About 1,500 immigrant New Yorkers and their supporters marched to
City Hall from Battery Park today to draw attention to school
financing, on-the-job accidents in the construction industry, access to
housing and other issues that they described as critical for the citys
foreign-born population.
Holding signs that read, Proud to Be an Immigrant! and I Love
Immigrant New York! the marchers, representatives of more than 70
organizations, called on the city government to make immigrants a
public policy priority.
This march sends a powerful message to Mayor Bloomberg and the City
Council that we can do better when it comes to immigrants, said
Chung-Wha Hong, executive director of The New York Immigration
Coalition, which organized the event. The mayor made immigrants the
centerpiece of his State of the City address in January, but warm words
are not enough. We can do better. The mayor and City Council need to
adopt bold policy solutions that improve the lives of immigrants and
all New Yorkers.
Ana Maria Archila, coexecutive director of Make the Road New York,
a Brooklyn-based group that focuses on Hispanic immigrants, called on
the city to restore proposed cuts in the citys education budget, while
Gonzalo Mercado, director of El Centro del Inmigrante, pointed to a
rise in construction-site injuries and fatalities in the city,
estimating that three of four workers hurt or killed in recent times
have been immigrants.
Photo Caption: About
1,500 immigrants [including Make the
Road New York members] marched to City Hall from Battery Park this morning
to call for improvements in education, working conditions, housing and
education programs. More than 70 immigrant groups were represented. (Photo:
Annie Tritt for The New York Times)