Chinese Staff and Workers Association

Please donate now to support the workers laid off from Jing Fong and their efforts to stop displacement in NYC's Chinatown and Lower East Side!

On March 7, 2021, the iconic Jing Fong Restaurant in New York City’s Chinatown, closed its dining hall which hosted over 10,000 patrons a week before the COVID 19 pandemic. In the process it laid off over 170 workers many who were represented by the 318 Restaurant Workers Union. The restaurant owners told members of the Union that the landlord, Alex Chu and Jonathan Chu, forced them to give up the lease and vacate the dining room at 20 Elizabeth Street so the landlord could pursue their plans to redevelop the property.

The laid off workers of Jing Fong recognize that the restaurant's closure is much more than the loss of their jobs but it is also about the larger issue of displacement that is slowly destroying the community where many of them live and work. Chinatown and the Lower East Side have been facing extreme displacement pressures over the last few years forcing out long term, low and middle income residents, and many family owned small businesses. Despite the anxiety created by the loss of their jobs, the laid off workers of Jing Fong have taken a stand to demand the reopening of the iconic dining hall and to hold those promoting displacement accountable to the people who live and work in the Chinatown/Lower East Side community.

Please donate to support the laid off workers of Jing Fong Restaurant as they intensify their efforts to reopen the dining hall at 20 Elizabeth Street, in what has been described as the heart of the Chinatown economy. Your donation will provide important financial support to the laid off workers as they expand their pickets from twice weekly to five times per week. Your donations will help stem the forces of displacement threatening the survival of New York City’s historic Chinatown and Lower East Side.