Transit Workers Turn out for Dominican Celebration and Parade on 6th Avenue

AUGUST 10 – Transit Workers paraded up 6th Avenue for the 43rd Annual Dominican Day Parade, saluting the nearly three-quarters of a million New Yorkers of Dominican ancestry, including TWU Local 100 members. One of those – our own Carlos Bernabel, Secretary-Treasurer of TWU Local 100 – was honored as an Ambassador of Hope at an early morning breakfast in Inwood where unions and political leaders gathered.
 
TWU Local 100’s Political Action Director, Sharase Debouse, was also recognized. Warmly embraced by Adriano Espaillat, the first Dominican-American to be elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, she gave her remarks first in Spanish and then translated for the crowd.
 
“Thank you all so much for this honor,” she said. “I do this work because I love it. I love my community, I love my people, and I love labor.”
 

Later that morning in midtown, about 200 members met at the massive TWU float to get ready to dance and march through the streets.
 
A live band played atop the float and was followed by the dozens of marchers wearing union t-shirts, costumed characters and a city bus decked out for the occasion. The TWU Local 100 Honor Guard was in front, with President John V. Chiarello and Secretary-Treasurer Bernabel leading the other officers and members.
 
In remarks to the crowd as a festive lunch was being served, President Chiarello said that Secretary-Treasurer Bernabel exemplifies Dominican pride, loyalty, and family. Admin VP Alexander Kemp said that although members come from many races and ethnicities, we are one family and are all bound together in our union, and Bernabel addressed the crowd in Spanish, exhorting them to fight for a new contract.

See more photos of Dominican Day 2025 at flickr