The site has great meaning to the community. Old maps show how a portion of it was leased to immigrants to become a Chinatown, then a Japanese American settlement.
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The development will address the housing shortage and give an economic boost to businesses in Japantown. That will help to preserve the culture and history of the Japanese pioneers who first arrived in the late 1880's.
Japantown was established in 1900. It's one of only three surviving in the U.S. The others being in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
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