Queens Shows Unity In Parade
Get out your rainbow gear, the Queens Pride Parade is coming to Jackson Heights
By Noah C. Zuss

The 16th Annual Queens Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Parade and Festival will take place June 1.

This year's theme of "Live, Love, Be" will celebrate the diversity and mutual respect of the borough of Queens.

The parade, organized by The Queens Lesbian Gay Pride Committee is Queens' largest multi-service lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights organization.

A rainbow banner is laid out at the start of last year's Queens Pride Parade

The mission of QLGPC is to disseminate information about, and foster knowledge and understanding of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities.

They seek to "educate the public about the history of LGBT rights and create and support activities commemorating events of importance within the LGBT movement."

Their assembly of Queens' annual Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Parade and Multicultural Festival is the group's primary organizing effort. This year's parade is expected to draw upwards of 40,000 participants.

New York State Assembly Member Jose Peralta (D-Jackson Heights), City Councilwoman Rosie Mendez (D- Manhattan) and Richard Burns, executive director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Services Center, have been named grand marshals and will lead the annual pride parade and festival in Jackson Heights - one of Queens' most diverse neighborhoods.

Daniel Dromm, co-organizer and community district leader is proud to bring the event to Queens.

"I think the parade being in Queens is particularly significant because it brings home the message that Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender people are your friends, family and neighbors," Dromm said. "And when the parade started we wanted to put a face on the tens of thousands of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender people in Queens. If you come to the parade you can see the diversity of those faces. I think that's what makes it unique."

The parade kicks off noon at 89th Street and proceeds down 37th Avenue to 75th Street where it disperses into the festival.

The festival runs from 11 a.m. until 6 p.m. and is held on 37th Road between 73rd and 77th Streets.

At the festival three stages will be set up for performers. Highlighting this year's guests will be American Music Award winner and multi-Platinum recording artist Randy Jones, the original Village People Cowboy.

There will also be a youth pride section at the festival.

Assemblyman Peralta, Councilwoman Mendez and Burns were tapped to lead the parade because all have been outspoken advocates of equal rights and same sex marriage.

"We are extremely pleased that Assemblymember Jose Peralta and Councilmember Mendez are serving as our Grand Marshals," said Hank Krumholz, co-chairman of the Queens Lesbian and Gay Pride Committee. "Assemblymember Peralta and Councilmember Mendez have been long time supporters of the LGBT communities and of marriage equality."

Particularly noteworthy is Councilwoman Mendez. She is a progressive, out lesbian member of the City Council.

The parade expects to draw near 30,000 to Jackson Heights this Sunday.

Also being honored this year as a Grand Marshal is Burns, executive director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Services Center in Manhattan.

The Center is celebrating its 25th anniversary and Queens Pride chose to honor Burns because of his leadership throughout the years.

"All of our honorees are leaders in the fight to secure equal rights for LGBT people," said Dromm. "Among those rights is the right to marry. LGBT people are demanding the same rights as non-gay people."

This year's celebration is expected to attract the largest crowd ever. More than 30,000 people attended last year's event.

The event is quite inclusive as organizers invite both gay and non-gay groups to march and stress that no group is too small or too large to march. Seventy-five groups registered in last year's parade and more than 100 vendors set up booths and tables at the festival.

The parade and festival were originally conceived in 1993 as a response to the homophobic attitudes in Queens.

Since then the Queens parade has become a wonderful mixture of party and politics welcomed by the Jackson Heights community.

Also of note is the multicultural mixture of the parade attendees. Parents bring children in strollers to view the glamorous drag queens and colorful floats involved in the event.

The Queens celebration is first in a series of very special events that kick off a month of Pride activities citywide. Also included in this month's activities are a LGBT celebration at the Queens Museum of Art and the Queens Borough President's LGBT Pride celebration at Queens Borough Hall on June 24.

The Queens Lesbian and Gay Pride Committee is the borough's largest LGBT organization. This program is funded, in part, by a grant from the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs.

The QLGPC also receives much funding from elected officials, including Queens Borough President Helen Marshall, to provide direct social services to the LGBT communities in Queens, the "Borough of Nations."