Chinatown residents loudly denounce Sixers arena proposal at contentious meeting

Loud cascades of boos, shouts, and catcalls rained upon a 76ers representative from more than 200 people who packed a Chinatown restaurant Wednesday night to question and criticize the team’s plan for a $1.3 billion arena on Market Street.

“My name is David Gould … ,” began the chief diversity and impact officer for Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, which owns and operates the team.

“Boo! Boo!” came the cries.

He tried to go forward. “What we announced in July was a proposal … an idea.”

“Don’t do it!” people shouted back. “Bad idea!”

Organized by a coalition of more than 20 community organizations, including Asian Americans United (AAU) and the sports organization the Philadelphia Suns, the gathering at Ocean Harbor restaurant was billed as the first open, public community meeting on the arena after months of small, closed-door discussions arranged by the Sixers. To many who attended, the meeting showed that while the Sixers have insisted some Chinatown community members are open to the arena, the majority of the neighborhood is vehemently opposed.

“People are very frustrated about the developer continuing to promote their proposal without thinking about Chinatown people’s anger,” said Wei Chen, the civic engagement director of AAU.

Gould said the team is sensitive to the harms that Chinatown has suffered for 50 years, from the neighborhood losing property to the Vine Street Expressway and the Convention Center, to beating back plans for a Phillies baseball stadium, casino, and federal prison.

But Chen said it’s impossible for the team to understand the importance this neighborhood holds to a community trying to preserve its heritage and culture across generations.

“Every time they say they can understand our trauma, it’s just making our community members more angry,” Chen said. “Chinatown is our home. Think about the next 10 years, the next 15 years — Chinatown is going to die because of this proposal.”

Questions flew in Mandarin, Cantonese, and English about how the arena would affect traffic, safety, parking, businesses, and housing costs in a community that dates to 1870, when a man named Lee Fong started a laundry at 913 Race St. For decades Chinatown has been a gateway for immigrants and the cultural heart of the Philadelphia region’s Asian community, a role threatened by gentrification and disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Wednesday, people repeatedly called for fair, formal studies of how the neighborhood would be affected by the construction of an arena on its southern edge.

Gould insisted that the Sixers would address concerns raised by Chinatown residents — and by people in nearby neighborhoods — as plans moved forward. He said that the team wants the project to benefit the city as a whole and that because the arena would take part of the Fashion District Philadelphia, the mall formerly known as the Gallery, the use of that space amounted to “replacing one big box with another.”

If the Sixers did not build at that location, specifically the footprint from 10th to 11th Streets, Market to Filbert, someone else would, he said.

But many in attendance walked away dissatisfied with Gould’s answers.

“The Sixers did not answer the question,” said Yuming Wang, honorary chairman of the Pennsylvania United Chinese Coalition. “It seemed to me they did not do any study before they wanted to start the project. So they were not able to give us good answers.”

Community members said that if Gould and the developers cared about their concerns, they would take the proposal elsewhere. Gould did not directly answer when asked whether the Sixers would consider other locations if a majority of the community opposed the arena.

Gould insisted over cries and shouts that the team was listening to Chinatown residents and that while those at the meeting might be opposed, others in the neighborhood were ready to consider the project.

“Communities are not monoliths,” he said.

» READ MORE: A developer said Chinatown is ‘positive-to-neutral’ on the Sixers arena. Not so, say community members.

After nearly 90 minutes, Chen announced from the stage that Gould and Leslie Smallwood-Lewis, the founder of Mosaic Development Partners, who faced similar hostility when she spoke, were going to leave after taking two last questions.

They departed, trailed by shouts of “F– you!” and a roaring, repeated chant of “Hands off Chinatown!”

“Clearly the room last night represented a group of shareholders that have serious concerns about the project,” Gould said Thursday, reiterating that others want to learn more about it. “Overall we would have liked the opportunity to speak more and not get cut off and answer questions.”

He left, he said, believing that the questions were starting to stray off topic.

City Councilmember Mark Squilla, whose district includes Chinatown, answered questions through the evening at the Ocean Harbor restaurant. He said no authorizing legislation would move from his office unless community members had a chance to review it first.

After repeated questions, Gould ultimately answered that the Sixers would do the same. The pledges came after an under-the-radar bill proposed at a City Council meeting last week, which would have freed up more land in the area where the 76ers hope to open the arena in 2031.

The 76ers say a Center City arena would bring jobs, vitality, and business, boosting a Market Street East corridor that has struggled for revival and injecting millions of dollars of economic power into the area. To many in Chinatown, however, the proposal represents only the latest in a half-century of big development projects that have consumed land, homes, and energy — and threatens to erase the cultural vibrancy of the neighborhood.

“My question is really simple,” Clayton Prince, a Philadelphia-born actor known for the movie Hairspray and other credits, said from the floor Wednesday. “Why can’t you guys stay where you are?”

The team has said it wants to control its own space and scheduling, difficult while it shares the Wells Fargo Center in South Philadelphia with the Flyers, Wings indoor lacrosse, and other events.

“It’s important for us that it’s a benefit overall for the city,” Gould said in an interview before the Wednesday meeting. “We need to figure out what that looks like and do that.”

» READ MORE: Big projects like the Sixers’ arena plan have often threatened Philly’s Chinatown. But the AAPI community always fights for the neighborhood.

At the same time, he said, the Chinatown of today is not the Chinatown of 2019 — before the COVID-19 pandemic hurt restaurants and businesses. An arena studded with new retail spaces could help draw customers, he said.

The project is to be privately funded.

Gould said Sixers representatives have met some 30 times with Chinatown community leaders, elders, and business organizations to build relationships and hear feedback.

“This,” someone shouted at him as anger rose Wednesday, “is your feedback!”