NYC HISPANIC CHAMBER OF COMMERCE LUNCHEON HONORING MAYOR MICHEAL

Gracias, Miriam y Nick, y Tonio
también. ¡Qué águila tan grande!
Buenas tardes amigos y amigas. Es un
placer estar aquí con todos ustedes. For
anyone here who doesn’t speak Spanish,
my accent is perfect. And for those who
do: No digan nada por favor.
“Summer officially begins this weekend.
We may even see the sun. Actually, it’s
only rained twice in the past week: once
for three days; and once for four.
“Im honored by your award, and also
by the support so many of you have given
us over the past seven years. Es un honor
recibir esta distinción y por el apoyo que
tantos de ustedes nos han brindado en los
últimos siete años. Toghether, we’ve
achieved so much for all the people of our
city. We’ve continued to reduce crime to
historic lows. We’re the undisputed safest
big city in the nation. Our public schools
are also becoming a model for the nation.
You can see that impressive gains our students
made on their math and reading test
scores again this year.
“We should be proud of all of them
–and specially proud that Hispanic
students, along with African American
students, continue to lead the charge.
They’re closing the achievement gap in our
classrooms that has been the shame of our
city for far too long. We’re continuing to
create affordable housing at an historic
pace –a subject I’m going to come back
to in a few minutes. And New Yorker is
living longer than our fellow Americans.
“So our city is safe and strong, and our
long-term future is bright. Por todo eso,
nuestra ciudad está fuerte y segura, y tenemos
un futuro prometedor. And perhaps
the strongest vote of confidence in that future
is that our population continues to
grow to record levels. Y tal vez el más significante
voto de confianza sobre ese futuro
es que nuestra población sigue
creciendo de forma impresionante –y
esto incluye a los hispanos. Today we
have 8.4 million New Yorkers –nearly
one-third of whom proudly proclaim their
Hispanic heritage.
“For all those reasons, I wouldn’t trade
the cards in our hand for those held by any
of the cities we compete with in rest of the
nation. But just like those cities, New York
has also been hit hard by our strains on the
small businesses that are the backbone of
our city’s economy. I know ho hard ...