Asian Influx in Suburbia

Your articles on Asian impact in the San Gabriel Valley sound like a prerequisite announcement about an invasion by an extraterrestrial army.

A boxed quotation of Frank Rizzio, former Monterey Park resident, saying, “What the Chinese have done to this community is a shame. Alhambra’s next. Then San Marino and then Arcadia. Have you asked them why they want to come to the San Gabriel Valley and make a little China out of this place?” sounds even more scary.

The answer is money--a great deal of money. No exception in every case that didn’t involve big profit of doubling their house value in turning their properties over to the newcomers. It has been an open bonanza for the homeowners to sell out their houses of 30 or more years.

Unlike the old generations of Asian immigrants, who were mostly coolies and railroad workers, the new ones are relatively richer and generous. A great many of them are intellectuals and scientists who quietly teach at universities or quietly work at defense industries. They tried to earn a decent living only by paying more to satisfy those who wish to have a new home in a new environment by earning more from their old houses. You must know that no Asians could own a house in San Marino or Arcadia some 20 years ago for sheer racial reasons.

Unfortunately, such a tendency has stirred up a wave in certain areas and the real estate dealers have a heyday.

JEROME Y.L. CHU

Alhambra