Chair introduces Melissa Mark-Viverito; Mark-Viverito introduces herself

Thank you, and I love the books and your background, very apropos, we are at a library.

And with that, we do have a special guest in person, the first Latina Puerto Rican former speaker, Melissa Mark-Viverito, to provide testimony.

Good afternoon, everybody, council members and chair.

Wonderful to see you all.

And incredibly powerful that this conversation is happening here at the Arturo Schomburg Research Center, all that he represents to us in the diaspora and in Puerto Rico and as Boricuas.

So good afternoon, gracias for holding this important hearing today on resolutions 294, 27, 28, and 372.

I am Melissa Marguerito, former city council speaker, born and raised in Puerto Rico as a colonial subject.

I'm before you today, a member of our extensive diaspora, using my voice and leveraging my actions to demand my island's sovereignty.