The Hum article discussed how community organizations have tried to fill the holes not filled by community boards. According to the article, even though Sunset Park is not a majority white, white people are the majority in community board 7. The article did not state whether this was the case in Flushing, but since the two community boards were grouped into the same paper maybe it is. The community boards do not create perfect space for talks about race relations and solutions to the issues between races are not created by some community boards. If one group that isn’t even the majority is too dominating, it must be very  difficult to complain about that group.

I found the KACF’s solution to race issues in Flushing to be such a smart and responsible first step. I admire the initiative that the KACF took after it saw all the racial tension, shown by the complaints written to the city council, that had been created after the building of the Korean spa. The KACF had already worked on solving race issues, when there was conflict between Koreans and blacks, so it made sense to lead a meeting involving problem solving with multiple ethnicities during this unstable time. In the meeting, community leaders from all different ethnicities present in Flushing could openly discuss what each group wanted. Some issues brought to the meeting were that businesses were not speaking enough English, law enforcement was not strong enough, and immigrants experienced discrimination. The community leaders were supposed to think of steps that could be made, so these issues were lessened.

According to the essay, meetings like this one could not be a one time thing, if they were going to have any positive affects. At the end of the meeting, participants did seem hopeful for future race relations in Flushing. I am interested in knowing what the actual results were after months or years of meeting. Even after the first meeting, with everybody’s complaints out in the open, tensions between these community leaders were probably lessened, but what about the general population that was not present at this meeting? Did community leaders report back to the communities? Also, were the issues discussed and solutions brainstormed brought to the community board meetings, so that the solutions could actually happen?