The efforts to STOP the formation of a Chinatown BID continue undaunted

June 21 2011 CONTACT: Jan Lee 917-710-7503, Stephen Cheung – 212- 941-7452

Location: Lin Ze Xu Foundation headquarters at 22 Chatham Square.

Weekly meeting of property owners and small business owners Against the Chinatown BID.

Today, at 11:00am, property owners and small business owners met to discuss their plans for this week as the deadline to submit Official Objection Forms to the City Clerk nears.

OBJECTION FORMS CAN BE DOWNLOADED BY CLICKING HERE

Friday June 24th is the last day that objection forms may be handed in to the city clerk’s office at 141 Worth Street.

Plans that are in progress right now:

1) Volunteers will be on hand tomorrow Wed. 22^nd 11:am – 1:pm to assist (Chinese and English) property owners within the BID to fill out Official Objection Forms. The location: Chatham Square Near Lin Ze Xu Statue. They will help locate missing deeds, and notarize the forms on site. Rain location : # 22 Chatham Square 3^rd floor – Lin Ze Xu Foundation headquarters.

2) Door to door outreach continues as it has for the last month. More volunteers needed to go to large buildings, volunteers can contact: Jan Lee, 917-710-7503 (eng.), Stephen Cheung (Chns.) 718-961-1272

3) Property owners and businesses will submit a letter to the entire City Council:

Asking City Council “HELP SMALL PROPERTY AND BUSINESS OWNERS SAVE CHINATOWN- NO B.I.D.”

4) Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund will send a letter to City Council as well.

5) Another protest rally is scheduled for June 28^th (the day before the City Council votes on the Chinatown B.I.D.) on the STEPS OF CITY HALL – we ask all small business and small property owners to join this rally – to express our concerns to City Council members to vote “NO” for the Chinatown BID. Property owners will sign an open letter to Council member Margaret Chin at the Rally. ALL who are Against the BID are welcome to join, but especially small businesses and property owners. We wish to publish this so we can get good attendance.

6) It was agreed that the property owners will organize to form a Property Tax Payers Association, a group that is unified against the B.I.D.. Applications can be picked up at 74 Forsyth Street, 212-941-7452, Mr. Stephen Cheung.

There will be a small membership fee to cover the group’s expenses paid by property owners, small businesses can join for FREE. This group will also work with community boards, and explore alternative cleaning services – that do NOT involve a BID.

CLICK HERE FOR THE DRAFT MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION (DRAFT VERSION)

CLICK HERE FOR English version of application (DRAFT VERSION)
more complete application forms will be coming soon, we need to get an idea at this point of how many people/buildings are signing on. The property owners group is still forming the corporation at this time.

7) It was unanimously agreed that efforts to stop the BID from forming will continue, and even if the BID is formed the efforts to dismantle it will continue indefinitely.
NO B.I.D. in the City has ever had this many objection forms turned in.

9) The small property owners organization will explore cleaning options that the Councilmember and CPLDC refuse to explore.

End. – submitted by Jan Lee, Coalition Against the Chinatown BID

Video of June 9th Protest Rally Against The Proposed Chinatown BID

Video by George Lou, Chinatown resident

We'd like to thank George for donating his time to document this historic event, thanks George!

This is a quote from Wellington Chen, Exec. Dir. of Chinatown Partnership LDC in an attempt to diminish the efforts of hardworking tax-paying property owners in Chinatown who have to work against his world-class lobbyist in order to be heard:

"Chen believes Chinatown is at a crossroads. It has the choice of rallying around a BID, of keeping the streets clean and of protecting the neighborhood for decades to come. Or, he said, the community can remain divided and it can forfeit the chance for self-improvement for many years.

“Who in their right mind would try to try this again?” he asked.

He told me opponents of the BID are loud and skilled at the game of media manipulation, but that they represent a tiny constituency." from www.thelodownny.com

Who are the ones really in charge of media manipulation? The community who is out on the street or the CPLDC who hires professional lobbyists who work for Real Estate Developers?

In 2010 and again in 2011 Chinatown Partnership LDC hired Rubenstein Public Relations to promote the Chinatown B.I.D.

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE CONTRACT BETWEEN Rubenstein Public Relations

and The Chinatown Partnership LDC whose purpose is to professionally target and lobby City Council Members to Vote "yes" to approve the Chinatown B.I.D.

Rubenstein's real estate clients include (according to their website):

Real Estate:

Bizzi & Partners
The Setai Fifth Avenue
Brown Harris Stevens
Capstone Equities
Nest Seekers International
Halstead Property
Prodigy International
Estates at Alpine
Concierge Auctions
Swig Equities
366 Fifth Avenue/Joseph P. Day
Gal Nauer/”The Plaza Unveiled”
Corigin Holdings
Lisa Lippman
Paula DelNunzio
Azure
Madison International Realty
Century Properties, Inc.
Clipper Equity
WEmi:t
The Galleria Group
Keller Williams NYC
Morris Adjmi Architects
Savanna

Protest Rally Against The Chinatown B.I.D. - Property Owners have their say

For Immediate Release:

Jan Lee, 917-710-7503

Stephen Cheung, 212-226-8400

Song Mei Rong, 917-771-6006

Media Advisory

Community Opposes Chinatown Business Improvement District and Its Disastrous Impact on Small Businesses and Working Class Families

Councilmember Margaret Chin Criticized for Favoring Outside Developers

And Ignoring Community Needs

Who: Concerned Chinatown small business owners, workers and residents

Coalition Against the Chinatown BID

What: Press Conference

When: Thursday, June 9, 2011 at 11AM

Where: Kim Lau Square, also known as Chatham Square plaza

Why: Chinatown small business and property owners, residents, and workers oppose the proposed Chinatown Business Improvement District (BID) because it will destroy existing small businesses and affordable housing. While ignoring all opposition to the Chinatown BID, City Councilmember Margaret Chin is promoting her political agenda. She has promoted only the B.I.D. and ignored all other options. The Chinatown BID is not in the public’s interest and primarily serves to promote outside developers’ interests in encouraging luxury, high-rise development along Canal Street and throughout Chinatown.

"Let Them Eat Dim Sum!!" Mayor Tries to buy votes in Chinatown with a Senior Breakfast

Invitation to the Breakfast for Votes Campaign Stop - hosted by Mayor Bloomberg


As if it wasn't bad enough to BUY votes in the Chinatown community, Michael Bloomberg has managed to co-opt a Chinese holiday (Mid Autumn Moon Festival) to do it. Today, Tuesday, September 29 at 9:15 a.m. Mayor Bloomberg slithered his way into and out of a dark, alley way entrance to Jing Fong restaurant at 20 Elizabeth Street, to avoid the chanting protesters at the main entrance shouting "Dump Bloomberg" and "Chinatown - Not For Sale".

Fifteen minutes before Bloomberg's entourage arrived in front of Duane Reade drug store on the Bowery, 5th Precinct officers drove a line of four, full sized NYPD vans in front of the protesters -- parking them bumper to bumper on Elizabeth Street to block the view of the Mayor from protesters. The chanting grew louder as news of the Mayor's arrival spread via cellphone contact with people on the Bowery. Protester's placards read everything from "Buying Breakfast = Buying Votes" to "Eight is Enough" and "King Bloomberg." One favorite was "Return Democracy," referring to his opponent's comment that "Bloomberg has hijacked democracy".



The Mayor has yet to make an honest-to-goodness meet and greet on the streets of Chinatown, his style is more akin to "let them eat DIM SUM. I can handle them from the podium, heck, I'll even pay for it."

Seniors received this invitation in the mail, advising them to RSVP and that seating was limited. Jing Fong restaurant seats over a 1000 people




Judging from the 1500 or more people lined up at 8:00 A.M., with many turned away, there were plenty to provide a paid audience for his campaign promises. Yet many had long enough memories to remember that for eight years, Bloomberg's policies have only served the elite while destroying the predominantly working families and small business community of Chinatown, passing policies, such as:

• A rezoning plan that has already caused dozens of buildings to be evicted of long-time residents
• Large rent increases for small businesses on city property
• Huge increase in water rates
• Continued Park Row street closures and loss of Municipal Parking shuttering and battering surrounding small businesses
• Installation of a Joint Operations Command Center without review that will further tighten "security" in an area over saturated with security cameras
• Attempt to ram through the Chatham Square Reconstruction with inadequate community notice or input, lied about the time line, distorted pedestrian safety focus away from the many deaths at Canal Street and the Manhattan Bridge
• Manhattan Bridge entrance still unsafe after decades of deaths and years of protest
• Renewed threats to install congestion pricing and East River Tolls to further increase the cost of living in Chinatown. Small storefronts dependent on frequent deliveries will be forced to pay increased toll costs that will be passed on to residents whereas the true cause of traffic congestion is not addressed which is --
• Government Parking Permits still abused despite a crackdown after a $570K DOT study found 145,000 legal government permits, not including illegal ones. Free parking permits one of the leading causes of vehicles into Manhattan, the majority of which are found in Chinatown and Lower Manhattan. Just last month the NYPD Internal Affairs Bureau's officer in charge of the permits was forced out after reporters spotted a permit on his girlfriend's car
• Grand Street Bike Lane on a narrow heavily congested street
• Parents' loss of voice in their children's schools, "teach to the test" curriculum and inflated grades
• Scant communication between the mayor's office and the community; translated materials available only at election time

But as a few seniors told us on the way into the restaurant, "Sure, we're
going to enjoy the dim sum, but doesn't mean we're going to vote for him!"