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Public
Employee Press Puerto Rican
Day Parade Members march on 5th Ave.
A
robust contingent of DC 37 members joined the estimated 2 million people who came
to watch or march in the 52nd Annual Puerto Rican Day Parade June 14.
Its
important for our union to be here every year representing Puerto Rican members
of the labor movement, which plays an important role in this city and in their
lives, said DC 37 Latino Heritage Committee Chair and Local 372 Executive
Vice President Santos Crespo as he got the DC 37 participants together for the
march up Fifth Avenue. Members of Local 1549, Local 420 and the Retirees Association,
with their friends and families, led the DC 37 group.
Parade veteran Isabel
Figueroa, the first vice president of Municipal Hospitals Employees Local 420,
waved a Puerto Rican flag as she marched with local members. I look forward
to marching with my union brothers and sisters every year, she said. The
Puerto Rican Day Parade has always been a very special event for our community,
and its important that labor has a presence here.
Guests
of Ruben Diaz Jr.
This year the DC 37 contingent was invited
to march up Fifth Avenue with Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. and his VIP
float, which included City Council members Joel Rivera, John Liu and Melissa Mark
Viverito, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and Comptroller William C.
Thompson. DC 37 volunteers helped Diaz win the April 21 special election for borough
president; he plans to run for the position in the November general election.
Celebrating
our Music was the theme of this years parade, which featured ex-New
York Yankee and now recording artist Bernie Williams and Grammy Award winners
Daddy Yankee, Eddie Palmieri, José Feliciano and Olga Tanon as grand marshals.
Alfredo Alvarado
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