Hispanic Heritage Night Honors Carlos Bernabel with First Nelson Rivera Award

Gone but never forgotten.

OCTOBER 13 -- TWU Local 100 honored the late Nelson Rivera at the Hispanic Heritage Celebration Wednesday night with personal tributes to the labor “warrior” and a new award bearing his name.

The inaugural Nelson Rivera Award award went to Private Operations Division Chairman Carlos Bernabel.

“He too is a true warrior in every sense of the word,,” MTA Bus/PBL/School Bus Vice President Pete Rosconi said of Bernabel. “I have watched him demand Liberty Lines managers treat Local 100 members with respect and dignity, and demand that Westchester County government officials pony up when it came to wages and benefits. I can not think of anyone more deserving of this award.”

Rivera served three terms as CED Vice President before the Executive Board elevated him to Administrative VP in 2017. He died in 2020 after a valiant struggle with cancer.

Rivera’s tenacity and commitment to the membership is becoming legendary: his battles with management literally continued to the day he died. He was on the phone on his final day arguing with supervisors about their failures in providing masks during the pandemic, his widow, Catherine recalled.

“He loved the union and the members,” Catherine said. “They were everything to him.”

Rivera also organized and led several relief missions to Puerto Rico after hurricane Maria.

Local 100 President Tony Utano presented Catherine Rivera with an award posthumously honoring Rivera as a “Humanitarian, Leader, Ambassador, Warrior.”