Forced from Home: Displacement Assessment in Boston Chinatown

At a time of increasing displacement, gentrification and insecure housing, this event marks the release of the first report from MIT DRAN on the displacement and eviction crisis in Boston’s Chinatown.

"Chinatown residents are disproportionately elderly and 40 percent of families have children but are losing this working-class core,” says Karen Chen, Executive Director, Chinese Progressive Association. “Being displaced means not only loss of housing and increased stress, but also loss of social networks, multilingual social services, access to nearby jobs, a voice on issues that impacts our lives and much more.”

The report is the result of over 3 years of collaboration between DRAN and Chinese Progressive Association in Boston, and details the results of a displacement impact assessment using a tool that DRAN has developed. This is the first time in the US that a comprehensive displacement impact assessment, benchmarked against global human rights standards, has been used in a major city