Portland Pride Waterfront Festival and Parade
To better serve our community, Pride Northwest has created a new website for all things related to Portland Pride and the Portland Pride Waterfront Festival and Parade. Go to http://portlandpride.org to stay up to date with all things related to the festival, parade, and Portland Pride. Registration for the Portland Pride Waterfront Festival & Parade, as well as the full Pride Week event lineup, will be located on the NEW event website at http://portlandpride.org *Beginning in 2023, the Waterfront Festival and Parade is moving to July.
Portland Pride is a community effort and we could not make it happen with out you. Thank you to our volunteers, partner organization, parade participants, and sponsors.
To receive updates on festival and parade plans for the 2024 Portland Pride be sure to sign up for the Portland Pride Email List.
Be sure to check out our Pride Northwest YouTube channel, where you can watch the Portland Pride Parade and Mainstage for 2021, in addition to our year round content, like Pride Table Talks!
Pride has been celebrated in Portland since the early 1970s, with the first outdoor celebration in 1976. Pride Northwest, Inc. has organized the annual Portland Pride Waterfront Festival and Parade since 1994.
The Portland Pride Festival is the single, largest visibility avenue for our region’s LGBTQ+ community organizations and businesses, where they can attract new supporters and clients, increase their volunteer base, and raise much needed funds. In addition, the festival attracts thousands of visitors to Portland each year, bringing significant revenue to the local LGBTQ+ business community and to the city, as a whole. LGBTQ+ community members travel here from all over the Pacific Northwest to celebrate themselves and each other, in what is often the only safe and open environment that they may experience for the year. Pride Northwest is particularly committed to providing the Pride celebration, in order to create a safe and celebratory environment for our young people. Not only do things get better, Pride is what better looks like!
One of the ways you can #gayitforward with Pride Northwest is through a direct donation! Your contribution to Pride Northwest not only supports the annual Portland Pride Waterfront Festival and Parade but year-round programming as well. You can find more information about all of our programs here.
Pride Northwest Announces Policy Change Regarding Law Enforcement Participation
in the Portland Pride Waterfront Festival and Parade
News Release: July 20, 2020
Over the last few months, Pride Northwest has acted in a number of ways, responding to both the COVID-19 pandemic and the violence perpetrated against Black people across this country. In addition to supporting Don’t Shoot Portland in their efforts to support the legal needs of citizens exercising their Constitutional rights, we have been working to address the incredible needs of houseless people across the area. Pride Northwest has also made the decision to update its policies regarding the participation of uniformed and armed law enforcement in the Portland Pride Parade and Waterfront Festival. The COVID-19 pandemic interfered with implementation in 2020 but, in looking ahead, we are moving forward.
Beginning in 2021, uniformed and armed law enforcement officers will be disallowed from marching in the Portland Pride Parade and from exhibiting at the Portland Pride Waterfront Festival. The various agencies that typically include law enforcement in their contingents and booths were notified last week. We are now making this decision public, so as to assure our community that we have been paying attention and taking necessary action.
Since 2017, Pride Northwest has been directly engaged in dialogue with local law enforcement, including queer officers, regarding the impact of their actions on our community—specifically on Black, Indigenous, and queer people of color. While there have been glimpses of hope in those conversations, current events and our own experiences tell us that it is not nearly enough. In 2019, we implemented a prohibition against firearms in the parade and continued dialogue but it is not enough. The ever-increasing use of violence against our citizens, many of whom are part of the LGBTQ+ community, is both frightening and unacceptable. While Pride Northwest remains committed to an engagement that ends the violence, we are compelled to take additional action now.
As we have said in the past, the LGBTQ+ community, particularly those of us who are not Black, Indigenous, or people of color, are at a crossroads. We can either continue to ignore the responsibility we carry and the work we still need to do for a better future, or we can stop dead in our tracks and acknowledge the truth of our history and its resulting inequities. Ultimately, we can choose a different path—we MUST choose a different path. Addressing the historical and current impact of police violence is one very important step on that path.
For more information, please contact Executive Director Debra Porta at debra.porta@pridenw.org or Board President Manumalo Ala’ilima at malo.alailima@pridenw.org
In addition to the work and steps referenced in the press release, Pride Northwest has also proceeded with the following:
1. We have made a formal ask of the Alliance for Safer Communities to request their local department members, i.e. the PPD and Multnomah County Sheriff's Department, to cease cooperation with federal agents. We have long been concerned about the efficacy of the Alliance, but the ask cannot go unmade and their members cannot be left without accountability.
2. We have signed onto the Stop Cop Riot letter to Mayor Wheeler.