Public Employee Press

Everyday heroes
Green Machine can count on her

By ALFREDO ALVARADO

Whenever the Green Machine, DC 37's army of activists, issues a call to put boots on the ground for an election campaign, SSEU Local 371 member Aurea Mangual is sure to answer.

A Community Coordinator who has worked in the Office of the Bronx Borough President for the last 15 years, Mangual has volunteered for several campaigns, not just locally but around the country. She's spent weekends in Ohio and Pennsylvania going door to door to help get out the vote. In 2012 she spent four weeks in central Florida for the presidential campaign, a campaign she remembers well. "I came down with poison ivy going to all those houses," Mangual recalled.

That year the activists were assigned to Orlando. Using her own vacation time, the Harlem resident traveled with a group of volunteers from DC 37 and Puerto Rico's Council 95 to Florida.

Her Spanish language skills came in handy in Orange County. The Orlando area has seen an explosion in the Puerto Rican population with as many as 30 percent of the 334,000 people who left the island from 2005 to 2012 moving to Florida, according to the Pew Research Center. With 29 electoral votes, Florida is also the largest swing state.

That was not the first time she traveled to Florida. Mangual lived in a small town near Tampa with her mother during the late 1950s and saw segregation up close.

The family later moved to New York and Mangual became a community organizer and worked with the Southeast Bronx Community Organization founded by Rev. Louis Gigante.

As a Community Coordinator one of Mangual's responsibilities is to represent the borough president at four community boards. Mangual feels unionists should be more active in their local community boards. "This is where the needs of the district are addressed," she explained. "We need to be there."

Mangual plans to be retired by the fall and looks forward to being active with the DC 37 Retirees Association. She has grandchildren in sunny California and Texas, but prefers New York City where she has lots of friends. And when Mangual gets that call from the Green Machine for the next campaign, she'll be eager to hit the road again.