Let’s say no to the Sixers arena plan, which threatens to gentrify Chinatown into extinction

A century and a half ago, Chinese immigrants in Philadelphia began building a community in an area of the city that was far from desirable.

As anti-Chinese violence pushed Asians out of other neighborhoods, Chinatown started to take shape and provided a sense of safety and belonging to those who would come to call it home. From that beginning, Chinese Americans have built a strong, vibrant community, which today is home to 4,000 residents, two elementary schools, four churches, two temples, senior citizen centers, day cares, and more than 150 small businesses.

All of that, plus 150 years of history, would be in jeopardy if the Sixers arena is allowed to proceed. The developers’ proposal is hardly the first time our community has faced this kind of existential threat — or heard hollow promises about the rewards of development.

When the Pennsylvania Convention Center was built in the early 1990s, and 200 people lost their homes, our community was told that the new facility would bring an influx of customers to our shops and restaurants. On the contrary, neighborhood businesses tell us that every time there is a large convention, revenue drops because regular patrons have no desire to contend with traffic in the area.

When a new baseball stadium for the Phillies was proposed in 2000, we were told that project was the only way to revive what was then the largely dormant northern end of our community. In the shadow of what would have been a baseball stadium, we have built a school, a church annex, a temple, and two cultural centers.

Chinatown has already lost 25% of its land over the past 50 years to the Vine Street Expressway, Market East, and the Convention Center. In the past two decades alone, we have had to fight against the construction of a federal prison, a proposed baseball stadium, and two planned casinos. Chinatown still exists because we fight for it.

The proposed arena project has been marked with bad faith since its inception. Many members of our community found out about the proposal through a press release. In December, developers tried to sneak through shady legislation to fast-track the arena (using language written by the arena developers’ attorney). We found it, mobilized, and stopped it.

Ever since, the developers’ representatives have failed to adequately address residents’ concerns about how six years of demolition and construction would harm the environment, burden small businesses, displace longtime community members, increase traffic jams, and shrink available parking. Even a recent pro-arena letter to the editor written by the project’s architects offered more questions than answers.

The developers claim to have held dozens of Chinatown meetings, but still haven’t released who they met with, or when.

The developers told us they studied the arena project that decimated Washington, D.C.’s Chinatown, and will not make those same mistakes if this arena project advances. But they still haven’t answered what they studied, what they found, what mistakes were made, or how they’d avoid those pitfalls.

The developers have talked about a $50 million community benefits agreement to be funded by the Sixers, but that wouldn’t even begin to repair the harms the arena would cause. Those kinds of agreements, particularly in relation to communities impacted by arenas, have proven to be a Trojan horse. No amount of money is worth selling out our community.

The Sixers started their promotional campaign for the arena in our community by claiming they want to “be a great neighbor,” but when Chinatown’s opposition became clear (one local poll found that more than 90% of residents, business owners, and visitors oppose the project), they pivoted to the claim that “the arena isn’t in Chinatown.” The truth is the northern wall of the arena will sit flush with the southernmost homes and businesses in our community.

The developers’ claims of “job creation” make little sense. Any temporary construction jobs created will exist no matter where the arena is built. The jobs within the arena walls already exist at the Sixers’ current home at the Wells Fargo Center in South Philadelphia — workers there will simply be moved to the Market East location, or have their hours inconveniently split between the two arenas. And over time, as demolition, construction congestion, traffic, and streets full of sports fans descend on one of the last working-class communities of color in Center City, Chinatown will all but disappear.

Hundreds of family-sustaining businesses in Chinatown will be replaced by part-time, seasonal, low-wage jobs, while the bulk of the profits returns to the developers, not workers. We know this because the data on arenas is abundantly clear: According to one report, which examined 130 studies over 30 years, there is little to no economic gain to cities from sports venues. Ten years after construction, the report found, housing supply and vacancy rates in those cities increased within a one-mile radius of the venues, but median property values in other parts of those communities remained flat.

Just as damning: The developers claim that their current home, the Wells Fargo Center — which opened in 1996 — is obsolete. Using that timeline, the proposed arena will be too old to use in 25 years, at which point they will tear it down. And by then, Chinatown will have been gentrified into extinction.

The three developers behind the arena would have you believe they are a bunch of Philly bros who care about sports. But everyone can see through that. Citywide opposition to the arena is growing as students, restaurants and small businesses, Chinatown lovers, Sixers fans, and everyday Philadelphians watch the developers try to force the arena project on a community that doesn’t want it.

We’ve already seen how drab, giant construction projects like the Fashion District and the Convention Center harm the bustling commercial corridors like Chinatown that make our city special. We should take the time as a city to study what the best practices are in urban revitalization around the globe, and build a plan for Market East that makes the best use of this vital piece of land while preserving precious places.

Debbie Wei is a founder of Asian Americans United, the annual Chinatown Mid-Autumn Festival and the FACT Charter School, located in Chinatown.