UPDATE: San Jose officials question who controls Vietnamese garden

San Jose officials are reckoning with a political fight over a park important to the city’s older Vietnamese community.

The issue reached a handful of councilmembers at Wednesday’s Rules and Open Government Committee, which voted unanimously with brief discussion for a clear explanation as to how the parks department manages access to the Vietnamese Heritage Garden for public events. This comes after District 7 Councilmember Bien Doan last month announced he would limit a political rival’s control of a monthly flag-raising ceremony at the garden. City parks employees then changed the garden’s locks — keeping it closed to the public except during special events and causing yet another rift in the long-divided community.

Doan held a news conference ahead of the meeting, where he accused his political rival Ha Trieu’s group of using a private key to the garden to “manipulate, influence and strike political favor” in the community. Doan further alleged Trieu’s group harassed and intimidated other organizations like the Vietnamese American Roundtable and Immigrant Resettlement and Cultural Center. Neither of those groups responded to requests for comment.

Trieu, chairman of the United Vietnamese American Community of Northern California, denied those allegations.

“I never talked to the Immigrant Resettlement and Cultural Center or Vietnamese American Roundtable about the flag raising, all statements are false,” Trieu told San José Spotlight. “I categorically deny the false statements and I will engage an attorney to respond appropriately to any false statements.”

Since 2021, Trieu has held his own key to the garden after becoming a “park adopter,” which he has argued allows him certain privileges like hosting events without reservations.

Doan is reserving the garden on the first Saturday of every month, the same day Trieu’s group holds its own event. Doan says this gives other community groups an opportunity to run the show and that his office has already received 11 applications. He said Trieu’s group would still be allowed to apply. Doan didn’t specify on how the city parks department would judge each application and decide who gets access to the garden.

“The parks department is overseeing the whole process at this point,” Doan said.

More than a dozen residents spoke during public comment, but City Hall was left fumbling when most speakers made their comments in Vietnamese. The city didn’t have a human interpreter on hand, instead relying on the artificial intelligence software Wordly which failed to translate properly.

The issue prompted an apology from Councilmember Pam Foley to the audience, imploring the speakers to comment in English if they could. Doan presented an employee of his own office to pause each speaker every few sentences so she could translate in real time.

Speakers like Mary Nguyen questioned the need for Doan’s new rules, saying the flag-raising ceremonies have gone for years without a hitch under Trieu’s group.

“Does the Vietnamese Heritage Garden belong to the city or council District 7?” Nguyen asked.

Other speakers sided with Doan, lauding him for opening the event-hosting opportunity to different organizations, and dismissed the need for a council discussion at all.

District 5 Councilmember Peter Ortiz, who also represents a portion of the city’s Vietnamese American community and has raised concerns over Doan’s rules, requested the committee take up the issue. He said his office has had difficulty answering questions from constituents over “who is in charge.” He’s waiting to see if the parks department will offer those specifics on how it will evaluate the different groups that applied to run the flag raising ceremony.

“I am hoping it will,” Ortiz told San José Spotlight.

State lawmakers raised similar concerns last week over Doan’s announcement, which came after Doan found himself at odds with Trieu during an unrelated June restraining order trial that roused drama in the Vietnam War refugee generation over who in the community is viewed as sympathetic to the Vietnamese government.

The garden dispute opens a bitter new chapter of political divide in Little Saigon’s older social circles. Since June, the divide has sparked a tense courtroom battle between Doan and a powerful businessman. Meanwhile, a staffer in Mayor Matt Mahan’s office who testified in that trial is suing several members of the community for defaming her as a communist over a charity she helps run that does work in Vietnam.

Contact Brandon Pho at [email protected] or @brandonphooo on X, formerly known as Twitter.