View Margaret's video on NBC New York
Thank you for all your support on September 15. Without you, I will not be able to achieve victory. But, the journey has not ended yet. We still need your vote and support for the general election. Please vote for me in the general election on November 3, 2009!
Endorsed By:
Dear Friends:
Welcome to my website. Here you will learn why I am running for City Council and how you can be a part of my campaign.
Council District 1 is diversity: Tribeca and Little Italy. SoHo and Chinatown. NoHo and the Lower East Side. Battery Park City and the Financial District. South Street Seaport and the Village. And of course, City Hall. In a small part of the city, our district has all the elements that make New York City great.
However, many who built and preserved the character of District 1 are moving away because of skyrocketing rents, and many are presently in danger of losing their housing. Some of my local favorites such as Socrates Diner in Tribeca and Sweet n’ Tart in Chinatown are closed. The Strand Bookstore on Fulton Street will also close soon. District 1 has a collection of great neighborhoods to live in and raise children but has given way to noisy bars, constant construction, traffic jams, broken sidewalks, overcrowded schools and out of scale developments.
I am running for City Council again because I feel very strongly that New York City should not be a place just for the wealthy and that our government should be accountable and accessible to its people. We ought to be able to afford to live in the neighborhoods that we helped to build. I want to be your council member because I know our city can have superior education for our children and quality care for our elderly. I will fight for District One’s preservation in today’s environment of overdevelopment and will prevent the displacement of residents who contribute to its diversity and vitality. I grew up in Chinatown. My husband, Alan Tung, and I live in the Financial District, and we raised our son, Kevin, here. I am your neighbor, and I understand your problems at a personal level.
For more than 30 years, I have dedicated my life to public service. I was a teacher and a college administrator. I understand that to improve our current educational system, we need to increase parental involvement, decrease class size, make our school buildings physically safe and establish more ESL and bilingual services for immigrant students. As a director of a not-for-profit organization, Asian Americans for Equality, we worked together with the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) to strengthen housing codes and help preserve and build hundreds of units of affordable housing. We successfully worked with the New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR) to protect tenants from unscrupulous landlords. Working together with the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), we helped tenants fight against discrimination through enforcement of fair housing laws. We also helped tenant leaders to preserve their Project Based Section 8 buildings by getting owners to extend their contracts with HUD. As previous members of Community Boards 1 and 3, I strongly believe in the importance of community engagement in decision making. Because of my experience and dedication, I will be a strong voice for tenants, the elderly, parents, students, immigrants and small businesses.
I want your vote as well as your input and active participation. Together we can make District 1 a great place to live and raise our families. Together we can change how our local government operates so that we, the people, are listened to. I am excited about the change to come and look forward to meeting and working with you on the campaign trail.
Sincerely,
Margaret S. Chin
