Patty Fong
Thanks to recent letters from Ms. Bettie Luke and Mr. Lawrence Matsuda on the Sound Transit Chinatown International District (CID) plan, we now have a solid understanding of CID’s history of racist land grabbing and social marginalization shocks, and a very Good list of suitable mitigation alternatives that can save CID.
I call on Mayor Bruce Harrell and the Seattle City Council to support this historic and purportedly protected immigrant community — the only immigrant community of its kind in Seattle.
CID is currently being ruthlessly and tragically squeezed to death by a thousand cuts from Sound Transit, King County Metro, and the City of Seattle.
However, I also call on business owners and community organizations to do more to address current and growing problems such as violent crime, graffiti, litter, drug use and tent camps.
We know how Sound Transit can squeeze an already marginalized community.
Have you tried taking the bus on South Jackson Street lately? At the #3600 bus stop (now abruptly closed by the King County subway), drug addicts and other homeless have a monopoly on the shelter. No one else can use it. I complained online and it was later closed.
Subway closed the bus stop on the controversial corner of 12th & Jackson and moved it west across the street. It’s been constantly full of trash lately, and now drug addicts are squatting there, using and selling what may be stolen goods to fund their habit.
Most of the drug use I’ve witnessed happens in the Little Saigon area. I saw drug activity on the second floor of Joyale Seafood Restaurant. I have seen suspicious loitering in the large garage of this building. The now-closed New Saigon Deli has been taken over by open users.
Little Saigon is full of massage parlors and garbage. People swept rubbish from the sidewalk to the trees. Trees are planted unattended, overgrown with weeds, and garbage. What message does this bring to tourists, tourists and residents?
The City Navigation Center with a “Harm Reduction” policy is located in Little Saigon. I strongly suspect this is the root cause of vandalism and drug use. It shouldn’t be there at all, and there’s a school nearby.
Digitally away from the infamous 12th & Jackson street corner, there are at least two low-income housing projects – one of which belongs to LIHI.
If CID/Little Saigon is to become the first choice for such social experiments, the least cities and counties can do is to mitigate the consequences and impacts. But benign neglect and indifference suggest otherwise. Why? Because of cultural and political racism.
CID is not a dump! This is an immigrant community already plagued by drugs, violent crime, absentee landlords (buildings full of graffiti), poverty, small independent businesses struggling to survive post-pandemic, boarded up windows, trash on the street, more Troubled by a small number of Asian-owned small businesses. Business and other consequences of deep marginalization and neglect are exacerbated by racism and apathy.
Mayor Harrell, your mother Ross used to run a flower shop in CID, and you, yourself, are Japanese American and black. Where is your support?
Not only do we have to protect the CID from all these attacks, we also have to infuse the CID with aid to small businesses, crime and drugs. We need better bus route planning and maintenance, and the elimination of litter and graffiti.
What happened to CID and Little Saigon is shocking but completely preventable.
Can Seattle do it?
