Asian American activists denounced the City of Chicago’s proposed $95 million dollars for a police training facility in one of the biggest celebrations in the Asian American community.
Asian American community activists are marching in the annual Lunar New Year Parade demanding the City of Chicago (“the City”) allocate its planned $95 million funding for a police training facility to instead fund schools. The Lunar New Year Parade is one of the biggest celebrations in many Asian American communities.
“We are here to talk to Chinatown residents about how our City is spending $95 million on a police academy while many of our neighborhoods need schools,” says i2i Core Leader Kristina Tendilla, “All over the city communities are asking to keep their high schools or for the city to build new ones. Instead of competing with each other for funding, we need to look at how the city is prioritizing money and insist that they invest in our communities,” she stated.
Sunday, February 25, 2018, at 1:00PM – 2:00PM | Chinatown Lunar New Year Parade, Wentworth Ave, Chicago, Illinois
Over several years, residents in the Chinatown community have advocated for a high school that serves students in Chinatown, Bridgeport, Armour Square, and the surrounding neighborhoods with an expanding Asian American community. However, in the last year the City, the Chicago Public School (“CPS”), and the Chicago Board of Education (“BOE”) have caused tension between communities with a proposal to shut down the New Teacher Academy (“NTA”), a successful elementary school, to convert the school into a South Loop High School to serve a small part of Chinatown.
Parents and students in Chinatown and its surrounding areas are unwilling to support a proposal to close NTA, which will displace hundreds of elementary school students. Meanwhile, the City, CPS, and the BOE have claimed limited resources preventing them from sufficiently funding all schools, including plans to shut down high schools in Englewood. Advocates point to the contradiction of the lack of funds for these efforts while the city spends $95 million on a police academy.
WHO: Asian American community activists, including Invisible to Invincible (“i2i”): Asian/Pacific Islander Pride of Chicago, DOPE Asian American Pacific Islanders (“DOPE AAPI”), and Asian American residents in Chinatown and Uptown, and supporters of the #NoCopAcademy campaign.
