LETTERS: Pick another date for Pride parade, please

To the editor:

As a respected source for news in West Hollywood, I wanted to pass along my planned public comments at tonight’s West Hollywood City Council on Item 4B.

“Good evening, my name is Grant Turck and I am the executive director of Venice Pride, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation, dedicated to saving lives through acceptance of diversity. We celebrate that mission at Venice Beach, the #1 tourist destination in Southern California, that was founded in 1906 as a peoples paradise by Abbott Kinney. With its world famous bathhouses, dance halls and draw of artistic communities, Venice became a meeting place for LGBT peoples since it’s founding over 100 years ago.

We have been reestablishing that history since our founding in 2016 by creating the first rainbow lifeguard tower on the site of LA’s historic gay beach, dedicated to our first openly gay Councilmember Bill Rosendahl; monthly Gaywatch events and our annual pride celebration lighting the iconic Venice sign in rainbow colors. This year we planned the inaugural Venice Pride Parade down L.A.’s world famous Venice Beach boardwalk scheduled to take place from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, June 5, 2022.

We have Celebrated the first weekend in June since 2016 when we began as a protest to closing the historic Roosterfish gay bar. This year will mark Venice Pride’s fifth annual celebration of the LGBTQ community in L.A.’s coastal region following a two-year pandemic hiatus. In addition to the inaugural Venice Pride Parade on Sunday, June 5th, Venice Pride is thrilled to be presenting the L.A. premiere of Artist Yvette Mattern’s Global Rainbow laser light installation nightly on June 3rd, 4th, and 5th in the sky from Venice to Malibu and the Venice Pride Festival on June 4th and 5th. These preparations are all well underway.  

Unfortunately, these event dates conflict with the proposed WeHo Pride Parade you are now considering. To remedy this; on behalf of Venice Pride, we respectfully ask West Hollywood to consider alternatives including marching in the Venice Pride Parade this year, scheduling the West Hollywood parade to begin in the afternoon of June 5th or moving the West Hollywood parade to another date, possibly the second weekend in June. 

We think competing parades would divide our greater L.A. community’s response to either event. As we all emerge from the pandemic, we are hoping our two historic LGBTQ communities can work together to resolve this conflict and create an even better celebration of pride this year. Thank you.”

Please feel free to reach out if you have any follow-up questions.

Thank you,
Grant Turck
Executive Director