Poll finds 61% of Democratic voters oppose Metropolitan Park plan
On Main Street in Flushing’s Chinatown, shoppers move between fruit stands, restaurants and family-run businesses that have served the New York City neighborhood for decades. But many residents said they fear the working-class immigrant community is under threat from an $8 billion casino development that could displace renters and force small businesses to close.
The Metropolitan Park project is a casino and entertainment development backed by the New York Mets owner, Steve Cohen, and Hard Rock International through Queens Future LLC. It would convert parking lots next to Citi Field at Willets Point into a casino, hotel, restaurants, an entertainment district and a public park between the Flushing and Corona neighborhoods. The project won one of New York’s three downstate casino licenses in December 2025.
Jack Hu, 37, a Flushing resident and member of the No Casino in Flushing Meadows Corona Park campaign, said his father developed a gambling addiction soon after immigrating to the United States from Guangzhou more than three decades ago. “A predatory project is being dumped in our community that disproportionately harms our people,” Hu said. “This community is really upset about this project and how it was pushed through without our consent.”
Hu said casino operators use meal coupons, free bus vouchers and free gambling vouchers to lure working-class Asian Americans into casinos. “They get them addicted to gambling, so that they can take their money,” Hu said.
Studies have found that Chinese immigrant communities face higher rates of problem gambling than the general population, attributed to cultural beliefs around luck and fortune, immigration-related stresses and isolation, barriers to accessing mental healthcare, and casino marketing targeting Chinese-speaking clients. Residents said elderly populations in Flushing are especially vulnerable.
A spokesperson for Metropolitan Park said the project includes over $1 billion in community benefits, including a community impact fund and funding for responsible gaming and addiction services. The project has signed memorandums of understanding with local organizations including Elmcor Youth & Adult Activities, Hamilton-Madison House, Korean Community Services, and the Korean American Family Service Center to create “culturally sensitive and community-adapted addiction services,” the spokesperson said.
According to the Urban Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank focused on economic and social policy, the Metropolitan Park proposal could displace nearly 16,000 renters who spend more than half of their income on housing in Corona and Flushing due to rising rents.
The Metropolitan Park spokesperson said a comprehensive environmental impact study “found that Metropolitan Park will not directly displace any existing businesses or residents” and noted the study was reviewed and accepted by the city planning commission.
Many business owners in the community have already been affected by the Trump administration’s sanctions against China, making imported goods more expensive, some residents said. They expressed concern that rising commercial rents from the development could force more independent businesses to close.
Residents also said they were skeptical that casino visitors would patronize Flushing’s independent businesses, noting the resort will have its own restaurants and amenities. They pointed to the limited spillover from nearby Citi Field and the US Open, which they said have brought few sports fans into the neighborhood. “If you look around here, you’ll see just locals,” Hu said. “There’s nobody that comes here and drops a load of money at a local restaurant. These events do not pull business into Flushing.”
A new poll conducted by Public Policy Polling in June, commissioned by Democratic congressional candidate Chuck Park, found that 61% of likely Democratic voters in New York’s sixth congressional district oppose the project, compared with 20% who support it. The remaining 19% were undecided. Park, who lost the Democratic primary to incumbent Rep. Grace Meng, said he knocked on the doors of 6,000 residents during his campaign, many of whom raised objections to the casino.
“We heard over and over and over again that people did not want the casino,” Park said. “This spanned from really socially conservative first-generation immigrants who thought that the casino would bring crime, human trafficking, and lead to major quality-of-life concerns. We also heard from young progressive leftist activists that this casino is a giveaway of public land to a billionaire who just wants to make himself even richer.”
During the project’s public approval process in March 2025, the casino’s backers told the New York City Council that Metropolitan Park had “actively engaged with community leaders.” In a statement, a project spokesperson said: “With nearly four years of community engagement, over 30 public meetings and approvals from six community boards, the city council, the state legislature, the community advisory committee and the gaming commission, Metropolitan Park has undergone one of the most rigorous and transparent public reviews of any project. The community has been heard, and their message is clear: they want Metropolitan Park.”
The project received a major boost from State Senator John Liu, who introduced Senate Bill S7121A, the parkland alienation bill, which allowed a local government to sell or repurpose public parkland for non-park uses. Without that legislation, critics say, the project may never have been realized. In exchange for the parkland alienation bill, Cohen pledged to build a bridge, similar to Manhattan’s High Line, connecting downtown Flushing to Willets Point, which Liu has called “Flushing Skypark.”
Chuck Park described the development in blunt terms. “Casinos are the worst form of aggressive tax,” Park said. “They lure in low-income members of local communities. They get them addicted to gambling, and then they just milk money.”
Hu said he fears the casino will deepen his father’s addiction, which has lasted more than three decades. “He wants to retain a little bit of hope to become wealthy,” Hu said. “It’s like you’ve grown up your entire life with nothing. You come here seeking to build a better life for yourself and for your family, and it’s these types of people that fall victim to these predatory businesses that tell you that you can get wealthy quickly.”
Xiang, an employee of a Flushing bakery who moved to Queens from China seven years ago, said: “Tourists might bring money, but the casino could also bring trouble here.”