Philippine Independence Day, or June 12, is now preceded by another historic day for Filipinos, at least those in northeastern New Jersey.<\/p>\n
On June 11, they made political history by electing one of their own, Rolando Lavarro, Jr., to the City Council of Jersey City, the second largest city in the state. In a metropolis of 250,000 people, 15,000 to 20,000 residents are Filipinos, according to an editorial by Manuel L. Caballero in The Filipino Reporter lauding the election results as a \u201csmart decision by Pinoys.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lavarro, the son of Philippine immigrants, became the first Filipino American in Jersey City elected to a full four-year term. He already claimed another first when he won a special election in November 2011 to fill a vacant council seat. Serving as councilman-at-large, he became the first Filipino American to hold an elected position in the city.<\/p>\n
Caballero points out that, as with any community, is appreciated to have one of their own in government.<\/p>\n
Pinoys know it is for the best interests of Filipino-Americans to have a voice in city government, who will look after their \u201cdemands\u201d (meaning, needs or requests).<\/p>\n
It is a fact of democratic life in a free community that, occasionally, certain groups present demands to their policy makers or legislators.<\/p>\n
Caballero presents a list of \u201cnot really big demands\u201d particular to \u201cwe, in the Filipino-American community.\u201d<\/p>\n
We need proclamations for yearly occasions, like Philippine Independence Day or the birthday of Dr. Jose Rizal.<\/p>\n
We need a piece of city land to put up a monument of a Filipino hero.<\/p>\n
We want the mayor or a city official to attend our social functions.<\/p>\n
We need a place for an important community meeting.<\/p>\n
We want an outstanding achiever in the community recognized by the City Council.<\/p>\n
Caballero emphasized that \u201cit is important that we have someone in City Hall whom we could approach.\u201d Lavarro’s win comes after two votes: the May 14 runoff in which he came in second, with the top three all garnering a vote tally of within 1 percent of each other, and June 11, where unofficial results show him coming in at a close third to capture the council-at-large seat.<\/p>\n
Lavarro praised the Filipino community, telling The Filipino Channel, a California-based TV network that targets the Filipino diaspora:<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Filipino community in Jersey City was a huge part of the voters turnout and I’m looking to it being a great resource for the community going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
http:\/\/filipinoreporter.us\/editorials\/on-my-watch\/2494-smart-decision-by-pinoys-in-jersey-city.html<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Philippine Independence Day, or June 12, is now preceded by another historic day for Filipinos, at least those in northeastern<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":72448,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"magazineBlocksPostFeaturedMedia":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg","medium":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","medium_large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","1536x1536":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","2048x2048":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-highlighted-post":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-featured-post-medium":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-featured-post-small":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x90.jpg","colormag-featured-image":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-default-news":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg","colormag-featured-image-large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-block-extra-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-small-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-medium-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg"},"magazineBlocksPostAuthor":{"name":"Admin","avatar":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53e6cdc30765aade0129f85e5aeb50124b1d3f5bb9a70373be31e4eb328371e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g"},"magazineBlocksPostCommentsNumber":"0","magazineBlocksPostExcerpt":"Philippine Independence Day, or June 12, is now preceded by another historic day for Filipinos, at least those in northeastern","magazineBlocksPostCategories":[],"magazineBlocksPostViewCount":140,"magazineBlocksPostReadTime":3,"magazine_blocks_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg",113,170,false],"medium":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg",113,170,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg",113,150,true]},"magazine_blocks_author":{"display_name":"Admin","author_link":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/?author=1"},"magazine_blocks_comment":0,"magazine_blocks_author_image":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53e6cdc30765aade0129f85e5aeb50124b1d3f5bb9a70373be31e4eb328371e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","magazine_blocks_category":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/72448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}