Maloney Celebrates Passage of Bill to Expand the Lower East Side Tenement Museum Historic Site
WASHINGTON, DC - Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney (NY-12) released the following statement in response to the House of Representatives’ approval of H.R. 1846, the Lower East Side Tenement National Historic Site Amendments Act. The bill, introduced by Rep. Nydia Velázquez (NY-7) and cosponsored by Rep. Maloney, will expand the boundaries of the Lower East Side Tenement National Historic Site to include 103 Orchard Street.
“The Lower East Side Tenement Museum is one of our nation’s most important historic and cultural institutions,” Maloney said. “It tells the story of those immigrant families who settled in one of our nation’s most iconic and important neighborhoods – the lower East Side of Manhattan. And thanks to this bill, the museum will be able to tell even more stories to more people. I commend my friend and colleague, Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, for her authorship of this important bill.”
“Whether it is Chinatown, Little Italy, or émigrés from Germany, immigration has made New York a more vibrant place, offering invaluable economic and cultural contributions, while shaping the city’s identity,” said Rep.Velázquez. “The LES Tenement museum honors these communities and pays tribute to the challenges they overcame when arriving in a new nation and city.”
Rep. Maloney previously represented a portion of the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in Congress, until the museum’s visitor center and shop moved to newly renovated space across the street and remains an honorary trustee of the museum. This past summer, Rep. Maloney hosted a tour of the museum for members of Congress as part of the Faith and Politics Institute’s pilgrimage to New York and New Jersey.
Rep. Maloney has also secured federal funding to support and expand the museum. In 2005, Rep. Maloney secured $121,250 in federal funds for the Museum’s An Irish Family in America project - a living history exhibit exploring the Irish immigrant experience to the United States.
Founded 25 years ago, the original museum building at 97 Orchard Street tells the progression of our country through the stories of immigrants from Ireland, Italy, Poland, Greece, Austria, Russia, Germany and Lithuania, through 1935. H.R. 1846 will allow the Museum to expand to a new site so it can tell the stories of Jewish Holocaust survivors, post-1965 Chinese families, and Puerto Rican migrants in the 1950s - bringing immigrant history to the present day. More than 200,000 people visit the museum each year.
The Museum just received from National Endowment for Humanities a $500,000 challenge grant to support its exhibit. A link to the NEH press release can be found here: http://www.neh.gov/news/press-release/2013-12-02.