Restaurant union fights alongside community members in protesting gentrification

Outside of the Museum of Chinese in America, a group of community members and workers as part of the Coalition to Protect Chinatown hold tattered cardboard signs, worn from use over the years. 

“MOCA is selling out Chinatown!” they shout, handing out bright yellow flyers to passersby. When people try to enter the sleek, modern museum building on Centre Street, they are greeted by a passive, expressionless door-holder — whose shift only spans for the duration of the protest — but are usually first stopped by protestors before they can enter.

“BOYCOTT MOCA!” the yellow flyers read. 

“Jonathan Chu, a third-generation Chinatown landlord and former co-chair of the MOCA board, accepted a bribe of $35 million from the city to fund this museum and support the construction of a skyscraper jail,” Lily Ma, member of Youth Against Displacement, to numerous passersby, says.

The jail they are referencing is part of a larger, controversial City Council plan to replace Rikers Island with four high-rise jails throughout New York’s boroughs. In 2019, in order to make the plan more palatable, the city gave $137 million in “community investments,” including $35 million for MOCA. The museum came under fire for accepting the money, as it was the largest amount of money promised to a single city institution.

This picket has been going on for the past four years, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Thursdays through Sundays. Though it is directly outside of MOCA, the picket also targets a web of landlords and developers connected to the museum, and was originally started by former workers of Jing Fong, a dim sum banquet hall and anchor of the Chinatown community on Elizabeth Street. 

During the pandemic, business at Jing Fong plummeted, and in 2021 landlord Jonathan Chu evicted the beloved restaurant, which seated 800 people and was the locus for weddings, birthday parties and community gatherings.

Jing Fong was also the site of historic labor wins in Chinatown. In the 1990s, Jing Fong workers were the largest group of restaurant workers to join the 318 Restaurant Workers Union, the only union representing Chinese restaurant workers in New York City. Following the 2021 closure, Nelson Mar, the union’s president, penned a letter to Jonathan Chu, proposing to reopen the dim sum restaurant. 

Chu has argued that he has done everything to keep the restaurant running, stating that it was ultimately the owners’ decision to close the space and opt for a different location at 202 Centre St. Just a few months ago, the original Jing Fong space was leased out to Vitra, becoming a high-end, Swiss museum-grade furniture showroom. 

“The new Jing Fong is much smaller, and not all former workers were able to be rehired,” said Sky Wong, a member of the 318 Restaurant Workers union and worker at the current Jing Fong location. 

“The incredibly wealthy Jonathan Chu wants to displace us working-class Chinese folks and build luxury towers,” said Bang Zhang, also a member of the 318 Restaurant Workers Union and a worker at the original Jing Fong. “It’s not only about Jing Fong, but also the fate of all of Chinatown. MOCA and the skyscraper jail are a part of that.”

In addition to picketing, the Coalition to Protect Chinatown endorsed the Chinatown Working Group Rezoning Plan, a “community-led rezoning plan that protects the Chinatown & Lower East Side neighborhood from over-development and displacement by setting rules on how land can be used.”

Four years after its establishment, the picket represents Chinatown workers’ persistent fight against the gentrification threatening to take over their neighborhood.