<PREV <--> NEXT>

A Home For Diversity

By Angela Montefinise

When Michael Lau left China and came to Flushing in 1991, he had one goal: to make enough money to bring his wife Jane and his nine-year-old daughter Mary to America where they could make a better life together.

Lau rented a one-room apartment in the downtown area and soon found work as a cook in a small Chinese takeout restaurant. “Late hours,” he told the Tribune of the job. “Always late. I worked hard there. And I made little money.”

He learned English from a Chinese American who lived in his building. The rest of the apartments were mostly filled with Koreans.

“It was hard to speak to people. I knew no English, and everyone was [Korean]. So I took a class with a friend who spoke English. I learned enough to get a job as a waiter.”

Eventually, as a waiter in a more upscale Chinese restaurant in downtown Flushing, Lau made “much, much more money.” With the extra cash, he could move into a larger apartment.

As he worked diligently and saved his wages to bring his family to the country, he noticed the neighborhood around him changing: The Korean influence that had permeated the neighborhood when he first moved in slowly faded away, replaced by a Chinese one.

“Less Korean signs and more Chinese signs were here,” he said. “Things changed since 1991.”

In 1999, Lau’s daughter Mary came to America and learned English from the same friend that her father did.

“She learned much faster,” he said. “She’s smart, you know.”

One year later, Lau’s wife Jane moved to Queens and took a job at a garment factory in Long Island City to make money and she started learning English.

“When I came, we wanted to send Mary to school,” she said. “We needed more money, so I worked…Two buses! Two hours it would take to get there.”

This September, Mary – who went to Flushing High School for three years – started college at the University of Iowa, enrolled in pre-med classes.

Michael Lau is now a manager at a restaurant.

“It’s amazing, America,” he said. “Such chances here.”

As for Queens, Lau said with a smile, “We will never leave. This place is how we made it. We love it here.”

The story of the Laus is common in Queens, where thousands of immigrants have settled for better lives and to fulfill a dream.

Since the early 1990s, more and more immigrants have headed to Queens, creating enclaves of cultures that mix to make the borough the City’s most diverse and most unique.

Now, in our sundry quarter, every corner of the Earth is represented—sometimes on a single block.

From Astoria to Glen Oaks, no part of the borough has been untouched by the wave of immigration that has changed the sights, smells and look of Queens over the past 10 years.

Take a quick drive through the borough (or just buy a ticket for the 7 train and make some random stops): Queens’ foreign-born population has increased by 36 percent since 1990.

So we may as well get used to it; multiculturalism is a way of life for us, the more than two million people living in Queens.

To Census takers, that radical increase in foreign-born residents makes Queens an interesting case.

For the Lau family and thousands of other immigrants, that change simply makes Queens home.

DIVERSITY, BY THE NUMBERS
According to the last U.S. Census, taken in 2000, overall population in Queens increased from 1.95 million to 2.22 million people in the 1990s, with 46 percent of those people foreign-born.

The number of Hispanics increased from 381,120 to 556,605 and the number of Asians increased from 229,830 to 390,164. Those two groups—though broadly lumped together in the terms used by the Census—are the ethnicities that grew the most in Queens.

“Queens has, by far, the biggest foreign-born population in New York,” said New York Department of City Planning Population Division Director Joseph Salvo, who worked closely with the Census to compile New York City’s demographic information and spoke to the Tribune.

The areas of Queens with the most immigration, the biggest population and the greatest population increase included Jackson Heights, North Corona, Woodhaven, and Richmond Hill, according to Census statistics.
North Corona had a 31 percent population increase since 1990, and now has over 169,000 people living there.

The Woodhaven and Richmond Hill area experienced a 28.3 percent increase in population, and the population of Elmhurst and South Corona increased by 21.9 percent.

The area with the least population growth was the Rockaways, according to Census statistics. But the population still grew by six percent.

“There is a clear correlation between immigration and population increases in New York City,” Salvo told the Tribune. “In Queens, where immigration is the highest, we’ve seen the most changes in area population. In areas with extremely high immigration or migration, like Jackson Heights and particularly Richmond Hill, population increases were huge. Queens really stood out in the Census. The changes were fascinating.”

IT’S EVERYBODY’S BOROUGH
Salvo said he loves analyzing Queens’ demographics.

“[It’s] completely different than any other borough,” he said, referring to its ethnic diversity. “Clearly the most diverse in the City.”

He also explained that approximately one million new immigrants came to Queens since 1990, making almost half of Queens’ current population foreign-born.
“If you look at any one area in Queens, there is no ethnic group that dominates,” Salvo told the Tribune, his interest piqued speaking on the subject. “Even in Flushing, where there is a strong Asian presence, no one group is the dominant ethnicity. You know how many Asian groups there are? Chinese people only make up 15 percent of the area.

“It is conceivable that an area can have a large number of different ethnicities, but no diversity, because the groups stick together and don’t mix. That’s not the case in Queens at all. Southeast Queens may be primarily black and Flushing may be primarily Asian, but within those groups is tremendous diversity. I just love to look at Queens.”

United States Census Bureau Regional Director Tony Farthing—the man in charge of New York State’s Census count—agreed with Salvo, and told the Tribune that driving through the borough of Queens is like driving through a cross-section of the entire world.

“No one ethnic group stands out in any area,” Farthing said. “It’s a rarity.”

MEET YOUR NEIGHBORS
Salvo’s favorite area to look at in Queens is Jackson Heights.

“[It] is the most working class neighborhood for Germans and Italians,” he said. “And over the last 20 years, it has become a haven for a variety of immigrant groups. In Jackson Heights you still have pockets of working class European immigrants, you have blacks and Asians, and you have Hispanics, who come from a variety of countries. Many Mexicans are moving there from other parts of New York, as well as Dominicans and Puerto Ricans. The category of Hispanic doesn’t mean just one group. That group is diverse within itself.”

Census statistics for Community District 3 – which includes Jackson Heights and North Corona – show that 57.3 percent of the population is Hispanic – a major increase from 1990, when only 43 percent of the area was Hispanic.

The percentage of Asians also increased, mostly in the form of Indians and Pakistanis.

“There is a mix of Hispanic culture in Jackson Heights, and large numbers of Caribbean people,” Salvo said. “You can really find any ethnicity there.”

Bryan Pu-Folkes, the founder and executive director of New Immigrant Community Empowerment (NICE) – an immigrant advocacy group – was born in Jamaica, grew up in Flushing, and currently lives in East Elmhurst.

“I’ve seen a lot of changes in Western Queens,” he told the Tribune. “I’ve noticed that the old European populations are older. I’ve noticed that the younger people are Ecuadorian, Colombian, Puerto Rican and mostly South American.”

Besides an increase in the number of immigrants in the borough, ethnic groups have also shifted where they live from one area of Queens to another.

As Michael Lau pointed out, where there were once Koreans in Flushing, there are now Chinese immigrants. Where there were once Europeans in Jackson Heights, there are now Hispanics. Where there were once mainly whites in Bellerose, there are now South Asians. Queens has become a moving tapestry of traditions and customs, an ever-changing portrait of populations.

“You see Hispanics moving into areas like Maspeth, Glendale, Middle Village, Jackson Heights and Corona, which used to be havens for Italians,” Salvo said. “Germans, Irish and other working class immigrant populations. Those populations have moved East or out of New York State…We see Korean populations that used to live in Flushing moving further down Northern Boulevard to Douglaston and Little Neck. These people have been the country for several years, and are affluent enough to move.”

Besides internal population shifts, Salvo said there has been a tremendous amount of immigration from South Asia, the Caribbean and South America.”

The neighborhoods that show this the most are Woodhaven and Richmond Hill in Community District 9, according to Salvo.

“Those areas have seen unbelievable growth and a complete change in its population,” he said.

Census numbers show that in 1990, whites outnumbered Hispanics in the area two to one, and the Asian population was less than 10 percent.

Today, Hispanics outnumber whites, and the Asian population has doubled. City Planning’s online analysis of Census numbers said, “Community District 9 has achieved an unprecedented mix of population by race and ethnicity.”

“People from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are coming here, and they’re moving to Richmond Hill, Ozone Park and Woodhaven,” Salvo said. “That’s a major change for that area.”

Farthing mentioned that Bellerose’s population has also completely changed.
“That change was overnight,” he said. “In 1990, that area was almost all white. Now it’s mostly South Asian. Indians and Pakistani people have moved in and taken over the stores. It’s truly fascinating what happened there.”

In areas with older populations, like sections of Flushing and Eastern Queens, Salvo said there have been major ethnic shifts because people are either moving away—or passing away.

“In Douglaston,” Farthing told the Tribune, “we’re seeing whites leave for other places and seeing Koreans move in. This has to do with the fact that Koreans have been here a while, and have made enough money to move to the more upper-class areas.”
Salvo said the neighborhoods to watch over the next 5 years are Astoria and Long Island City.

“I think you’ll see the ethnic mix of Jackson Heights move over to those areas,” he said. “Their populations are already changing somewhat.”

QUIETER CULTURES
While several ethnic groups in Queens have experienced large growth spurts over the last 15 years, there are others that have remained relatively small in number.
But they’re still just as essential in making our borough the most ethnically diverse place on the planet.

These ethnic groups—from the Dutch to the Swedish, the Swiss to the Vietnamese—may not have clear dominant communities like the Chinese do in downtown Flushing and Hispanics do in Corona. But according to Salvo, they play a large role in the dynamics of the borough.

“The ethnic differences in Queens go way beyond solid groups,” he said. “The people in Queens are often descendents of those who came to America for a better life, and once they got it, moved to Queens for a more peaceful, suburban lifestyle.”
Several races and ancestries claim less than one percent of the total Queens population, which was counted at 2,229,379. Those groups include Vietnamese, Arab, Cuban, Czech, Danish, Dutch, French, French Canadian, Hungarian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Scotch-Irish, Scottish, Slovak, Swedish, Swiss, Ukrainian, and Welsh.

“This is what makes Queens so interesting,” Salvo said. “There’s a little bit of everything, even if it is just a little bit.”

The Queens Vietnamese population, which was counted at 3,268, is the largest in the City, according to Census figures. So is the Swedish population. It was counted at 3,079. Most Vietnamese tend to live in middle-class neighborhoods like Flushing and Bayside, while many Swedes live in Western Queens.

Large numbers of Queensites who identify themselves as Scottish, Swedish, Czech, Filipino and Trinidadian live in Western Queens, and are members of the First Presbyterian Church in Newtown, which was built in 1652 and is the oldest church in Elmhurst. Many Dutch Queensites also live in Western Queens, and are members of the Dutch Reform Church, which is a historic landmark.

Most of Queens’ Arab residents live in Jackson Heights, Long Island City and Elmhurst, while most Swiss live in Eastern Queens, Douglaston and Bayside.
The number of Cubans in Queens has been hampered by the Communist government’s restrictions, but the 12,793 that have made it into the borough tend to live in Western Queens, which is evidenced by Cuban stores that line the streets in Jackson Heights and Corona.

Eastern Europeans, such as the Ukrainians, Slovaks, Czechs and Lithuanians, congregate in Western Queens and in Forest Hills, Rego Park and Ozone Park, and have tight connections with the Russian community.

And the French? They tend to stay in Queens Village and Southeast Queens, according to Census records, while Norwegians and the Welsh are pretty much spread out all over the borough.

“No two places in Queens are alike,” Salvo said. “It’s truly an amazing place, and it’s the rich mix of cultures that make it that way.”

Want More
Census Information?
To examine Census statistics by borough, look at City Planning’s website at www.nyc.gov/html/dcp. Raw data for the entire nation, maps included, is also available at www.census.gov

 Multi-Cultural Queens