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Jersey City's various communities are demonstrating their cultural diversity this summer with ethnic festivals and events.

The city's 2003 Golden Neighborhood Festival Schedule line-up will include parties thrown by the Latino communities of Downtown as well as other ethnic enclaves like Journal Square's Indian Village.

"[Festivals] represent the ethnic diversity of Jersey City, and it's a way to keep the community together," said Joan Moore, special event coordinator in the city's Department of Cultural Affairs.

First up is a week full of Dominican pride events that will culminate in the Sixth Annual Jersey City Dominican Parade and Festival.

Dedicated to the students of the future and to the disabled, the week will begin with a Mobile Immigration Unit being set up at City Hall on Sunday, July 27.

Said festival Coordinator Minnie Torres, "[The Dominican Republic Mobile Immigration Unit] will be at City Hall from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. to provide services like renewal of passports and other services. Anyone can come in from the Dominican community to find out the immigration status of their relatives and themselves."

There will be a pair of flag-raising ceremonies that week: one at City Hall at 6 p.m. on Monday, July 28, and the second at Brennan County Courthouse at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, July 30.

After the Monday, July 28 flag-raising, native Dominican dancers will be on hand to perform while traditional snacks are distributed and official proclamations honoring community members are announced.

A banquet will also be held Friday, Aug. 1, at Gray Cliff Restaurant in Moonachie. Tickets are $60 and the event begins at 7 p.m.

At noon on Sunday, Aug. 3, parade participants will gather at the Jersey City Armory, located at Montgomery Street and Jordan Avenue, to prepare for the trek down Montgomery Street. The parade - which will be broadcast live to the Dominican Republic - will converge on Greene Street, where vendors will be on hand to tantalize the estimated 4,000 festival-goers with foods from around the world. Notable Dominicans will also be present, Torres said.

Two weeks later is the Jersey City Indian Festival, scheduled for Saturday, Aug. 16 at the Heights' Leonard Gordon Park, located at Manhattan Avenue and Kennedy Boulevard. The event features both a parade and festival, and 500 people are expected to attend. Festival organizers could not be reached last week to provide further details.

Meanwhile, the congregation of Downtown's Holy Rosary Church, New Jersey's oldest Italian parish, holds on to its roots with a traditional street festival on Sixth Street between Brunswick and Monmouth streets from Wednesday, Aug. 13 through Sunday Aug. 17.

Sponsored by the DiFeo auto dealerships of Jersey City, the festival coincides with the Catholic feast days of Our Lady of Assumption and St. Rocco.

"Holy Rosary Church has a tradition of 188 years of keeping the Italian-American tradition alive, and this feast is the evidence of that," said festival Co-chairperson Phil Fusiello. "Each year we make the feast bigger and better and [its success] relies on the strength of our Italian-American heritage. It's a fun night out."

Described as an old-world street festival, the event will feature a smorgasbord of Italian and other ethnic foods, featuring zeppoles and "arancinis," a deep-fried ball of rice with a dollop of meat sauce and peas in the center.

In addition, Downtown's recently opened Baker Boys Café will provide panini for partygoers.

Children will be able to enjoy amusement rides while adults can indulge in chance games and hourly 50/50 drawings. Live music will also be offered each evening at the festival's two stages, a general bandstand on the street and at the Café Pompei, located at the back of the church. Call the church rectory at (201) 795-1093 for more information.

Also slated for weekend of Aug. 16-17 is the Puerto Rican Day Parade and Festival, taking place Saturday and Sunday from noon to 10 p.m. at Exchange Place. Organized by the Desfile Puerto Riqueno de Jersey City and entitled "Uniting Our Generations," the party is estimated to draw up to 30,000 people and will feature both local and international musical acts.

Now in its 42nd year, the annual Puerto Rican Day Parade and Festival is one of Jersey City's most time-honored traditions. With at least 25 vendors selling Puerto Rican and international foodstuffs and other miscellaneous items, the party is known for its fun-filled activities and spirited performances that entice people from all races and ethnicities to celebrate Puerto Rican heritage.

"Everyone is Puerto Rican on that day," said festival committee President Wanda Rodriguez. "It doesn't matter where you come from - you're Puerto Rican that day."

This will be the first year the event is being held at Exchange Place. It was previously held over four days on 18th Street between Jersey Avenue and Grove Street, but the many transportation options available at Exchange Place - in addition to its famously scenic vista - drew organizers to stage the festival there.

While the festival undoubtedly remains a leisure event, its theme this year addresses a serious and growing problem in ethnic communities throughout the country: Families beginning to lose touch with their native customs as more generations are born in the United States.

"We're just trying to make sure our kids don't forget where they come from and that they learn the culture," Rodriguez said.

There will be three beer booths at the festival, Rodriguez said, adding that Coors, Budweiser, and Heineken are confirmed sponsors. Although Bacardi is also a confirmed sponsor, Rodriguez said she wasn't sure if they would be providing any rum for the event.

The planners also will be holding a banquet Friday, Aug. 15 at 8 p.m. at North Bergen's Schuetzen Park. Tickets are $75, which include an open bar, food, and entertainment.

Saturday's events will kick off with a noon Mass, followed by five hours of folkloric music. Jersey City's International Godfather Tito Puente Jr. and his band then come onto the Exchange Place stage at 6, paving the way for later performances by merengue artist Joseph "El Gato" Portes and the New York-based Spanish Harlem Orchestra.

The Sunday parade will begin at 1 p.m. from the Kennedy Boulevard entrance to Lincoln Park. It will work its way northward to Montgomery Street, where it will turn eastward on its way to City Hall. This year's Grand Marshal is Hiram Cordona, a founder of the Roberto Clemente Little League of Jersey City.

Sunday's musical features at Exchange Place start off with four hours of deejay mixes, followed by an hour of salsa music by Nelson Moreno. "Old School salsa" group Sies del Son comes on at 5 p.m., with more salsa by Willie Moreno at 6 p.m. and by Jersey City International Godmother Brenda K. Starr at 7 p.m.

Segundo Quimbamba will tantalize Sunday's audience with their Plena and Bomba stylings before tropical band Los Soneros del Barrio closes the night out at 9 p.m.

The summer season begins to wind down with the Seventh Annual Greek Festival of Jersey City, taking place Sunday, Sept. 7, at Exchange Place. Organized through a committee led by Paulus Hook-based travel agent Michael Vasilakis, the festival will happen from noon to 6 p.m. and feature traditional Greek food, music, and dancing.

"We are a really lively group," Vasilakis said last week. "We have Greek food, Greek singers and live Greek music. We do traditional dances and it's really a lot of fun. We welcome all our American friends to come down and become Greek for a day."

On hand to lead the festivities are the Pan-Hellenic Dancers of the Evangelismos Church and the Staten Island-based Delta Greek-American Band, a group comprised of regional musicians headed by vocalist Nick Moudatso.

Proceeds from the festival benefit the St. Demetrios and Evangelismos Greek Orthodox churches, the only two in the city. Each church gets approximately $5,000 from the event, an amount Vasilakis described as essential for the churches' survival.

Instead of using private vendors to provide food for festival participants, the Greek Festival relies on the generous contributions of local Greek restaurateurs and the time of church parishioners. Vasilakis said churchwomen prepare traditional Greek dishes with food donated by the Flamingo, Lincoln Inn, Colonette, VIP and Coach House restaurants.

Call the city's Department of Cultural Affairs at (201) 547-5522 for more information.