Community leaders in San Francisco’s Chinatown are worried about a pattern emerging in their neighborhood: Their huge banquet hall restaurants keep closing, only to reopen as upscale establishments primarily serving people who don’t live in the area.

For decades, Chinatown had five thriving banquet restaurants that didn’t just serve food but also functioned as community centers: Empress of China, Far East Cafe, Four Seas Restaurant, Gold Mountain Restaurant and New Asia Restaurant. Only Far East and New Asia are left.

Michelin-starred restaurant Mister Jiu’s replaced Four Seas in 2016. The China Live complex, which includes a $225 tasting menu from the upstairs restaurant Eight Tables, replaced Gold Mountain one year later. This spring, Empress by Boon is preparing to open in the space Empress of China vacated in 2014. Chef-owner Ho Chee Boon, who was born in Malaysia and has worked at restaurants in Singapore, Hong Kong, London and New York, is best known as the former executive chef at the international high-end Cantonese restaurant chain Hakkasan.

Empress by Boon promises to be a destination restaurant, with sweeping views of the city and Boon’s light, seasonal approach to Cantonese cuisine. Menu prices haven’t been finalized, but dinner for two will probably reach $100.

“The food is probably going to be great,” said Malcolm Yeung, deputy director of the Chinatown Community Development Center, a neighborhood advocacy group. “But for who?”

Fearing the sense of loss that Empress by Boon’s arrival represents for the community, Yeung filed an appeal with the San Francisco Planning Department, calling into question whether the top two floors of the building should still be used as a restaurant. The hearing was scheduled for Wednesday night but has been postponed.

“It’s an opportunity to force the owner into a conversation,” Yeung said.

Boon declined to comment for this story. Building owner John Yee, an immigrant who grew up in Chinatown and purchased the Grant Avenue site for a reported $17.2 million in 2017, said he is committed to contributing to the community. His goal is for the building’s businesses, including Empress by Boon, to be “authentic to the cultural identity of the neighborhood,” he wrote in an emailed statement.

While elaborate Chinese wedding banquets have gradually fallen out of favor in the past 20 years, Chinatown’s banquet restaurants still host hundreds of gatherings a year for family associations, nonprofits, political events, fundraisers, Lunar New Year luncheons and other celebrations. The typical attendance for such banquets is 500 people — people who now can choose between only Far East and New Asia.

“The number of banquets we hold in Chinatown is stunning — it’s still a very vital part of the community,” Yeung said.

Tatwina Lee, co-chair of the Chinese Culture Foundation in San Francisco, recalls watching her father’s presidential inauguration for a Chinese association at Far East; holding one of her wedding receptions at Four Seas; and celebrating her brother-in-law’s wedding at Empress, which, in its heyday, was a favorite spot for such events.

Lee has deep family roots in San Francisco Chinatown, and though she lives in the East Bay, she still loves coming to Chinatown because it feels like home. She brings her children and grandchildren to the neighborhood’s historic restaurants to help them feel connected to their culture — and says that more high-end destinations are not going to help. She points to the gentrification of the Mission and worries that Chinatown could look similar if more historic spaces turn into fine dining destinations.

“Sometimes I feel like Chinatown is one or two IPOs away from going the same way,” she said.

Beyond the sheer size of these restaurants, affordability is a key reason why they’re considered community fixtures. An eight-course meal with bountiful portions for a table of 10 typically starts at $400.

The banquet restaurants have also historically been important economic forces within Chinatown, hiring people who live in Chinatown — often low-income immigrants looking for their first American job — and sourcing ingredients from the neighborhood’s grocers and specialty shops, according to Yeung. He said employees typically eat at other Chinatown restaurants, and customers often spend time in the neighborhood before or after meals.

“We help each other,” said Bill Lee, owner of Far East Cafe. He wonders whether Empress by Boon will be part of the same ecosystem.

Banquet restaurants are “cultural and economic engines in a way the higher-end restaurants aren’t and can’t be,” Yeung said. “I think it’s an open question whether the people coming to high-end restaurants are doing anything other than Uber-ing in, grabbing a bite and Uber-ing out.”

Building owner Yee doesn’t agree.

“Empress will be a major contributor to the Chinatown ecosystem with its daily purchasing power and by providing new employment opportunities within the community. The restaurant will also draw people to Chinatown, including tourists, who will shop in the local stores and patronize our local businesses,” he said by email.

When Mister Jiu’s and China Live were in the planning stages, Yeung said there were many conversations with the restaurateurs — who both have roots in Chinatown — about their impact and place in the neighborhood. He said there haven’t been such conversations with the team behind Empress by Boon, which is why he filed an appeal with the city.

China Live owner George Chen has noticed fewer and fewer people from the neighborhood dining at his restaurant, which is pricier than nearby establishments. But he feels there are other ways to show his Chinatown pride and contribute to the community, such as donating to local causes, hosting events for free and paying staff who live in Chinatown more than minimum wage.

He also established a smaller, 200-person banquet hall on the third floor of China Live but hasn’t seen much demand for it.

“I took it on thinking it was the old Gold Mountain, but I kind of wish I didn’t,” Chen said. “Nobody economically can afford to do it with today’s rents.”

Yeung wonders whether there could be an affordable banquet component within Empress by Boon. If one of Chinatown’s last two banquet restaurants closes, community leaders hope there could be a chance to replace it with a worker-owned co-op, a public-private partnership or something else that hasn’t been attempted before.

“Is there a way to make it where you don’t have to look at a for-profit model but a community benefit model that would make enough money to run itself?” Tatwina Lee said.

Other Chinatowns across the country are disappearing. In Washington, D.C., the construction of a sports arena ramped up development, and national chains began replacing bubble tea shops. In Los Angeles’ Chinatown, gentrification brought hip restaurants slinging trendy items such as Nashville hot chicken in place of dumplings.

According to a 2013 study from the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, Asians went from being the majority of residents to the minority in Boston, New York and Philadelphia Chinatowns from 1990 to 2010.

“The model of what’s happened to other Chinatowns can’t be the only answer,” said Stephen Gong, the executive director of the Center for Asian American Media in San Francisco. “That it’s inevitable.”

This story was updated to reflect new information about the Board of Appeals hearing.

Janelle Bitker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: janelle.bitker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @janellebitker