San Jose City Councilmembers unanimously voted Tuesday to adopt a resolution to apologize to Chinese immigrants and their descendants for the city’s role in systemic racism and oppression, and the 1887 Chinatown destruction.District 3 Councilmember Raul Peralez said he believes the resolution is a profound moment for San Jose.
District 3 includes San Jose Downtown, encompassing various neighborhoods, San Jose State, the SAP Center at West Santa Clara Street and Barack Obama Boulevard and the Mineta San Jose International Airport, according to its website.
“This is not actually our first time acknowledging our mistakes to the Chinese community,” Peralez said. “There was a plaque there in the Fairmont Hotel to honor that but we have not done a formal resolution.”
The Fairmont hotel is located on South Market Street, three blocks adjacent to San Jose State’s main campus.
Peralez said it'll be important to continue recalling this effort, both with Fairmont’s plaque and this resolution.
Since the 1800s, San Jose has hosted five Chinatowns: First Market Street Chinatown (1866-70), Vine Street Chinatown (1870-72), Second Market Street Chinatown (1872-87), Woolen Mills Chinatown (1887-1902) and Heinlenville (1887-1931), according to its Tuesday memorandum.
The most well-known Chinatown, Second Market Street, collapsed from deliberate arson in 1887 after city councilmembers unanimously declared the site a public nuisance and ordered it’s removal, according to the same memorandum.
The removal was to make way for the reconstruction of a new city hall and led to the destruction of homes and businesses that displaced more than 1,400 San Jose Chinese community members, according to the memorandum.
Connie Young Yu, board emeritus of the Chinese Historical Society of America, is a descendent of kin who lived through two different Chinatowns in San Jose.
Young Yu, a local historian and author of “Chinatown, San Jose, USA,” said she’s glad the resolution includes that the city was responsible for policies that stopped the Chinese community from rebuilding after the Second Market Street Chinatown Fire.
“My grandfather never expressed bitterness for the hardships that his kin suffered during the [Second] Market Street Fire. I felt all these years, anger, an annoying sense of injustice and something unresolved,” Young Yu said. “Until now, a weight has been lifted from my shoulders and I'd like to say it was a superb experience working with Chris Cambises [San Jose’s immigrant affairs manager].”
Gerrye Wong, Chinese Historical and Cultural Project and the Chinese American Historical Museum cofounder, spoke before the council about passing the resolution.
“I helped form the Chinese Historical and Cultural Project that rebuilt the historic Ng Shing Gung Temple [that’s inside the museum],” Wong said. “We presented it to the city of San Jose in 1991 as a token of friendship from the Chinese community to be placed as part of San Jose’s history.”
The Chinese American Historical Museum is located at 635 Phelan Ave.
“In recognition of this ongoing friendship and acknowledgement of the city’s past, I ask the city today to adopt this long-needed resolution of apology which will be a significant part of today’s Chinese American history.”
The city will hold a ceremony of apology to the Chinese community from noon to 1 p.m. Wednesday in Circle of Palms Plaza, which is across from Plaza de César Chávez on South Market Street between West San Fernando and San Carlos streets.
