luxury apartments.

The Department of City Planning says our plan is too “far-fetched”. But the city didn’t think the plan to limit the height of buildings in the majority white East Village in 2008 was too “far-fetched”. Why can’t our community of Latinos, Chinese and blacks have equal protection from displacement? If our rezoning plan is passed, luxury developers like Extell would not be able to demolish Pathmark to build an 80-story tower with a “poor door”. If our rezoning plan is passed, NYCHA will not be sold to developers for luxury housing. If our rezoning plan is passed, our families will have a future in Chinatown and the Lower East Side. We will have the chance to improve our homes and schools, protect our small businesses and community programs.

Let’s march to demand that the City:

Pass the Chinatown Working Group community rezoning plan

Stop the racist Extell development

Stop the 421-a tax giveaway (the property-tax break that helps developers like Extell build luxury buildings)

Spread the word on Facebook and RSVP for the March!