Daily World Buzz: The turning point for San Francisco mayor, a Chinese in Silicon Valley

Saturday, January 8, 2011

The turning point for San Francisco mayor, a Chinese in Silicon Valley

SAN FRANCISCO - After the relocation of its factories, California relies on "Made in China" where you least expect it: in the government of his city. San Francisco and Oakland Chinese choose two as mayor. The news has reached us and while Lee was at the airport in Hong Kong, ready to board the flight for a short holiday in the spa of Yangmingshan.

It is the land of his ancestors that Lee was able to be part of history. China will be the first mayor of San Francisco. The first Asian to administer one of the largest cities in the United States. The story of Lee, 58, son of immigrants who landed on the West Coast to escape hunger, crown the rise of the Chinese of America: demographic, economic, political.

In San Francisco the first to come with the Gold Rush of 1848. They were the laborers to build the intercontinental railroad great: they were "physically", to make the United States by combining the two coasts with the new means of transport. Titanic thousands died in that work, the cemetery on the beach facing the Pacific Beach Baker recalls the carnage.

They lived in Chinatown like a ghetto, a cordon sanitaire surrounding the area to prevent the spread of epidemics (the last plague came from Hong Kong in 1900). Were the target of the fiercest law xenophobic, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, in full psychosis "yellow peril". 160 years after his revenge is complete.

In San Francisco the Chinese are 170,000, 20% of the population. One third of the hi-tech companies in Silicon Valley created founders belong to Asia. It is also thanks to them that this city has levels of education, employment and income well above the average American more than 44 percent of the adult population has a bachelor's degree, and San Francisco with only 850,000 inhabitants is the eighth largest city in the world's billionaires.

Chinatown, as well as an attraction for tourists worldwide, has become an economic power. The direction of the appointment of Lee has the imprint of Ms. Rose Pak, the godmother of Chinese business. President of the Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, the gray eminence Pak is that everyone must see before making any decisions.

Rose Pak celebrated the rise of Lee with his favorite lunch of dim sum at New Asia Restaurant, then an evening of cocktails at the Chinatown Hilton. "I play in politics - said gloating - as a martial sport." Sa maneuver in dealings with the People's Republic - Chinatown over the years has become increasingly less and less anti-Communist and pro-Beijing - but at the same time know the rules of American democracy.

His protégé Lee is a true liberal, who took the bones in politics defending the rights of minorities, including blacks. Five days before the San Francisco Bay on the other side of the "poor sister" has paved the way for Oakland. Was sworn in Monday's new mayor, Jean Quan, the Chinese. The Quan has a story similar to that of Lee: 61 years, is descended from an immigrant family 104 years ago.

Her father died when the age of five years, with the mother who never learned a word of English, Quan has worked hard in night shifts of Chinese laundries in order to win a scholarship at the University of Berkeley. On the opening day paid tribute to the memory of his ancestors by visiting the Buddhist temple Lung Kong Tin Yee.

Now he must contend with social decay that none of his predecessors has been able to eradicate: Oakland has the national record for the murders. "I want to make the protagonist of an epic rebirth, like the one my family has lived," he said. Lee has other issues to be addressed - the invasion of the chronic homeless people from across the United States come to San Francisco, attracted by the more generous welfare system - and less time available.

His appointment is pro tempore. The city council of San Francisco must nominate the replacement for the outgoing mayor Gavin Newsom (elected lieutenant governor of California), while the direct election of his successor will take place only in November. Even in ten months, however, is likely to be always the first Chinese city of San Francisco.

The main candidates in the running are two other notable fact of Chinatown: David Chiu, president of the council, and Leland Yee, a pediatrician, now senator in the legislature of California. Local governments are facing dramatic problems: the collapse in tax revenues during the years of recession has dug pits of debt, bankruptcy looms over several cities.

The Chinese-Americans have some advantages: the sense of business, discipline, and ability to weave alliances. The appointment of Mrs. Rosa Lee Pak has mobilized the black former mayor of San Francisco, Willie Brown, and the elders of the Italian - Americans Michela Alioto. With the power of money and population, Chinatown is slowly engulfing North Beach, Little Italy, where the old signs and traders increasingly speaks Mandarin or Cantonese.