Historic San Jose home faces uncertain future NBC Bay Area [Video]

San Jose is getting ready to move ahead with a huge housing development that will add more than 1,500 homes and commercial space, but preservationists and Japanese American community groups are clashing with the city, worried the project could erase the property’s historical significance.

A house on the 23-acre site belonged to a Japanese American pioneer and community icon, Eiichi, also known as Ed Sakauye, who was not only a prominent farmer but maintained the farm even through internment during World War II. That’s one reason why the Preservation Action Council wants the house saved one way or another.

Right now, the plan is to tear everything down and name a park at the site after Sakauye.

“We have to do better,” Preservation Action Council of San Jose Executive Director Ben Leech said. “This is a really special place. It’s one of the last orchards in San Jose. It’s connected …