Final Week of Canvassing in Chinatown for the Elections
PLEASE SHARE!
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Dear CCED Supporters,
THIS IS IT! After 6 months of meetings and organizing, CCED needs your support next TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23 @ 9am when the City Council meets to decide whether to pass the Interim Control Ordinance (ICO), which would put a temporary hold on Wal-Mart’s construction in Chinatown. We’ve been working hard for this day, so we hope that many of you will be able to attend and testify about why the ICO is so important to Chinatown!
Hearing De
Tuesday, October 23 @ 10am**
L.A. City Hall, Council Chambers
200 N. Spring Street, Room 340
Los Angeles, CA 90012
**CCED will be meeting at 9am prior to the City Council meeting.
For more information, contact (213) 986-8887 or email us at ccedchinatown@gmail.com.
Speak Up for a Better Chinatown!
p.s. Don’t forget to bring your CCED t-shirts!
Join us for the Chinatown Voter Project!
Register to vote by Oct.22 and vote yes on Prop 30!
CCED / SEACA / APALC is hosting a FREE t-shirt painting and workshop
in Chinatown. Come join us!
“Workers at Walmart-contracted warehouses are standing up against abusive working conditions. Listen to Daniel Lopez share his moving account of what it’s like to work at a Walmart contractor, and how he and his coworkers found the one antidote to injustice: unity.”
Follow the Play by Play
Follow the Play by Play in getting the Interim Control Ordinance passed by Los Angeles Planning and Land Use Management Committee (PLUM). It’s a small victory. Now, we have to work on getting it passed through City Council in September.
http://storify.com/ccedLA/planning-and-land-use-management-committee-approve
Interim Control Ordinance Hearing this Tuesday (tomorrow). Please share.
So What the Heck is an ICO?
In simple terms, the Interim Control Ordinance (ICO) accomplishes the following:
· Prohibits the opening of chain retail stores such as WalMart if the store is greater than 20,000 square feet and in the Chinatown area.
· The Chinatown area is bounded by the 110 Pasadena Freeway on the west, Sunset Boulevard and Cesar Chavez to the south, Main and Alameda Streets to the east and Cottage Home Street to the North.
· The ICO would be in effect for one year with the possibility of two six-month extensions during which time the Planning Department would develop a permanent ordinance.
Why we support the passing of the ICO:
· It keeps WalMart out of Chinatown for at least a year and possibly two years.
· It provides an opportunity for a more permanent ban on retail chains in Chinatown.
· It sets a precedent that the unique characteristics, history and traditions of Chinatown must be protected.
How do we get it?
· Ultimately, it’s up to the City Council to vote it up or down. Contact your councilmember today!
From the Streets to City Hall— Chinatown will be heard.
On June 30th we marched against WalMart and to protect and defend our community. On July 12th, we took that fight to City Hall where the Department of Planning was to vote on the Interim Control Ordinance (ICO). Frankly, I felt more at home parading through Chinatown with 5,000 of my brothers and sister than sitting through the long boring, brain-numbing hours of Planning Department deliberations.
Despite my apprehensions, when the July 12th meeting was scheduled, I showed up at 8:00 am sharp at City Hall and wandered up to room 1010 where the hearing was to be held. The door was locked, not a soul in sight. But back downstairs, I saw CCED red shirts starting to make their way to the main council chambers. Evidently the Planning Department had gotten wind that we were showing up and moved the meeting to a larger room to accommodate the crowd—our crowd. Good thing, it was standing room only. The Country Federation of Labor was there, so were our friends from the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE). But most importantly, CCED was there.
When we marched through Chinatown we said “What town? Chinatown! Who’s town? Our town!” And we meant it. Normallyl, government hearings are held during working hours, guaranteeing that the majority of working people and small merchants cannot attend. Even though 90% of the people in the room were there for the ICO testimony, discussion and vote, the Planning Department scheduled our item for last on the agenda, making us wait for hours, until mid-afternoon.
While we waited, we kept busy. We lined up speakers representing CCED. One of our speakers asked me to help her practice. It was perfect. A young Latina member of CCED she was preparing to read the statement of a merchant, who as a refugee from Vietnam, had found a home in Chinatown and wanted to speak out to defend her community. Nervous at first, her confidence and determination grew. When it was her time to speak, she spoke with the strength, commitment and determination of our entire community.
It is clear that the city government wants our community to be quiet and go away. Corporate giants like Walmart would rather we be obedient and passive consumers. But those days are gone. The residents and merchants in Chinatown need a say in what happens in our community. Even though the Department of Planning voted 5-2 against us, the word is out: We are here to stay.
And we get better every day. Starting as a loose collection of individuals, bound together with the premise that WalMart has no business in Chinatown, we have fashioned an organization that is growing and learning every day. We have built an effective outreach committee that knows and is increasingly known among the residents and merchants in Chinatown. We have a communications team that has become the public face of our effort with effective and imaginative messaging. Our initial opposition to WalMart has expanded to a vision of what we want for and in our community. Check out that vision at http://nowalmartinchinatown.tumblr.com/aboutus.html.
Every one of us is an active player in this movement. We all have a role to play. This is what I saw at the July 12th Planning Department hearing. This is why I am proud to be a member of CCED and confident in the future of Chinatown.
Play by Play on the ICO Hearing from Yesterday
Check it out on the play by play on Storify:
http://storify.com/ccedLA/ico-hearing-at-city-hall-8-15
CCED members came out strong to the PLUM ICO Hearing.
We thank all those that showed up in support of the ICO.
HELP THE ICO GET TO CITY COUNCIL!
Help the Interim Control Ordinance get to City Council. This Tuesday, August 14 we’ll be meeting at City Hall Room 350 @ 2:30PM. ICO will be going through Planning and Land Use Management Committee Hearing. If you plan on attending, please email ccedchinatown@gmail.com!
King Cheung’s Speech at June 30th Anti-Wal-Mart Rally
We want to share King Cheung, a fellow CCED speech at the largest Anti-Walmart Rally in the country. It’s a bit late but we want to share a clarion call to resisting the proposed Wal-Mart.
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你好嗎? Good afternoon! On behalf of the Chinatown Community for Equitable Development (CCED), welcome to Chinatown! 歡迎大家到唐人街! We are a new, multi-cultural organization formed in March this year. Already we have over 100 members. We oppose Wal-Mart opening a store in Chinatown. We believe that small businesses will be hurt, some will close down, and workers will be laid off. When the big chains move into these vacant spaces, land value will rise, rents will go up, further hurting our local merchants and residents. We want development in our community to create a historically and culturally unique Chinatown for all of us to live, work, and visit. I come to Chinatown to get dim sum, not a hamburger from one of those big chains.
We thank the LA County Federation of Labor for organizing this march and rally, and the many community and civic organizations that are here today. When labor and communities unite, we move mountains! Wal-Mart, for treating our workers and our communities like dirt, today we give you the biggest anti-Wal-Mart protest ever held in the United States!
Wal-Mart is known for treating their workers with no respect, and paying them low wages. I also want to tell our senior citizens that live in Grand Plaza that Wal-Mart and their owners also support politicians and organizations that want to cut and privatize Social Security, to make all of us suffer in our twilight years. We just can’t support a Wal-Mart who has no heart and no morals.
Wal-Mart! Listen up! We do not want you in Chinatown! We do not want you in LA! So pack up your merchandise and go back to Bentonville, Arkansas! Attention, Wal-Mart shoppers, this store is closed, forever!
Today we have a powerful march and rally. Do you feel the energy? Do you feel the heat? Well, you are hot! After the rally, we in the Chinatown community, instead of going to Disneyland, are going to organize! Going door to door, shop to shop. Please come out and speak at the July 12th Planning Commission hearing on the Interim Control Ordinance (ICO) to protect Chinatown. We invite you to attend our planned August 11community forum, a place where all stakeholders can openly discuss the impact of Wal-Mart, and build a Chinatown that we all can be proud of and support.
Thank you.
Jenny Mai’s Sandwich Shop is against Wal-Mart.
Wacky Wednesdays!
Another small business owner that is saying no to Walmart.
Chinatown small business owner opposes Wal-Mart. We all see the ramifications of Wal-Mart moving in.
