Cid Wilson, President & CEO, and the HACR Team walked from Capitol Hill in Washington, DC to Wall Street in New York City with the support of major national organizations advocating for greater DEI in Corporate America.
WASHINGTON and NEW YORK, Oct. 13, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — The Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR) is pleased to announce that on October 11, 2024, it accomplished its groundbreaking and historic Walk To Wall Street for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion when the organization’s team members arrived in lower Manhattan, completing the 240 mile trek from Capitol Hill to Bowling Green Park. The walk began on September 17, 2024.
Led by HACR President & CEO, Cid Wilson, the walk to Wall Street was a movement to elevate the importance of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) in Corporate America. Wilson and members of the HACR team physically walked from Washington, DC to New York City with rally stops in Baltimore, Wilmington, DE, Philadelphia, Trenton, NJ, and Newark, NJ, before crossing the George Washington Bridge and concluding the walk in the Financial District of New York City. Each day, the Walk to Wall Street for DEI focused on one of the many historically marginalized communities that lack presence and representation on boards of directors and at senior and executive levels of Corporate America, as well as the board of directors.
“We organized this historic ‘Walk to Wall Street’ because the issues that impact historically underrepresented communities still exist and have not gone away,” said HACR President & CEO, Cid Wilson. “This extraordinary environment where diversity, equity, and inclusion are under attack means that it was time for us to respond in extraordinary ways, thus the movement to physically walk 240 miles from Capitol Hill to Wall Street to elevate the continued importance and the need for greater diversity, equity, and inclusion at all levels of Corporate America, especially the senior positions, the C-suite, and the corporate boards.”
“Those that wish to take us backwards to the days when it was acceptable to have inequality and exclusion have attempted to take the acronym ‘DEI’ and brand it as a word. Our ‘Walk to Wall Street’ is a reminder that DEI is not a word, but an empowering acronym that stands for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Those who oppose DEI support the opposite of DEI, homogeneity, inequality, and exclusion. That is why HACR announced in January 2024 that we were not going to slow down, back down, or turn around on movement for greater DEI. This is the year we call on Corporate America to ‘Double Down on DEI’, thus the extraordinary decision to Walk to Wall Street for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Corporate America,” continues Wilson.
HACR thanks the following nonprofit organizations who officially supported the ‘Walk to Wall Street’ (listed in alphabetical order):
- Asian American Business Development Center
- Association of LGBTQ+ Corporate Directors
- Bowling Green Association (host of finale rally in NYC)
- Dominican Bar Association
- Disability:IN
- The Executive Leadership Council (ELC)
- Global Black Economic Forum
- Hispanic Alliance for Career Enhancement (HACE)
- Human Rights Campaign Foundation
- Latino Corporate Directors Association (LCDA)
- LatinoJustice PRLDEF
- Leadership Education for Asian Pacifics (LEAP)
- LGBTQ+ Corporate Directors Association
- MANA – A National Latina Organization
- National Urban League
- SER – Jobs For Progress National
- UnidosUS
- Women’s Business Collaborative
“While we accomplished this groundbreaking walk, the movement for greater DEI continues. We will build on this momentum to elevate our call for Corporate America to stand strong in support of diversity, equity, and inclusion, and to not yield to those societal elements who intend to take Corporate America backwards despite our growingly diverse and multicultural country. Corporate America must acculturate to an increasingly diverse workforce, not ask a diverse society to assimilate to a decades-old corporate culture that does not embrace DEI nor recognize the increasingly diverse workforce,” concludes Wilson.
HACR will commemorate the completion of the Walk to Wall Street for DEI on Monday, October 14, 2024, at 5:30pm ET with a ceremonial walk through Times Square in New York City into the New York Marriott Marquis where we will cross the finish line tape as the organization hosts its 32nd Annual HACR Symposium: The Power of Hispanic Inclusion™.
About HACR
Founded in 1986, the Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR) is the nation’s leading nonprofit organization whose mission is to advance Hispanic inclusion in Corporate America at levels commensurate to our economic contributions. Through corporate and public engagements, research, leadership advancement programs, and advocacy, HACR illuminates The Power of Hispanic Inclusion™ in the areas of Employment, Procurement, Philanthropy, and Governance. The organization is governed by a coalition board of thirteen leading national Hispanic nonprofit organizations.
Please address media inquiries to HACR Director of Communications and Marketing Andrea Orlando at aorlando@hacr.org.
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SOURCE Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR)
