Public Employee Press

Black History Month at DC 37
Fitness, fun and family

It was a DC 37 family affair Feb. 6 as hundreds of members’ children and grandchildren enjoyed fitness and fun at the Black History Committee’s annual Family Day.

Three floors of workshops and activities at the union hall greeted the little ones and their parents at one of the highlights of DC 37’s celebration of Black History Month. Children with brightly painted faces and superhero tattoos clung to candy-colored balloons shaped and twisted into animals, swords and crowns. Puppeteer Bruce Cannon, a member of Local 299, told Harlem’s story of great migrations with marionettes and music.

The day also featured a golf clinic for kids, double-dutch sessions, fencing, and archery lessons for amateurs by Larry Brown, the former coach of Columbia University’s archery team, who coaches kids in Brooklyn, the Bronx and Manhattan and at the Children’s Aid Society summer camp. His Center Shot Archers joined him at Family Day before they headed off to the national championship competitions.

“This is fun and so much better than video games or hanging around the house,” said Faybian Jaysura, whose mother is in Local 420.

Fitness guru and personal trainer Vince Ferguson of Bodysculpt energized the crowd with funky workouts, financial whiz Gwendolyn Williams advised parents on investing wisely, and expert Fred Lane led a financial aid workshop for college-bound students and their parents.

Public Health Nurses from Local 436 offered hands-on healthy-living tips, and massage therapist Vance Allen soothed parents’ tense muscles.

The threat of a snowstorm did not deter sisters Lily and Qiao Kun Kuang, who came to Family Day with the latter’s daughter Michelle, 4. “There’s so much here to see and do, it’s great that my union provides fun activities like this,” said Lily, a Local 1549 member.

Black History Committee members Nola Brooker, Professional Division director; Tyler Hemmingway, assistant director of the Hospitals Division; Audrey Iszard, executive vice president of the DC 37 Retirees Association and others helped organize the event. They offered big thanks for contributing to the success of Family Day to Locals 299, 371, 374, 420, 768, 924, 957, 983, 1219, 1359, 1482, 1549, 1655, 1930 and the DC 37 Retirees Association.

— Diane S. Williams