Racist Mailer To UES Tenants Prompts City To Suspend Inspector

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — The city has suspended a housing inspector after tenants on the Upper East Side received a letter last week containing a racist slur against Asians, a spokesperson for the Housing Preservation Department confirmed Monday.

After requesting a heat and hot water inspection earlier this month, roommates Khang Duong and Duc Pham received a confirmation letter from the city days later. Instead of their names in the address field, however, they found a slur commonly directed against Asians.

https://t.co/QW50g4Z14p
Racist letter from NYC Department of Housing. @cnn @angryasianman @NextShark @nytimes pic.twitter.com/034wHzRLJc
— Michael Choi (@mchoiuk) March 26, 2021

"He never asked any of us for our names so what we suspect happened was he put our names down in that form as a racial slur," Pham told ABC7 on Friday, referring to the inspector who visited their apartment.

In a statement, HPD said it had suspended the employee without pay and was "conducting a full investigation to determine further disciplinary action.

"We've reached out to the individual affected to express our profound apologies. Racism has no place in New York City," an agency spokesperson said. "We stand with the AAPI community against hate."

Representatives from the agency also met with Pham on Friday to apologize in person.

The employee's alleged use of the slur was widely condemned after Pham posted a photo of the letter on Facebook last week — especially in light of a wave of violent crimes targeting Asian Americans in New York and elsewhere across the country in recent weeks.