Leneé Son

“We are too poor to afford anything” – new report uncovers the power of retail shops in the gentrification of Chinatown and the Downtown Eastside

In an area where over 13,000 people live in poverty having to survive on social assistance, gentrifying businesses are selling $138 mink eyelashes and $11 bottles of juice. Those are some of the findings of the Carnegie Community Action Project’s (CCAP) new retail gentrification report. On Wednesday, February 22, CCAP released The Retail Gentrification Mapping Report, the result of a year-long project in which low-income residents surveyed over 450 retail stores in the neighbourhood. The report found that 20 new gentrifying/zone of exclusion businesses have opened since the summer of 2015. In total, there are now 156 gentrifying retail zones of exclusion businesses in the neighbourhood, which the report defines as retail stores that seek to attract and cater to higher income residents or visitors and exclude low-income community members. (…)