December 4, 2025 • 32 mins
Philadelphians have a history of banding together and organizing when faced by powerful and monied development that has threatened their displacement. From professional sports venues to ever-expanding “eds and meds,” all across Philadelphia, working-class communities of color have pushed back, sometimes winning, sometimes losing, sometimes ending up somewhere in between. In this panel discussion, we’ll hear from neighborhood leaders who share their stories and lessons learned for others when these projects arise.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Straw hut media.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Capitalism hates community.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
I can't emphasize enough like this, this sort of intangible,
the stuff that money can't.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Buy, is this stuff.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
To attend to because that is the stuff that befuddles developers,
because they're going to say how much do you want
for this?
Speaker 2 (00:31):
And you're going to say it's priceless.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
This is Lucas Grinley from Next City show about change
makers and their stories. Truth is, there are solutions to
the problems of pressing people in cities. If you're listening,
I hope it's because you want to spread good ideas
from one city to the next city. Fighting big development,
especially when it comes back by corporate money in city support,
can feel like an impossible task. But in Philadelphia, the
(00:55):
Chinatown neighborhood prides itself on having defeated proposals over the
years for a federal prison, a baseball stadium, and a casino,
and that track record's part of why residents just defeated
a proposed one point three billion dollar arena from the
seventy six ers. Their resistance has become a defining moment
for community power, which maybe now can be galvanized citywide.
(01:15):
Taking us through the story is Debbie Way of Asian
Americans United, a lifelong organizer who helped lead the fight,
and guiding the conversation is Emily Rizzo of Kensington Voice,
who originally hosted this discussion at this year's Vanguard Conference.
We all met at a local school in Chinatown called
the Folk Arts Cultural Treasures Charter School or FACTS, and
the result is something very special. Debbie explains how the
(01:37):
community held together even as developers tried to divide it,
how they created a network of neighbors, students and researchers
that ultimately stopped the arena, and maybe most importantly, how
their sustaining of tradition of collaboration and resistance. There's so
much to learn, but first we asked someone to help
us set the stakes, and not just anyone. We're incredibly
lucky that the Vanguard host committee included former Philadelphia Council
(01:59):
Member at Large Helen Gim. No one could have said
it better. Here's Helen.
Speaker 5 (02:09):
In Kaream.
Speaker 6 (02:09):
We have a phrase called monsei, which literally means ten
thousand years, and it was meant originally to talk about
kind of like a It's a reclamation of like a
royalty phrase, like you know ten thousand years to a
kingdom but got reclaimed during the Japanese occupation by revolutionaries
in Korea. To speak to ten thousand years of a
(02:31):
people's movement of resilience, stability, power that could overthrow empires, domination, oppression,
and to me like that is what we are going
to be talking about on this panel today.
Speaker 7 (02:44):
I'm so proud and honored to come out of a
history of people's.
Speaker 6 (02:48):
Movements in the city of Philadelphia that has spanned neighborhoods
and communities.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Obviously, you said in one of them.
Speaker 6 (02:56):
Chinatown stands as one of the few remaining chinatowns in
the country, but has not done so because of government,
but in spite of it, in spite of the ideas
in which development creates displacements, this is a community that
has figured out some of the alternatives to that.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
And it doesn't start.
Speaker 6 (03:14):
With like institutions, capital and government. It starts with the
strength and resilience of communities.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Across generations, to remember.
Speaker 6 (03:24):
Their history, to understand the connections between elders and young people,
to create connections that bind us, whether it's through arts
and culture and reclamation, a street festivals and an elevation
or whether it's running powerful citywide coalition, building movements that
crisscross neighborhoods and remind people that the things that connect
(03:46):
us together are ourselves. In a time of like deep
in humanity, it is that reclamation of humanity in the
faith of so much that seems against us that actually
makes us Philadelphia as a people who are in government
adjacent to government, who are talking about development. We can
talk about processes, we can talk about policies, we can
(04:07):
talk about institutions and little vehicles. But the thing that
we wanted to do and why I'm so grateful to
next city, is we have to talk about community.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Power, about people.
Speaker 6 (04:17):
The people erased from anything is not going to be
a city that is worth building. It's going to be
a city of bricks and mortar, of institutions, individual processes.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
That's not us.
Speaker 6 (04:29):
And when we talk about fighting poverty and oppression, taking
on racism and white supremacy and the things that exclude
and hold people down, it is the fundamental power of
communities to overthrow that. So, whether you believe in Frederick Douglas,
there's no struggle without progress, whether you want to be
with Margaret Meade and the small group of committed thinkers
or whether you want to talk about political scientists. Erica
(04:50):
Chanawa talking about the three and a half percent rule
that when three and a half percent of this population
is engaged, anything can happen. Authoritarying rule can fall, and
new movements can build. But that fundamentally starts with the
power of community. And why as people who come and
believe in government, this is not civic engagement, This is
(05:11):
not always polite processes.
Speaker 7 (05:13):
They don't always go the way we want.
Speaker 6 (05:14):
But when we talk about lasting, sustainable power, we have
to invest in the power of independent, organized communities to
fight for a vision that is bigger than the capacity
that we may currently handle. And it's towards a longer
vision than we may currently hold. And I think like
once we understand how that works, that sometimes uncomfortable next
(05:35):
us when community meets government can be understood.
Speaker 7 (05:38):
This is a place to be nurtured. It's a place
of power.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
When we lose, we lose big.
Speaker 6 (05:43):
Chinatown has lost half of its land and a third
of its housing to so called development projects. The black
Bottoms have been erased not from memory but in its
physical infrastructure. We've lost schools that have never come back
When we lose things, they don't come back, but we
build on those stories of loss and we remember that
(06:03):
this is a fight for our lives as well as
it is for our people.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Across the country, communities face the same pattern where stadium
and arena projects aren't really about sports at all but
about money. Here's de wi way.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
These guys have financialized team, so they're not sports bros anymore.
They used to be rich guy.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Loves his hometown, buys a team, go birds. You know,
we really care about the city. And now you've got
the hbs's right that are buying. They don't care what
city it is. They want to build these arenas because
it's an object of financialization, the same way they're taking
(06:43):
over housing. That's a different fight. And to me that's
like this is just personally, this is not a fight
of negotiation. This is a fight against oligarchy.
Speaker 5 (06:54):
And at a certain point you got to say, in
the Roman colisseum is like twenty five hundred years old.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Now, so do not come to me and tell me.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
That your arena that is twenty five years old is
too old.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
For your poor little babies to play in. Not to
even mention that we're in the midst of a climate crisis,
and this kind of waste, this kind of use of.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Carbon steel and concrete, which are some of the largest
carbon dioxide.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Emitters in the planet.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
And we're gonna say okay to the future of our
children because rich.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Boys want to play this game.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
No, Like, at a certain point, we collectively need to
stop this madness. And like whatever city that is facing,
I mean, they're trying to do the soccer thing in Chicago,
they're trying to build a fucking gondola, and Los Angeles
so the people don't actually have to walk to get
to a stadium, Like we as the people need to
(08:08):
start saying, you know what, like this isn't even time
for a CBA, because first you need to justify this.
You need to justify you have to make sure there
is zero tax dollars going into this thing, local, state
or federal. Like I think it's time to like just
put your foot down because this kind of spending on
(08:28):
arenas and stadiums when our public transport, infrastructure, schools are
falling apart is absume.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
You're going to want to hear more from DEBBI, trust me.
After the break, we hear how developers came in with
money and pressure, offering deals to individual groups, and how
Debbie in a grassroots coalition countered that strategy with something
harder to buy, social capital built over generations. Welcome back.
(09:01):
Earlier we heard how the arena proposal fit into a
national trend of mega projects threatening to push out small neighborhoods,
and why Philadelphia's Chinatown saw it as an existential threat.
Now we talk about what actually happened inside the fight
and how people organized from within. Here's Emily Rizzo leading
the conversation with wa.
Speaker 8 (09:24):
So this new arena would have displaced many small but
likely was likely to displace many small businesses in China,
among other negative impacts. They delayed the developers' plans, messing
with their timeline and influencing public opinion, but our Mayor
Parker and the majority of city council were in favor
of the arena.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
The administration proposed.
Speaker 8 (09:46):
A community benefits agreement without the coalition's involvement, and soon
after council gave a final approval of the arena.
Speaker 9 (09:54):
After a two year long fight, the developers pulled out
of their plans and decided to stay in South Philly,
striking a new deal with Comcast.
Speaker 8 (10:06):
W let's get into it. Something you told me was
that there was some division internally in Chinatown, and I
want to hear from you about the work that y'all
put in the boots on the groundwork to create some
more unity internally first before this kind of became a
more a larger citywide movement.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
Yeah. Well, first of all, the developers of the arena
are poster boys for displacement.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
David Blitzer is the global head of Tactical Opportunities for
the Blackstone Group. Josh Harris was a co founder of
Apollo Global. David Adelman is the CEO and founder of
Campus Apartments, which operates in some eighteen to twenty states
displacing through campus housing. So you know that they have
(11:02):
been around the block a few times and they know
what they're doing. So the first thing was to come
down to Chinatown try to divide the community. And they
did this by meeting one on one with each individual
organization or church or whatever and throwing out a fifty
million dollar deal.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
You know, we want to build this arena.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
We're prepared to give you fifty million dollars for the community.
This is a community of small, family owned businesses that
have just come out of two years of COVID. Many
of our businesses did not survive and went under. Currently,
even as of today, they're still struggling to survive. It's
(11:45):
a working class community, many with limited English proficiency, quite
a few one documented. And you hear fifty million dollars
and do think this is going to saved my life?
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Right?
Speaker 3 (12:02):
So, Asian America United APIPA, the two core organizing groups
that started organizing the enci Amana, had a bit of
work to do, but we recognize that we've always had
work to do, so we never dropped that work after campaigns.
Over building and sustaining relationships in our community is part
(12:25):
of the work. Building and sustaining relationships with other communities
across the city continues to be part of the work
because anytime you're under attack, you need to be able
to go back to your people with your social capital
in hand and say hold up.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
So we had our social capital up against fifty million
dollars and our social capital won. So we had to
do a lot of research.
Speaker 3 (12:52):
We had to figure out how to distill very complex
ideas around what the traffic impact would be, around what
the economic impact would be around like arena usage and
around you know, what a CBA was and historically what's
happened around these in the rest of the country. We
would take all that research and distill it into sound
(13:15):
bites and we went back to old school, like I'm
sixty eight, I remember before technology, and that's much of
our community is not plugged into English language technology.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
We went back to school.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
We took out our printing presses and we did neighborhood
newspapers that talked about what the arena was. We went
door to door, we canvassed, we tabled, we left leafleted
in restaurants.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
They had a huge budget. Part of that budget they
used to pay for ads.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
In Chinese bilingual media. We didn't have that budget, but
we had our social capital, so we had our folks
posting on social media in Chinese like and reachat and
those other things. Our line. So our line was all
through public channels. Their line was all through like I
got to pay.
Speaker 8 (14:06):
For this ad.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
So we had to really work. And at the end
of the day, were there people that would have cut a.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Deal, no doubt, Like we're not saints, you know, there
were and there's assholes in every community.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
There are people ready. There are people that will sell
you out that no doubt.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
But one good thing about Chinese is that we know
like how shame works, and so like when you had
the majority of community behind you, like, no.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
You don't step out a lot. We're old school community.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
You know, you don't step out a line because your
model gonna know right. Like, so we were able to
at the end of the day, not only did we
not have a single organization entity individual in Chinatown agreeing
to a CBA, we didn't have a a single Asian
organization across the entire city willing to sign on.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
To a CBR.
Speaker 3 (15:09):
So then what the mayor did was the agreement was
you're not going to get this arena without a CBA.
So the mayor made her own CBA, which was fifty
million dollars for her pet projects, you know, like after
school something or other or this or other, nothing to
(15:31):
do with Chinatown.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
I think she had two million.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Dollars for trash pickup after events for Chinatown and that
was it. That was the CBA that she presented and
justified her support. That was the CBA that the city
council was saying, Okay, now we have a CBA now
we can vote on it. Not a single Chinatown resident,
(15:56):
not a single Asian entity.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Across the entire city involved in any CBA.
Speaker 7 (16:04):
And then you kind of had to negotiate a little
bit and get involved with the CBA and make it better,
try to make it better, right, Can you talk about
that process?
Speaker 3 (16:13):
I mean, yeah, this was when we were down to
the wire when we like we always knew we didn't
have this mayor. Once the primary was done, we knew
who the mayor was. We're like, okay, forget the mayor.
We also assumed we didn't have city council. We still
tried to.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Fight for votes on council. We ended up getting five
of council willing to stand up.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
And it was tough for council people because they knew
if they stood up against it, they'd lose.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
And like, do you give.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
Up your capital in you know, voting for that. I
don't know how politics works. That's why Helen does that
and I don't, but.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
That's why I'm like, now, I would never compromise.
Speaker 3 (16:53):
So it came down to the point where this thing
was going to go through whether what lot we liked it,
and then they were like, well, like if you could
negotiate a CBA, what would.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Be in it?
Speaker 3 (17:05):
And our stance all along and continues to be the
arena was an existential threat.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
It would have destroyed our community.
Speaker 3 (17:13):
There is nothing that we can negotiate for because they
would never have to pay a dime ount because our
community would have been gone.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
So what is the point? So they said, well, like
if you could dream about what could stop that?
Speaker 3 (17:27):
So we put together like a three hundred and fifty
million dollars CBA. Because we went around and we estimated
what would it cost the businesses, you know, to lose business.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
A third of the year.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
What would it cost, you know, for elderly to be
able to figure out how to get to their doctor
that they can talk to if they don't live in
this community and the bus lines can't run, what would
it cost? You know, we tried, you know, how do
you put a price tag on your grandmother?
Speaker 2 (17:57):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Like, we did what we could. We put together a
package city council. Some of our allies tried to submit
that it did not go through, but that's what we
ended up doing.
Speaker 8 (18:13):
And key parts of your strategy were slowing it down
right and then influencing public opinion, kind of like that
shame aspect that you're talking about, but making that like.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
A citywide movement.
Speaker 7 (18:27):
Can you talk about that?
Speaker 8 (18:28):
I also know that you must have had I know
you had so many people coming at you and saying,
how can I help?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
How can I help? How did you.
Speaker 8 (18:35):
Create inroads and grow this to a citywide movement and
create avenues for new people to engage.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
Well, we benefited from the fact that this was an arena,
and so even people that don't care about politics and
never would care about Chinatown, they heard about it like
they'd heard it.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
In sports radio. They heard it like all the bros
were talking about it.
Speaker 3 (18:58):
So at least it wasn't like some of our communities
that are facing displacement like you see town homes.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
It's hard to get that kind of.
Speaker 3 (19:05):
Global, city wide knowledge of what's happening.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
So we did benefit from that.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
We benefited from the fact that we are the only
solid geographical Asian enclave in the Tri state area. So,
like you know, there may be fifty small black communities
in Philadelphia facing displacement, there's only one Asian one because
that's the only one we got.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
We also benefited from our history of these.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
Massive fights that we've had for over sixty years, so
that helped us in terms of raising public awareness, in
terms of waising public support, we again went back to
old school stuff and I was like, well, we got
to find out who else is going to be impacted
by this. So we started reaching out to surrounding neighborhoods
(19:56):
and educating though, because if it wasn't right in your backyard,
you're not thinking about it. But we were able to
get a hold of some traffic studies and things like that.
We were able to use those to educate communities.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
No, no, no, no, no, you're going.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
To be affected by this too, and this is how
you'll be affected. And slowly we built the coalition. This
coalition became so large and we had spin off organizations
that we built. One of the first ones was BOCK,
which is Students for the Preservation of Chinatown. So that
was when I went to Helen's daughter and my daughter,
who were very good friends, and I said, Okay, you
(20:33):
all are in college. Your job organize a college students
And they were like Tarren's like Auntie, Daddy, I'm busy.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
The guy was like mom in the winter, I'm like,
you went to school at SAX, you are.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
Organizing this city. And so they went out. They did
the student organizing. In doing that, they did teachings in
high schools and then they helped mentor high school students
who built SASA students against the Sixes Arena. They had
their own high school group. We went to Washington Square West,
the neighborhood did the South of US. They created No
(21:08):
Arena Wash West. We went to the gagborhood, which is
right next to the Wash West, said you're going to
be affected too. They created No Arena Gaborhood. We went
to Thomas Jefferson University, which is the only Level one
trauma center for this entire area of the city, and
we said, yo, your ambulances are not going to get through.
So then doctors and the nurses created No Arena jeff
(21:31):
and we just like kept at it. We kept building
building building till we had this massive coalition. We did
have one organization that we built called No Arena in
Chinatown Solidarity NACIS that would have monthly meetups and anyone
that wanted to volunteer for the arena could come once
(21:54):
a month to the school and.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
There'd be a workshop and we would update them. This
is where we are.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
Now Here's five thousand ways that you can get involved.
And we had all these different committees. You can do
the Outreach committee, so you can table, you can petition,
you can go get postcards signed. We had an art
hive that would do art builds for our demonstrations. We
had acquire that. Nowhere ren acquire. We sang our city
(22:20):
council testimony. We had like my brain child, my baby
is the research hive. There was so much research I
had to come out of this thing. What's the tax
breaks coming down here? What does the technical drawings look like?
And the research hive is this hive of very introverted,
wonky people who like never get involved with stuff because
(22:43):
they're like very introverted. And they were like they found
their people and they went crazy. They really turned out
the research.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
And by the way, all these groups that I have
just mentioned, they are still meeting.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
The research high I've like basically says to all community
groups like Philly, Thrive has worked with them because they're like,
could you find people to analyze as water report that
Hilko is doing And the hive is like, we're on it.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So any of y'all from Philly.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
Like, I don't know if they hive as much choice
beyond that, but if you have stuff that you need.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
Research, they'll do it. If they don't know it, they
find people, So yeah, I think what's what stands at?
Like they found community amongst themselves.
Speaker 8 (23:28):
Yeah, see smaller factions and then that's also made them
sustainable in a way too, and they want to just be.
Speaker 7 (23:33):
Around people who are values aligned and do research.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
For After the break, Debbie explained how the fight did
(24:00):
not end with stopping the arena and why building community
power between crises is so important, and she closes with
one of my favorite moments that's ever happened at a
Vanguard conference, and it's a reminder that culture, tradition, and
even a shared song can help hold a neighborhood together.
(24:23):
Welcome back. We've talked about the strategy organizers used to
fight the development of a massive sports arena, but there's
also a different kind of force behind Chinatown's fight, the softer,
everyday power that grows from years of connection and shared history.
Here's DEBI.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
I think what Chinatown has done here, which is kind
of like soft power, you know, to stop predatory.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Development, like We have a saying in AAU is that you.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
Fight the things you don't want, but the build the
things you do want. So when there's a lull, you
got to look around your community say.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Like we needed public school, so we built it.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Like the SPACK and SASA students, even in the middle
of the fight, they listen to the elders saying, you know,
you got to build what you want, and they said,
we don't have a third space for young people. So
in the middle of the arena fight, these two youth
organizations opened up a third space for young people. But
like it's something that's ingrained in the community, and that
kind of stuff is is I think like some of
(25:26):
the strongest medicine against predatory development, because you need to
people to be united. Like if you don't want people
to sell out on a deal, they need to be united,
and they are united because they have relationships with each other.
So really being really thoughtful about how do we spend
(25:47):
time building consciously a sense of community because capitalism hates
community and so I can't emphasize enough like this this
sort of intangible the stuff that money can't buy, is
this stuff to attend to because that is the stuff
(26:08):
that befuddeles developers.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Because they're going to say, how much do you want
for this? And you're going to say it's priceless.
Speaker 4 (26:16):
That idea that some things can't be bought or bargained
over is also something China Town learn from other movements
across the city.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
I got to say, like, the black community has taught us,
so I would not underestimate the power of the history
of black movement.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
I think.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Certainly this history of like a sixty year history of
resistance has built a playbook and a sense of fortitude
and a sense of tradition that maybe when I talk
about the soft power stuff is where I'm thinking, like,
how do we build this citywide? How do we build
a sense of resistance that becomes like when our kids
(27:01):
are growing up, it's like they learn certain things. They
get a red envelope of Chinese New Year, they eat
a mooncake on mid Autumn festival, and they pick up
a damn picket sign when your community's under attack, it's.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
Just inevitable, right, Like it is inevitable.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Our kids were marching against the casino when they were
like what five and six years old, and then they
went on to found Bock so I think there is
like this trajectory of tradition that we need to make.
The space for intergenerational connection that I think is like
I think we've always done it, all communities have done it,
(27:39):
but it's gotten fractured.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Right, we have to educate our children.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
Our work in Chinatown, a lot of our work is
on coalition. Why they need to care about the rest
of the city, why they need to be in coalition
with the rest of the city. I don't think it's
on any single one community, but I think it's on
all of us to.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Really figure out how we build.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
This sense of like collective resistance, and then within our
own communities, how do we build this inner generation or resistance.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
That that will stand the tust at Pine.
Speaker 4 (28:16):
That long term view matters, because Debbie says, the community
is concerned that fight in Chinatown isn't finished. Development could
be on the way. So now is one of those
times when it's important to build up soft power.
Speaker 3 (28:32):
But I did want to do one last thing, and
I asked permission to do this because I wanted to
do a soft power thing that we do and I
kind of feel like I here at facts when you're here.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
But also when you're with the arena movement, you cannot
not do this.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
So we're going to sing because singing is like one
of our strongest soft powers. I know. They want to
teach you a movement song that's really short, but it's
something that we are elders taught us to do and
then we somehow forgot to do.
Speaker 10 (28:59):
So we chant.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
But you get tired when you chant, Like, singing is
so much better. So I'm gonna teach you one of
our songs that we sing.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
And it goes like I'll sing it once and then
I'll have I'll have you follow me. It goes like this,
I have not come here alone. I carry my people
in my bones. I have not come here alone. If
(29:28):
you listen, you can hear them in my soul. Okay,
this is like we'll give you power when you're not
feeling power. So this is an example of the soft
power I'm talking about.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
So sing after me.
Speaker 3 (29:43):
I have not come here alone. I carry my people
in my bones, people in my.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
I have not come here alone.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
I have not long here alone.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
If you listen, you can hear them in my soul.
You can hear them in my soul. So I know
you're gonna feel this, so let's do it all together.
I have not come here alone.
Speaker 10 (30:29):
I carry my people in my bowls.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
I have not come here alone. If you listen, you
can hear them in my soul. One more time.
Speaker 10 (30:45):
I have not come here alone. I carry my people
my bowes. I have not come here alone. Ooh, miss
you listen, you can hear them in my soul.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
We hope you enjoyed this episode of Next City show
about change makers and their stories. Together we can spread
good ideas from one city to the next city. Thank
you for listening this week and for coming along with
us to Philly as part of the Vanguard Conference. I
should note that while the conference is over, our work
in Philly is not. Next City is partnering with Resolve
Philly and Germantown Info Hub on a year long reporting fellowship,
(31:49):
made possible with support from the Knight Foundation, So stay tuned.
Thank you to our guests, Council Member Helen Ghim, Debbie
Way of Asian Americans United, and Emily Rizzo of Kensington Voice.
If you want more of our coverage on antidisplacement strategies,
sign up for our newest newsletter, The Pushback. Visit nexcity
dot org slash the pushback to get updates. Our audio
(32:09):
producer is Slavona Alcala. Our show producers Maggie Bowles. Our
executive producer is Ryan Tillotson, and I'm Lucas Gridley, Executive
director for Next City. By the way, next City is
a news organization with a nonprofit model. If you like
what we're doing here, please consider pitching in to support
our work. Visit nexcity dot org slash membership to make
a donation. We'd love to hear any feedback from our listeners.
Please feel free to email us at info atnexcity dot
(32:32):
org and if you haven't already, subscribe to the show
on Apple, Spotify, good Pods, or anywhere you listen to
your podcasts.
Straw hut media.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Capitalism hates community.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
I can't emphasize enough like this, this sort of intangible,
the stuff that money can't.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Buy, is this stuff.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
To attend to because that is the stuff that befuddles developers,
because they're going to say how much do you want
for this?
Speaker 2 (00:31):
And you're going to say it's priceless.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
This is Lucas Grinley from Next City show about change
makers and their stories. Truth is, there are solutions to
the problems of pressing people in cities. If you're listening,
I hope it's because you want to spread good ideas
from one city to the next city. Fighting big development,
especially when it comes back by corporate money in city support,
can feel like an impossible task. But in Philadelphia, the
(00:55):
Chinatown neighborhood prides itself on having defeated proposals over the
years for a federal prison, a baseball stadium, and a casino,
and that track record's part of why residents just defeated
a proposed one point three billion dollar arena from the
seventy six ers. Their resistance has become a defining moment
for community power, which maybe now can be galvanized citywide.
(01:15):
Taking us through the story is Debbie Way of Asian
Americans United, a lifelong organizer who helped lead the fight,
and guiding the conversation is Emily Rizzo of Kensington Voice,
who originally hosted this discussion at this year's Vanguard Conference.
We all met at a local school in Chinatown called
the Folk Arts Cultural Treasures Charter School or FACTS, and
the result is something very special. Debbie explains how the
(01:37):
community held together even as developers tried to divide it,
how they created a network of neighbors, students and researchers
that ultimately stopped the arena, and maybe most importantly, how
their sustaining of tradition of collaboration and resistance. There's so
much to learn, but first we asked someone to help
us set the stakes, and not just anyone. We're incredibly
lucky that the Vanguard host committee included former Philadelphia Council
(01:59):
Member at Large Helen Gim. No one could have said
it better. Here's Helen.
Speaker 5 (02:09):
In Kaream.
Speaker 6 (02:09):
We have a phrase called monsei, which literally means ten
thousand years, and it was meant originally to talk about
kind of like a It's a reclamation of like a
royalty phrase, like you know ten thousand years to a
kingdom but got reclaimed during the Japanese occupation by revolutionaries
in Korea. To speak to ten thousand years of a
(02:31):
people's movement of resilience, stability, power that could overthrow empires, domination, oppression,
and to me like that is what we are going
to be talking about on this panel today.
Speaker 7 (02:44):
I'm so proud and honored to come out of a
history of people's.
Speaker 6 (02:48):
Movements in the city of Philadelphia that has spanned neighborhoods
and communities.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Obviously, you said in one of them.
Speaker 6 (02:56):
Chinatown stands as one of the few remaining chinatowns in
the country, but has not done so because of government,
but in spite of it, in spite of the ideas
in which development creates displacements, this is a community that
has figured out some of the alternatives to that.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
And it doesn't start.
Speaker 6 (03:14):
With like institutions, capital and government. It starts with the
strength and resilience of communities.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Across generations, to remember.
Speaker 6 (03:24):
Their history, to understand the connections between elders and young people,
to create connections that bind us, whether it's through arts
and culture and reclamation, a street festivals and an elevation
or whether it's running powerful citywide coalition, building movements that
crisscross neighborhoods and remind people that the things that connect
(03:46):
us together are ourselves. In a time of like deep
in humanity, it is that reclamation of humanity in the
faith of so much that seems against us that actually
makes us Philadelphia as a people who are in government
adjacent to government, who are talking about development. We can
talk about processes, we can talk about policies, we can
(04:07):
talk about institutions and little vehicles. But the thing that
we wanted to do and why I'm so grateful to
next city, is we have to talk about community.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Power, about people.
Speaker 6 (04:17):
The people erased from anything is not going to be
a city that is worth building. It's going to be
a city of bricks and mortar, of institutions, individual processes.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
That's not us.
Speaker 6 (04:29):
And when we talk about fighting poverty and oppression, taking
on racism and white supremacy and the things that exclude
and hold people down, it is the fundamental power of
communities to overthrow that. So, whether you believe in Frederick Douglas,
there's no struggle without progress, whether you want to be
with Margaret Meade and the small group of committed thinkers
or whether you want to talk about political scientists. Erica
(04:50):
Chanawa talking about the three and a half percent rule
that when three and a half percent of this population
is engaged, anything can happen. Authoritarying rule can fall, and
new movements can build. But that fundamentally starts with the
power of community. And why as people who come and
believe in government, this is not civic engagement, This is
(05:11):
not always polite processes.
Speaker 7 (05:13):
They don't always go the way we want.
Speaker 6 (05:14):
But when we talk about lasting, sustainable power, we have
to invest in the power of independent, organized communities to
fight for a vision that is bigger than the capacity
that we may currently handle. And it's towards a longer
vision than we may currently hold. And I think like
once we understand how that works, that sometimes uncomfortable next
(05:35):
us when community meets government can be understood.
Speaker 7 (05:38):
This is a place to be nurtured. It's a place
of power.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
When we lose, we lose big.
Speaker 6 (05:43):
Chinatown has lost half of its land and a third
of its housing to so called development projects. The black
Bottoms have been erased not from memory but in its
physical infrastructure. We've lost schools that have never come back
When we lose things, they don't come back, but we
build on those stories of loss and we remember that
(06:03):
this is a fight for our lives as well as
it is for our people.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Across the country, communities face the same pattern where stadium
and arena projects aren't really about sports at all but
about money. Here's de wi way.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
These guys have financialized team, so they're not sports bros anymore.
They used to be rich guy.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Loves his hometown, buys a team, go birds. You know,
we really care about the city. And now you've got
the hbs's right that are buying. They don't care what
city it is. They want to build these arenas because
it's an object of financialization, the same way they're taking
(06:43):
over housing. That's a different fight. And to me that's
like this is just personally, this is not a fight
of negotiation. This is a fight against oligarchy.
Speaker 5 (06:54):
And at a certain point you got to say, in
the Roman colisseum is like twenty five hundred years old.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Now, so do not come to me and tell me.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
That your arena that is twenty five years old is
too old.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
For your poor little babies to play in. Not to
even mention that we're in the midst of a climate crisis,
and this kind of waste, this kind of use of.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Carbon steel and concrete, which are some of the largest
carbon dioxide.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Emitters in the planet.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
And we're gonna say okay to the future of our
children because rich.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Boys want to play this game.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
No, Like, at a certain point, we collectively need to
stop this madness. And like whatever city that is facing,
I mean, they're trying to do the soccer thing in Chicago,
they're trying to build a fucking gondola, and Los Angeles
so the people don't actually have to walk to get
to a stadium, Like we as the people need to
(08:08):
start saying, you know what, like this isn't even time
for a CBA, because first you need to justify this.
You need to justify you have to make sure there
is zero tax dollars going into this thing, local, state
or federal. Like I think it's time to like just
put your foot down because this kind of spending on
(08:28):
arenas and stadiums when our public transport, infrastructure, schools are
falling apart is absume.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
You're going to want to hear more from DEBBI, trust me.
After the break, we hear how developers came in with
money and pressure, offering deals to individual groups, and how
Debbie in a grassroots coalition countered that strategy with something
harder to buy, social capital built over generations. Welcome back.
(09:01):
Earlier we heard how the arena proposal fit into a
national trend of mega projects threatening to push out small neighborhoods,
and why Philadelphia's Chinatown saw it as an existential threat.
Now we talk about what actually happened inside the fight
and how people organized from within. Here's Emily Rizzo leading
the conversation with wa.
Speaker 8 (09:24):
So this new arena would have displaced many small but
likely was likely to displace many small businesses in China,
among other negative impacts. They delayed the developers' plans, messing
with their timeline and influencing public opinion, but our Mayor
Parker and the majority of city council were in favor
of the arena.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
The administration proposed.
Speaker 8 (09:46):
A community benefits agreement without the coalition's involvement, and soon
after council gave a final approval of the arena.
Speaker 9 (09:54):
After a two year long fight, the developers pulled out
of their plans and decided to stay in South Philly,
striking a new deal with Comcast.
Speaker 8 (10:06):
W let's get into it. Something you told me was
that there was some division internally in Chinatown, and I
want to hear from you about the work that y'all
put in the boots on the groundwork to create some
more unity internally first before this kind of became a
more a larger citywide movement.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
Yeah. Well, first of all, the developers of the arena
are poster boys for displacement.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
David Blitzer is the global head of Tactical Opportunities for
the Blackstone Group. Josh Harris was a co founder of
Apollo Global. David Adelman is the CEO and founder of
Campus Apartments, which operates in some eighteen to twenty states
displacing through campus housing. So you know that they have
(11:02):
been around the block a few times and they know
what they're doing. So the first thing was to come
down to Chinatown try to divide the community. And they
did this by meeting one on one with each individual
organization or church or whatever and throwing out a fifty
million dollar deal.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
You know, we want to build this arena.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
We're prepared to give you fifty million dollars for the community.
This is a community of small, family owned businesses that
have just come out of two years of COVID. Many
of our businesses did not survive and went under. Currently,
even as of today, they're still struggling to survive. It's
(11:45):
a working class community, many with limited English proficiency, quite
a few one documented. And you hear fifty million dollars
and do think this is going to saved my life?
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Right?
Speaker 3 (12:02):
So, Asian America United APIPA, the two core organizing groups
that started organizing the enci Amana, had a bit of
work to do, but we recognize that we've always had
work to do, so we never dropped that work after campaigns.
Over building and sustaining relationships in our community is part
(12:25):
of the work. Building and sustaining relationships with other communities
across the city continues to be part of the work
because anytime you're under attack, you need to be able
to go back to your people with your social capital
in hand and say hold up.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
So we had our social capital up against fifty million
dollars and our social capital won. So we had to
do a lot of research.
Speaker 3 (12:52):
We had to figure out how to distill very complex
ideas around what the traffic impact would be, around what
the economic impact would be around like arena usage and
around you know, what a CBA was and historically what's
happened around these in the rest of the country. We
would take all that research and distill it into sound
(13:15):
bites and we went back to old school, like I'm
sixty eight, I remember before technology, and that's much of
our community is not plugged into English language technology.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
We went back to school.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
We took out our printing presses and we did neighborhood
newspapers that talked about what the arena was. We went
door to door, we canvassed, we tabled, we left leafleted
in restaurants.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
They had a huge budget. Part of that budget they
used to pay for ads.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
In Chinese bilingual media. We didn't have that budget, but
we had our social capital, so we had our folks
posting on social media in Chinese like and reachat and
those other things. Our line. So our line was all
through public channels. Their line was all through like I
got to pay.
Speaker 8 (14:06):
For this ad.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
So we had to really work. And at the end
of the day, were there people that would have cut a.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Deal, no doubt, Like we're not saints, you know, there
were and there's assholes in every community.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
There are people ready. There are people that will sell
you out that no doubt.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
But one good thing about Chinese is that we know
like how shame works, and so like when you had
the majority of community behind you, like, no.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
You don't step out a lot. We're old school community.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
You know, you don't step out a line because your
model gonna know right. Like, so we were able to
at the end of the day, not only did we
not have a single organization entity individual in Chinatown agreeing
to a CBA, we didn't have a a single Asian
organization across the entire city willing to sign on.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
To a CBR.
Speaker 3 (15:09):
So then what the mayor did was the agreement was
you're not going to get this arena without a CBA.
So the mayor made her own CBA, which was fifty
million dollars for her pet projects, you know, like after
school something or other or this or other, nothing to
(15:31):
do with Chinatown.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
I think she had two million.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Dollars for trash pickup after events for Chinatown and that
was it. That was the CBA that she presented and
justified her support. That was the CBA that the city
council was saying, Okay, now we have a CBA now
we can vote on it. Not a single Chinatown resident,
(15:56):
not a single Asian entity.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Across the entire city involved in any CBA.
Speaker 7 (16:04):
And then you kind of had to negotiate a little
bit and get involved with the CBA and make it better,
try to make it better, right, Can you talk about
that process?
Speaker 3 (16:13):
I mean, yeah, this was when we were down to
the wire when we like we always knew we didn't
have this mayor. Once the primary was done, we knew
who the mayor was. We're like, okay, forget the mayor.
We also assumed we didn't have city council. We still
tried to.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Fight for votes on council. We ended up getting five
of council willing to stand up.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
And it was tough for council people because they knew
if they stood up against it, they'd lose.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
And like, do you give.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
Up your capital in you know, voting for that. I
don't know how politics works. That's why Helen does that
and I don't, but.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
That's why I'm like, now, I would never compromise.
Speaker 3 (16:53):
So it came down to the point where this thing
was going to go through whether what lot we liked it,
and then they were like, well, like if you could
negotiate a CBA, what would.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Be in it?
Speaker 3 (17:05):
And our stance all along and continues to be the
arena was an existential threat.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
It would have destroyed our community.
Speaker 3 (17:13):
There is nothing that we can negotiate for because they
would never have to pay a dime ount because our
community would have been gone.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
So what is the point? So they said, well, like
if you could dream about what could stop that?
Speaker 3 (17:27):
So we put together like a three hundred and fifty
million dollars CBA. Because we went around and we estimated
what would it cost the businesses, you know, to lose business.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
A third of the year.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
What would it cost, you know, for elderly to be
able to figure out how to get to their doctor
that they can talk to if they don't live in
this community and the bus lines can't run, what would
it cost? You know, we tried, you know, how do
you put a price tag on your grandmother?
Speaker 2 (17:57):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Like, we did what we could. We put together a
package city council. Some of our allies tried to submit
that it did not go through, but that's what we
ended up doing.
Speaker 8 (18:13):
And key parts of your strategy were slowing it down
right and then influencing public opinion, kind of like that
shame aspect that you're talking about, but making that like.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
A citywide movement.
Speaker 7 (18:27):
Can you talk about that?
Speaker 8 (18:28):
I also know that you must have had I know
you had so many people coming at you and saying,
how can I help?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
How can I help? How did you.
Speaker 8 (18:35):
Create inroads and grow this to a citywide movement and
create avenues for new people to engage.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
Well, we benefited from the fact that this was an arena,
and so even people that don't care about politics and
never would care about Chinatown, they heard about it like
they'd heard it.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
In sports radio. They heard it like all the bros
were talking about it.
Speaker 3 (18:58):
So at least it wasn't like some of our communities
that are facing displacement like you see town homes.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
It's hard to get that kind of.
Speaker 3 (19:05):
Global, city wide knowledge of what's happening.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
So we did benefit from that.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
We benefited from the fact that we are the only
solid geographical Asian enclave in the Tri state area. So,
like you know, there may be fifty small black communities
in Philadelphia facing displacement, there's only one Asian one because
that's the only one we got.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
We also benefited from our history of these.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
Massive fights that we've had for over sixty years, so
that helped us in terms of raising public awareness, in
terms of waising public support, we again went back to
old school stuff and I was like, well, we got
to find out who else is going to be impacted
by this. So we started reaching out to surrounding neighborhoods
(19:56):
and educating though, because if it wasn't right in your backyard,
you're not thinking about it. But we were able to
get a hold of some traffic studies and things like that.
We were able to use those to educate communities.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
No, no, no, no, no, you're going.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
To be affected by this too, and this is how
you'll be affected. And slowly we built the coalition. This
coalition became so large and we had spin off organizations
that we built. One of the first ones was BOCK,
which is Students for the Preservation of Chinatown. So that
was when I went to Helen's daughter and my daughter,
who were very good friends, and I said, Okay, you
(20:33):
all are in college. Your job organize a college students
And they were like Tarren's like Auntie, Daddy, I'm busy.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
The guy was like mom in the winter, I'm like,
you went to school at SAX, you are.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
Organizing this city. And so they went out. They did
the student organizing. In doing that, they did teachings in
high schools and then they helped mentor high school students
who built SASA students against the Sixes Arena. They had
their own high school group. We went to Washington Square West,
the neighborhood did the South of US. They created No
(21:08):
Arena Wash West. We went to the gagborhood, which is
right next to the Wash West, said you're going to
be affected too. They created No Arena Gaborhood. We went
to Thomas Jefferson University, which is the only Level one
trauma center for this entire area of the city, and
we said, yo, your ambulances are not going to get through.
So then doctors and the nurses created No Arena jeff
(21:31):
and we just like kept at it. We kept building
building building till we had this massive coalition. We did
have one organization that we built called No Arena in
Chinatown Solidarity NACIS that would have monthly meetups and anyone
that wanted to volunteer for the arena could come once
(21:54):
a month to the school and.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
There'd be a workshop and we would update them. This
is where we are.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
Now Here's five thousand ways that you can get involved.
And we had all these different committees. You can do
the Outreach committee, so you can table, you can petition,
you can go get postcards signed. We had an art
hive that would do art builds for our demonstrations. We
had acquire that. Nowhere ren acquire. We sang our city
(22:20):
council testimony. We had like my brain child, my baby
is the research hive. There was so much research I
had to come out of this thing. What's the tax
breaks coming down here? What does the technical drawings look like?
And the research hive is this hive of very introverted,
wonky people who like never get involved with stuff because
(22:43):
they're like very introverted. And they were like they found
their people and they went crazy. They really turned out
the research.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
And by the way, all these groups that I have
just mentioned, they are still meeting.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
The research high I've like basically says to all community
groups like Philly, Thrive has worked with them because they're like,
could you find people to analyze as water report that
Hilko is doing And the hive is like, we're on it.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So any of y'all from Philly.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
Like, I don't know if they hive as much choice
beyond that, but if you have stuff that you need.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
Research, they'll do it. If they don't know it, they
find people, So yeah, I think what's what stands at?
Like they found community amongst themselves.
Speaker 8 (23:28):
Yeah, see smaller factions and then that's also made them
sustainable in a way too, and they want to just be.
Speaker 7 (23:33):
Around people who are values aligned and do research.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
For After the break, Debbie explained how the fight did
(24:00):
not end with stopping the arena and why building community
power between crises is so important, and she closes with
one of my favorite moments that's ever happened at a
Vanguard conference, and it's a reminder that culture, tradition, and
even a shared song can help hold a neighborhood together.
(24:23):
Welcome back. We've talked about the strategy organizers used to
fight the development of a massive sports arena, but there's
also a different kind of force behind Chinatown's fight, the softer,
everyday power that grows from years of connection and shared history.
Here's DEBI.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
I think what Chinatown has done here, which is kind
of like soft power, you know, to stop predatory.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Development, like We have a saying in AAU is that you.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
Fight the things you don't want, but the build the
things you do want. So when there's a lull, you
got to look around your community say.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Like we needed public school, so we built it.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Like the SPACK and SASA students, even in the middle
of the fight, they listen to the elders saying, you know,
you got to build what you want, and they said,
we don't have a third space for young people. So
in the middle of the arena fight, these two youth
organizations opened up a third space for young people. But
like it's something that's ingrained in the community, and that
kind of stuff is is I think like some of
(25:26):
the strongest medicine against predatory development, because you need to
people to be united. Like if you don't want people
to sell out on a deal, they need to be united,
and they are united because they have relationships with each other.
So really being really thoughtful about how do we spend
(25:47):
time building consciously a sense of community because capitalism hates
community and so I can't emphasize enough like this this
sort of intangible the stuff that money can't buy, is
this stuff to attend to because that is the stuff
(26:08):
that befuddeles developers.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Because they're going to say, how much do you want
for this? And you're going to say it's priceless.
Speaker 4 (26:16):
That idea that some things can't be bought or bargained
over is also something China Town learn from other movements
across the city.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
I got to say, like, the black community has taught us,
so I would not underestimate the power of the history
of black movement.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
I think.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Certainly this history of like a sixty year history of
resistance has built a playbook and a sense of fortitude
and a sense of tradition that maybe when I talk
about the soft power stuff is where I'm thinking, like,
how do we build this citywide? How do we build
a sense of resistance that becomes like when our kids
(27:01):
are growing up, it's like they learn certain things. They
get a red envelope of Chinese New Year, they eat
a mooncake on mid Autumn festival, and they pick up
a damn picket sign when your community's under attack, it's.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
Just inevitable, right, Like it is inevitable.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Our kids were marching against the casino when they were
like what five and six years old, and then they
went on to found Bock so I think there is
like this trajectory of tradition that we need to make.
The space for intergenerational connection that I think is like
I think we've always done it, all communities have done it,
(27:39):
but it's gotten fractured.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Right, we have to educate our children.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
Our work in Chinatown, a lot of our work is
on coalition. Why they need to care about the rest
of the city, why they need to be in coalition
with the rest of the city. I don't think it's
on any single one community, but I think it's on
all of us to.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Really figure out how we build.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
This sense of like collective resistance, and then within our
own communities, how do we build this inner generation or resistance.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
That that will stand the tust at Pine.
Speaker 4 (28:16):
That long term view matters, because Debbie says, the community
is concerned that fight in Chinatown isn't finished. Development could
be on the way. So now is one of those
times when it's important to build up soft power.
Speaker 3 (28:32):
But I did want to do one last thing, and
I asked permission to do this because I wanted to
do a soft power thing that we do and I
kind of feel like I here at facts when you're here.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
But also when you're with the arena movement, you cannot
not do this.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
So we're going to sing because singing is like one
of our strongest soft powers. I know. They want to
teach you a movement song that's really short, but it's
something that we are elders taught us to do and
then we somehow forgot to do.
Speaker 10 (28:59):
So we chant.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
But you get tired when you chant, Like, singing is
so much better. So I'm gonna teach you one of
our songs that we sing.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
And it goes like I'll sing it once and then
I'll have I'll have you follow me. It goes like this,
I have not come here alone. I carry my people
in my bones. I have not come here alone. If
(29:28):
you listen, you can hear them in my soul. Okay,
this is like we'll give you power when you're not
feeling power. So this is an example of the soft
power I'm talking about.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
So sing after me.
Speaker 3 (29:43):
I have not come here alone. I carry my people
in my bones, people in my.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
I have not come here alone.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
I have not long here alone.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
If you listen, you can hear them in my soul.
You can hear them in my soul. So I know
you're gonna feel this, so let's do it all together.
I have not come here alone.
Speaker 10 (30:29):
I carry my people in my bowls.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
I have not come here alone. If you listen, you
can hear them in my soul. One more time.
Speaker 10 (30:45):
I have not come here alone. I carry my people
my bowes. I have not come here alone. Ooh, miss
you listen, you can hear them in my soul.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
We hope you enjoyed this episode of Next City show
about change makers and their stories. Together we can spread
good ideas from one city to the next city. Thank
you for listening this week and for coming along with
us to Philly as part of the Vanguard Conference. I
should note that while the conference is over, our work
in Philly is not. Next City is partnering with Resolve
Philly and Germantown Info Hub on a year long reporting fellowship,
(31:49):
made possible with support from the Knight Foundation, So stay tuned.
Thank you to our guests, Council Member Helen Ghim, Debbie
Way of Asian Americans United, and Emily Rizzo of Kensington Voice.
If you want more of our coverage on antidisplacement strategies,
sign up for our newest newsletter, The Pushback. Visit nexcity
dot org slash the pushback to get updates. Our audio
(32:09):
producer is Slavona Alcala. Our show producers Maggie Bowles. Our
executive producer is Ryan Tillotson, and I'm Lucas Gridley, Executive
director for Next City. By the way, next City is
a news organization with a nonprofit model. If you like
what we're doing here, please consider pitching in to support
our work. Visit nexcity dot org slash membership to make
a donation. We'd love to hear any feedback from our listeners.
Please feel free to email us at info atnexcity dot
(32:32):
org and if you haven't already, subscribe to the show
on Apple, Spotify, good Pods, or anywhere you listen to
your podcasts.
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