The Aurora Puerto Rican Cultural Council was host to its annual Miss and Little Miss Puerto Rico Scholarship Pageanted and named Taina Torres, 20, as its new Miss Puerto Rico and Leilani Velez, 10, as its new Little Miss Puerto Rico.
Taina Torres, a senior at Aurora University, was named queen as Miss Puerto Rico of Aurora. She is a graduate of the Class of 2020 at Aurora Central Catholic High School. She represented the town of Corozal, Mexico.
Taking home the junior title of Little Miss Puerto Rico was fifth-grader Leilani Velez. She represented the town of Lares, Puerto Rico.
Each contestant represented a specific Puerto Rican municipality, of which a research project on that town was part of the total score in the competition. The participants competed in such categories as cultural wear, formal gowns, and verbal speech.
For her verbal speech category, Leilani explained her ultimate career goals, and Taina spoke about her desire to end child labor because of an experience her grandfather had as a child in Puerto Rico.
There to greet the new queen and princess were fellow crown-holders Miss Black Aurora Charitee Bouchee and Mr. Black Aurora Peter Eta.
One of the first official duties of the pair will be to help raise the Puerto Rican Flag during a special ceremony on Friday, July 21 to kick-off the annual Puerto Rican Heritage Week in Aurora. The week will conclude with the Aurora Puerto Rican Cultural Council’s 51st annual Heritage Festival on Sunday, July 30 in downtown Aurora.
The Aurora Puerto Rican Cultural Council held its first festivities in 1972 and celebrated last year its 50th anniversary in Aurora.
-City of Aurora government