Enclaves, Eyesores, and the Willets Point Repair Shop Response -Ariane Marchese

The government is there to represent the people and act according to its needs. Thus, it does have a responsibility to protect the poorest and dirtiest of parts of the region and the people residing in them. The Willets Point proposal that Bloomberg made improves the conditions but leave no room for the poor new immigrants to join the economy. Kenneth Guest had defined “The ethnic enclave is not an ethnic neighborhood. It is primarily focused on ethnic economic activity” (Guest 39) and, thus, show how immigrants need these environments. Willets Point was in poor condition. In fact, one may argue that the area was in worse condition than immigrants’ homelands. Improving the area would have been beneficial if it was only catered to the people living in the area. Pinsky said that the program would create 5,300 jobs, affordable housing, and lead to profit but what is the point if it does not help the immigrants that live in the area. As Guest had stated, the enclave allows immigrants, who might not know English, to join a workforce, gain skills, and eventually move up. Willets Point allowed its immigrants to do that with the enclaves. However, Bloomberg’s program destroys the enclave and makes the job opportunities less available for immigrants and more for the general public. Willets Point had possibly allowed immigrants to use their culture and background to fit into the workforce and enter the economy smoothly and comfortably. This is because the employer of the immigrant would easily understand the background he or she is coming from and can allow work to get done smoothly and efficiently with a mutually understanding. From there, the immigrant can only improve at the job and may even rise to higher positions and find another job easily. In addition, there is no language barrier to worry about and does not rush the immigrant to understand English right away. After the program and destruction of the enclave, however, immigrants would have a tougher time entering the economy as the language barrier might make interviews or even signs of a job opening difficult to understand. Immigrants might also not work as efficiently as expected as they are not aware of the American work environment and may even have trouble finding their way around and understanding instructions if they do not understand English. The government’s job is to represent and act on the needs of the people. However, to satisfy the needs of everyone, politicians must understand that they need to look into how to improve things for specific groups of people that are beneficial to all. For example, the job training program that’s available to both legal and illegal immigrants helps this specific group of immigrants enter and adjust to the American economy while still helping the general New York population by providing a larger source of labor for businesses.