To our beloved San Diego Pride family,
In an average year, we would be wishing you “Happy Pride.” This pride season, however, our community has been met with deep challenges. While we face external threats to our community’s liberty nationwide, we have also received local concerns around safety and visibility.
Be assured: San Diego Pride remains committed to a welcoming and safe Pride Week for all members of our community. To that end, we’ve outlined our approach to providing a secure environment for this year’s Pride Week events.
San Diego Pride’s Pride Week events celebrate queer identities, voices, and joy. To protect the spirit of these spaces, all participants in San Diego Pride’s Pride Week events – whether attendees, vendors, volunteers, or artists – are required to follow our entry policies and code of conduct, which includes a zero tolerance policy for hate speech.
As always, San Diego Pride is coordinating closely with SDPD and the FBI to ensure public safety support for the parade and festival. These agencies work together to ensure large-scale events like ours remain safe, including an increased presence of private security, plain clothes officers, and other safety initiatives. San Diego Pride employs multiple security companies to provide festival and stage security. This year’s parade and festival will include enhanced security and the presence of additional community safety measures, including Legal Observers, who will monitor interactions between law enforcement and the community. We are also consulting with the Chair of the San Diego Pride Military Department regarding ways to keep our entire community safe.
San Diego Pride has also updated our entry policies, including a requirement that only clear bags will be allowed into the festival (with limited exceptions).
Volunteers make Pride possible. Our incredible team of more than 2,000 volunteers work tirelessly to help the parade and festival run smoothly. Volunteer teams include medical, veterinary, community safety, and more.
Pride has its origin in protest, and we value that right. We have designated “free speech zones” at both the parade and outside of the festival. We will do our best to ensure a safe experience for protesters and ask that protest groups and contingents coordinate with San Diego Pride, as possible, so that we can best ensure everyone’s safety.
Whether you are coming out to celebrate and be proud, or you’re coming out to protest and be loud, we hope you will show up, be seen and support our queer community.
With Pride,
San Diego Pride
San Diego Pride raises funds primarily through festival ticket and beverage sales, and through sponsorships, and exhibitor fees. These funds support San Diego Pride’s community philanthropy which has distributed more than $2.5 million in advancement of its mission to foster pride, equality, and respect for all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities locally, nationally, and globally.
