Asian business districts hope for recovery after shutdown, racist attacks

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• Hari Sreenivasan:

  Before the COVID-19 pandemic forced many non-essential businesses to close in March 2020, New York's Chinatown business districts were already beginning to see a steep decline in sales due to coronavirus fears and a reduction of tourists.

  The financial hit was made worse by a disturbing increase in reports of anti-Asian hate crimes, which have spiked in recent months.

  NewsHour Weekend's Laura Fong visited businesses that have started to fully reopen again in Manhattan's historic Flushing district in Queens, home to the largest population of Asian residents in the city.

• Laura Fong:

  A year ago, Manhattan's Chinatown looked like this, but now, it's starting to come to life again.

  Restaurant owner Johnny Liu is thrilled he can fully reopen indoor dining.

  For 33 years, Golden Unicorn has been a popular dim sum parlor for large gatherings and a meet-up spot for locals and out-of-town visitors alike.

• Johnny Liu:

  Friends come here to have tea and chat. We do wedding parties and birthday parties. So many people unite here and socialize and meet friends.

• Laura Fong:

  But the COVID-19 crisis and citywide shutdown of indoor dining and other establishments forced many businesses to close for good. Golden Unicorn saw a dramatic 90 percent drop in revenue in the first few months of the pandemic. The two-story restaurant depended heavily on parties in its event space.

  Without that revenue, Liu rented a new space at the street level to pivot to a take-out business and in July, set up an outdoor dining space following strict protocols, hoping to stem the losses.

  But some Chinatown businesses are closing earlier than pre-pandemic times, in part because of the uptick in violent incidents targeting Asians.

  Forty seven anti-Asian hate crimes have been confirmed by the New York City police department in the first few months of 2021. That's an increase from 33 last year.

• Laura Fong:

  Have anti Asian attacks created an environment where people are scared to go out after night?

• Johnny Liu:

  Yes, because for many people who come to work, they live in Brooklyn and Staten Island, because, they use the subway at night. For attacks against Asians, I think it is a major cause. Employees are also worried that if they go back too late, they fear being attacked.

• Laura Fong:

  Indoor dining was reopened to 100 percent capacity on May 19th , but one of two dining floors at Golden Unicorn has largely sat empty.

  When do you think this will be filled again?

• Johnny Liu:

  Maybe August?

• Laura Fong:

  August.

• Laura Fong:

  In the meantime, two forgivable loans from the Small Business Administration's Paycheck Protection Program, known as PPP, have become a lifeline for the restaurant.

• Johnny Liu:

  Because our PPP was approved for the first time and the second time, it allowed us to survive. Sixty percent of the PPP can pay employees' wages, and there are 40 percent that you can use to pay rent and electricity and water bills, so we can maintain the operation.

• Laura Fong:

  The effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on Asian business owners has been acute. A Federal Reserve survey found that 93 percent of Asian business owners nationwide reported a decline in sales last year. And according to a McKinsey analysis, Asian-owned businesses make up a large percentage of hard-hit sectors: 25 percent of food and accommodation services and 16 percent of retail.

  Unlike Golden Unicorn, many small businesses were left out of the first round of the paycheck protection program.

  Jonnel Doris is commissioner of New York City's department of Small Business Services. The agency connects business owners to PPP loans, as well as city-funded loans and grants.

• Jonnel Dorris:

  The PPP program brought about $25 billion into the city as of January of this year. But we still saw that we were still missing based upon the number of businesses and the number of employees, about $3 billion that did not come into the city.

• Laura Fong:

  Do you think that there should be any particular funds designated for Asian-owned businesses that have struggled?

• Jonnel Doris:

  We saw of course an increase in hate crimes. I've personally walked corridors and in our Chinatown districts across the city and spoke to those business owners and heard from them personally about what it meant, the struggle that they're dealing with, one on the economic side, but also just being subject to racism and xenophobia. We have helped and assisted over 700 or so grants and loans to our small businesses in the Asian-American areas and zip codes around the city to $10.4 million

• Thomas Yu:

  We think hundreds and hundreds of businesses closed. You still see that walking through the streets.

• Laura Fong:

  Thomas Yu is co-executive director of Asian Americans for Equality, a nonprofit that has existing relationships with Asian-owned businesses, and helped facilitate PPP and other loans across the city.

• Thomas Yu:

  We have many loan counselors and officers that speak many different languages and dialects from our borrowers in our communities. And we were asking a lot of city agencies and banks to put money in this pool, and get it out the door as quickly as possible. But even that took forever. It didn't happen right away.

• Laura Fong:

  Unlike Manhattan's Chinatown, that relies heavily on tourists for some of its business; across the river in Queens, the Asian businesses here depend mainly on the local community.

• Ron Kim:

  Flushing, Queens is one of the most diverse, if not the most diverse neighborhood in the entire country. We have over 120 languages spoken here.

• Laura Fong:

  New York State Assemblymember Ron Kim represents a large part of Flushing.

  An analysis of Small Business Administration data showed one Flushing zip code had New York City's lowest proportion of eligible businesses receive PPP funding last year.

• Ron Kim:

  There was a distrust of the federal government, there wasn't that much communication and an effort to make accessible the loans to applications, how it works in our own different languages and also those bureaucratic layers. The loans were more structured for traditional type of companies and left the mom and pop immigrant and small businesses behind.

• Laura Fong:

  The latest round of PPP funding, under the Biden administration, prioritized smaller businesses, as well as women and minority business owners, who were largely underserved in the first two rounds of funding.

  One of the largest Asian indoor malls in the U.S. is located in downtown Flushing. Retail stores partially reopened in September, and the popular indoor food court is starting to see a return of customers.

  William Shao is Vice President of New World Mall. He said many retail shops have been able to return with the help of federal PPP loans and city assistance.

• William Shao:

  We've been closed for a while. Lifting the restrictions have been helpful. A lot of people have been vaccinated and a lot of people have come out without the fear of getting COVID.

• Laura Fong:

  Assemblymember Kim said the direct stimulus checks and the latest round of federal funding is crucial to jumpstarting the local economy. But in the long term, Kim says progressive taxation policies are needed to fill gaps.

  New York State lawmakers recently passed a tax increase on individuals making over $1 million in annual income, which is expected to raise an extra $4.3 billion per year.

• Ron Kim:

  We want sustainable revenue that's going to go to our schools, that's going to go to our social programs and all the things that matter, public infrastructure, public housing that needs help, that needs consistent revenue streams.

• Laura Fong:

  Back in Manhattan's historic Chinatown, Thomas Yu thinks the future will depend on bringing in new types of business.

• Thomas Yu:

  We can think about an arts economy, education based economy that could bring people back in other ways, especially other second generation, third generation Asian-Americans, that if they didn't want to be coming back for food or the occasional visit, they need something more constant to come back for.

• Laura Fong:

  Johnny Liu is optimistic Golden Unicorn will rebound.

• Johnny Liu:

  I like to do this kind of business in dining, that is why I do this business. I like the lively atmosphere because I feel very happy, it means I enjoy my job.