Organizers of the West Indian Day Parade are making sure it’s run by a Trinidadian majority, say critics who are charging discrimination.
The West Indian American Day Carnival Association, which organizes the annual Labor Day event along Brooklyn’s Eastern Parkway, has raked in more than $1 million in city, state and federal funds over the past five years, but the nonprofit isn’t inclusive enough to deserve taxpayer dough, according to Rickford Burke, the head of the Caribbean Guyana Institute for Democracy.
In a July 8 letter to Mayor de Blasio, Burke accused the parade’s board of “prejudice and overt discrimination.” He is also lobbying Gov. Cuomo and state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to force the board to be more open to non-Trinidadians.
“If the organization running the parade has such [an ethnic] deficiency, once it comes to their knowledge, they have an obligation to fix it,” he said.
Burke, who was rejected for the nonprofit’s board, said the application process is onerous for intentionally excluding other groups.
“The bylaws were deliberately written to discourage or encumber new membership,” he said.
Parade organizers did not return a phone call and an e-mail request for comment.