Irish Voice, March 8, 2007

Irish Times, March 03, 2000

NEW York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who refuses to march in the annual Fifth Avenue St. Patrick's Day Parade as long as it bans gay groups, has announced that she will march with her father in the St. Patrick's Day parade in Dublin.

Quinn, who is the city's first openly gay council speaker, is heading to the Dublin parade at the personal invitation of Irish officials. Her decision to participate highlights the fact that the Dublin parade does not ban gay groups.

Speaking at New York's only all-inclusive St. Patrick's Day parade in Sunnyside last Sunday she told the Irish Voice, "I'm marching in two inclusive parades this year, the Sunnyside parade and the Dublin parade. In both parades my participation is an opportunity to march openly as a member of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community, something we have not been able to do in New York City."

In Dublin, Quinn will march with the lord mayor, members of the Dail (Irish Parliament) and Dublin City Council members. The New York City Parade Committee has refused to allow gay groups to march since the issue arose in the early 1990s, and a series of court decisions have come down in their favor.

Quinn made her announcement to applause from participants in the Sunnyside parade. "I hope my participation in the Dublin march will send a message about the importance of inclusion," she said.

Speakers at the parade included New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who found himself eclipsed on the day by Quinn's dramatic announcement.

Other speakers included prominent Irish American attorney and former acting president of Division Five of the Ancient Order of the Hibernians, Cody McCone. Addressing the crowd before the parade, McCone said, "I can explain my participation here today very simply, our constitution says that we are all created equal."

McCone, of the O'Dwyer and Bernstein law firm, celebrated the commitment to social justice of his friend and former parade honoree, the late Frank Durkan. He also acknowledged the participation of Durkan's widow Monica, who was in attendance.

The parade doubled in size this year, and hundreds of observers filled out along the route to applaud participants. Irish groups in the parade included the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform and the Irish American Unity Conference.

Brendan Fay, the parade co-organizer, was delighted by the increased attendance. "No one will ever know what happens behind the scenes when calls are made by influential people to try and prevent participants from showing up. That chilling effect works on some but as you can see not on everyone this is our largest parade ever," he said.

The biting wind blowing in from the East River did nothing to dampen the spirits of Keltic Kids, the brightly dressed young Irish dance troupe from the Bronx. Dance teacher and parade honoree Caroline Duggan led them expertly through their paces along the route. Their skill and dexterity was matched only by Niall O'Leary's equally eye catching Irish dance troupe.

As happens every year, a group of protestors held up hand written sings along the route that read "Stop Blaspheming Our Lord," and "Fry Mumia Jamal." But this year, perhaps in response to the icy wind, their numbers had dropped.

Responding to them, Fay insisted the protestors had got it wrong in any case.

"This is not a gay parade," said the 47-year-old activist and filmmaker. "It is an all-inclusive parade. The point of it is that we don't discriminate against anyone. We're all welcome to celebrate our Irish heritage here."

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A St. Pat's Parade for Everyone

Metro New York

March 5, 2007

Patrick Arden

SUNNYSIDE. The wind was frigid at 43rd and Skillman yesterday, but you'd never know that by looking at Brendan Fay. Dressed in a checked sports jacket, gray slacks and tennis shoes, Fay darted among the marchers in his eighth annual

St. Pat's for All Parade, which bills itself as "New York City's inclusive St. Patrick's Day Parade." A wide range of groups were included, too: marching bands, Mexican folk dancers, dog owners, Veterans for Peace and a collection of artists

who dressed up in furry animal suits. Though parade co-chair Barbara Mohr wore a button that read "straight but not narrow," she wanted one thing to be perfectly clear. "This is an inclusive parade," said Mohr, a 73-year-old widow and

former nun. "It is not a gay parade." Yet the Queens event was founded in reaction to the refusal of Manhattan's St. Patrick's Day Parade to allow gay marchers. "We were so frustrated," Mohr recalled. "Then we decided it would be better to

start a celebration where everybody could come who wanted to come." Fay arrived in Jamaica, Queens, in 1984, planning to study theology at St. John's University. The 47-year-old is now a documentary filmmaker and activist. "I felt in my

heart that the city simply needed a celebration that would be open and welcoming to all who wanted to celebrate Ireland and its great cultural heritage," explained Fay, who pointed out that many of the parade's seemingly disparate groups

were "in some way honoring the Irish diaspora across the world." For example, he said, the dancers in the Ballet Quetzalcoatl de Brooklyn are perennials, coming up from Sunset Park every year to honor the Batallan de San Patricio, a

battalion of Texas militia who deserted and fought alongside the Mexican army in the 1846-'48 Mexican-American War. "You know, the founder of the Ecuadorian navy was from my own home town of Drogheda, Thomas Charles Wright,"

Fay said. "The Irish wound up in the Caribbean as slaves and working on the sugar plantations. Roger Casement went to the Congo and was an Irish patriot and gay man. So, to me, it makes sense that we all march together." When the

parade finished in Woodside, Fay went back to greeting people. Two had traveled all the way from Ireland. In a pub called Saints and Sinners, a friend asked Fay about the few protesters who lined the route, holding signs scrawled "Stop

Blaspheming Our Lord" and even "Old Hippies." "We've always had a handful," said Fay. "I wish I had cups of tea to hand them. I know what it's like to protest in the cold."

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn won't march again in the Fifth Avenue parade. She's been invited to march in Dublin. Unlike in Manhattan, the Dublin parade allows lesbian and gay groups.

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Place for Council Speaker in St. Patrick's Parade?

NY Newsday

March 10, 2006

Bryan Virasami

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn was on the fence Thursday as to whether she would participate in next week's St. Patrick's Day Parade, which excludes gay and lesbian groups, according to a spokeswoman.

Quinn, who is Irish and openly gay, in the past has condemned the parade for barring Irish gays. She was among a group of activists who were arrested seven years ago while taking part in a protest against the annual parade on Fifth Avenue.

Quinn's spokeswoman, Maria Alvarado, said Thursday that the speaker has not decided whether to march.

"We will be making a decision by the 17th," she said, referring to the day of the parade.

Alvarado declined to discuss whether Quinn has raised the question of gay and lesbian groups taking part in next Friday's parade with event organizers.

Brendan Fay, co-chairman of the St. Patrick's Parade in Queens, which was founded as an inclusive parade, said he was hopeful Quinn could pave the way for gays and lesbians to march openly at the Fifth Avenue event. Fay said he would surprised if she marched without seeking changes in policy.

"I think people are reflecting on the issue and on Christine Quinn and whether she marches or not," said Fay, a gay activist. "In a way, she embodies and raises the question for all of us."

A spokesman for the Manhattan parade, organized by the Ancient Order of Hibernians, could not be reached for comment Thursday. One parade organizer said that traditionally the City Council speaker is among the elected officials invited to participate and that the parade allows anyone to march as long as they are not part of an organized gay group with a banner.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg is expected to march in the Fifth Avenue parade, as he has done annually.

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Guest Op Ed: These Irish Eyes Won't Be Smiling On St. Pat's Day

Courier Life

March 9, 2006

Christopher Murray

The afternoon of Sunday, March 19th will mark the thirty-first anniversary of the Brooklyn Saint Patrick’s Day Parade, a festive and spirited showing of Irish pride and community cohesion. In the over ten years I’ve lived on Bartel Pritchard Square in the Windsor Terrace section of South Park Slope where the parade starts, I have never attended the parade.
 
Although I wear the map of Ireland on my face, love the stories of my wild and wonderful Irish uncles, and cherish the literature and traditions of the Emerald Isle, I have neither marched in nor watched the parade. And while I represent my community and neighboring Sunset Park on Community Board 7 and am active in civic organizations all over the wonderful borough of Brooklyn, this year will not be any different. I won’t march for the simple reason that I’m not welcome in the parade.

As one of the many, many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in Brooklyn, I remain excluded from this community celebration of my ethnicity which welcomes groups to march in the parade by invitation only and pointedly refuses all overtures from Irish gay and lesbian groups to join the festivities.

In fact, parade organizers have in the recent past added insult to exclusion, with one main parade organizer in 2003 confronting would-be gay participants to say “You’re not marching in this parade. You’re fags and you’re gay and you’re not marching.”

Things have even turned uglier in previous years. Peaceful protests at the parade culminated one year with the arrest of several gay protesters including gay Irish activist Brendan Fay and District Leader Alan Fleishman who joined the march at Bartel Pritchard Square.

While the Brooklyn parade’s exclusionary practices still sting, the LGBT community in Brooklyn is heartened that the vast majority of politicians representing the borough decline to march in the parade in solidarity with the idea that discrimination and prejudice based on sexual orientation or gender identity is a relic of the past.

And while the Fifth Avenue St. Patrick’s Day parade down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan remains aligned with the Roman Catholic church’s sadly intolerant position on homosexuality – all the sadder for that institution’s recent and continuing scandals regarding sexual abuse and misconduct among the clergy – the silver lining shown in our sister borough of Queens this past weekend at the St. Pat’s for All Parade in Sunnyside.

This inclusive parade had as its theme this year “Cherishing all the Children of the Nation Equally” and welcomed all comers including Mayor Bloomberg, openly gay City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, and noted Irish author of Angela’s Ashes Frank McCourt along with his brothers Malachy, Michael and Alfie.

While I defer to none in recognition of the pre-eminence of Brooklyn as the most magnificent of the boroughs of New York City, I admit to being jealous of Queens one day a year when they outstrip us in terms of their showing of tolerance, generosity and panache in regards to how they celebrate St. Patrick’s Day.

I look forward to the year hopefully soon when cold hearts unclench and I can march alongside my neighbors who love Brooklyn as much as I do and who share Walt Whitman’s notion that “a great city is that which has the greatest men and women” as we find togetherness and a sense of shared community in our identities, and not difference and separation.

Christopher Murray is the Co-President of Lambda Independent Democrats, Brooklyn’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Political Club. For more information, go to www.lidbrooklyn.org.
 
©Courier-Life Publications 2006

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Gay and Irish, Quinn Faces Tough Choice Over Parade
 
The Sun

March 7, 2006

Jill Gardiner
 
Seven years ago, Christine Quinn was arrested for protesting the annual St.Patrick's Day Parade because it does not allow gay and lesbian groups to march.
 
The newly elected City Council speaker, who is openly gay and Irish, has a difficult decision this year as leader of a body that historically has participated in the Fifth Avenue event. Yesterday, the chairman of the parade, John Dunleavy,said Ms.Quinn is "more than welcome to march" and that he believes she would do so as the head of the council's delegation.
 
"I have the utmost faith that she will respect the views of the parade and we will respect her,and that she'll march up and lead the City Council as speakers have done in past years," Mr. Dunleavy said during a telephone interview.
 
Ms. Quinn in the past called for elected officials to sit out the parade until it allows gay and lesbian groups to march. After gaining national recognition as the first female and the first openly gay council member to be elected speaker, some are wondering whether she'll try to broker a compromise with parade organizers.
 
A spokeswoman for Ms. Quinn, Maria Alvarado, said yesterday that the speaker "certainly hopes to be able to march, but there are no formal negotia tions at this time." Ms. Alvarado said they would see what happens between now and March 17.
 
Mr. Dunleavy said he has not talked to the speaker, but that individuals have been free to march in the parade for some time - as long as they aren't part of an organized gay group marching with a banner. Mr. Dunleavy also tried to soften the parade's past position by pointing out that it doesn't ban gays and lesbians, but simply does not allow any advocacy group. In 2004, one parade sponsor, Boru Irish vodka, was kicked out of the parade after it had sponsored a gay-friendly parade in Queens a week earlier.
 
A gay activist, Brendan Fay, who was arrested with Ms. Quinn in 1999 while protesting the parade, predicted there would be "many conversations" and "some deep soul searching" in the coming days as the speaker contemplates what to do. He also said that it would be "quite a step forward" for the parade organizers to have Ms. Quinn participate given that she is the most prominent gay leader in the city.
 
Mr. Fay, a founder of the Queens parade, said participation by Ms. Quinn could have profound implications and that she "could be the leader who moves the ongoing conflict toward a resolution."
 
"I remember the arrests, the animosity, and the deeply held prejudices that continue to have ramifications in the Irish community and in the gay community, and it always resurfaces at this time of year," he said.
 
Still, Mr. Fay expressed mixed feelings, saying that exclusion of gay groups is "tragic" and that nobody should have to hide their identity when they march.
 
His comments highlight the delicate nature of the parade for all elected officials. Mayor Bloomberg has come under fire from gay groups in the past for participating. Ms. Quinn's predecessor, Gifford Miller, skipped the parade.
 
Ms. Quinn, however, is in a unique position, given that she has spent much of her career fighting for gay and lesbian equality.That could give her more leeway in setting a new precedent.
 
A professor of public affairs at Baruch College, David Birdsell, said Ms. Quinn's position as speaker could ramp up the pressure on parade organizers to loosen their restrictions. He said it would be difficult for her to march in the very parade she's protested unless the organizers make changes.
 
"It's tricky," he said."If it's framed as Chris marches, but she does so under our relatively restrictive rules, than it looks like she capitulated to the niceties of position. On the other hand if it is the parade that muzzles itself ... that is something that looks much more like a compromise."

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The McCourts Take The Lead

NY Newsday

January 31, 2006

Dennis Duggan

The Brothers McCourt aren't big on parades and especially on the biggest and oldest of them all, the daylong St. Patrick's Day Parade up Fifth Avenue. "Angela's Ashes" author Frank McCourt once dismissed the grand march, saying that "if you threw a bomb at this ghastly assemblage, you would wipe out the cream of Irish mediocrity."

So why then, have the McCourts - Malachy, Frank, Mike and Alphie - agreed to lead this year's inclusive parade in Queens?
Outspoken gay activist Brendan Fay tells me that "We had a long list of names to consider and we agreed Malachy was our man. He has always supported us. When I called to tell him, he said he would march, but that he wanted his brothers to march with him and so they will."

"There will be an avalanche of McCourts at the parade," says Malachy McCourt, 74, now appearing in a one-man show, "You Don't Have to be Irish," at the Irish Repertory Theatre on West 22nd Street.

I asked Malachy why he had agreed to lead the much smaller Queens parade. He quoted the late City Council President Paul O'Dwyer, who told him that the larger Fifth Avenue affair "is guided solely by the question, 'Who can we keep out of this parade?'"

For Fay and Ellen Duncan, an Irish immigrant and a working nurse, who co-founded the Queens parade in Sunnyside and Woodside seven years ago, the question is not who can be kept out of the parade, but who can be brought into it. "We celebrate diversity," says Fay, "and so do Malachy and his brothers Frank and Alphie and Michael."

Fay, who is openly gay, decided to found the smaller parade in response to the systematic exclusion of a gay pride contingent along Fifth Avenue.

Despite the prestigious honorees, not everyone in Queens welcomes the annual parade in their borough, which wends its way through once overwhelmingly Irish neighborhoods. Some parishioners at Queen of Angels Church, a Catholic congregation along the route, which begins in Sunnyside and culminates in Woodside, have openly protested the parade, and groups of hecklers would just as soon see it disappear.

The Queens parade, which steps off on March 5 at 12:30 p.m., is a must for city politicians, including Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and national politicians such as Sen. Hillary Clinton. City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, the first woman and first openly gay person elected to the leadership post, will be honored along with the McCourts and Duncan.

Duncan, who works at the Mary Manning Walsh Home for the Aged in Upper Manhattan, says that "the McCourts are the premier Irish family in New York City today and it was a coup for us to be able to honor them.

"Everyone in the Irish community knows them," she said, "and so this brings a large amount of Irishness to the parade."

Fay is working on a film documentary on Father Mychal Judge, the fire department chaplain who died during the World Trade Center attack on Sept. 11, 2001, after he was struck by falling debris. Fay says he is hoping to get Irish actor Gabriel Byrne, now appearing on Broadway, or Ian McKellen to narrate the documentary.

It isn't easy to start a new parade, what with permits and costs and needed community approval, but in the summer of 1999, Fay and Duncan met at a Spanish restaurant in Queens. They talked about starting a new parade that would celebrate diversity. Duncan followed up and got several groups including unions and others to help sponsor it.

"I'd had it up to here after being arrested for being gay when I tried to march in the St. Patrick's Day parade on Fifth Avenue." So what began as dream in 1999 is now, seven years later, a reality and a parade that opens its arms to people who wouldn't feel comfortable with the much older, much bigger parade in Manhattan.

So, in a way, the success of this little parade mirrors the success story of the McCourts, an extraordinary clan who made it through the miserable childhood that Frank McCourt chronicled so eloquently in "Angela's Ashes." That book won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Award, an amazing trifecta. "Angela's Ashes" was followed by "'Tis," and this year by "Teacher Man." All three books made it to the top of the New York Times Bestseller List, a rare feat indeed.

"I am not living the American Dream; I am living the American fantasy," says Frank McCourt.

On March 5 he will be at the head of the Queens parade, along with his three brothers and Ellen Duncan, whose perseverance turned what began as a kind of fantasy into a well-established parade in Queens, a borough that itself celebrates diversity each and every day.

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St. Patrick's Day Parade Touts Unity in Sunnyside

Times Ledger

March 10, 2005

Matthew Monks

Unity was the theme of the annual St. Patrick's Day Parade in Sunnyside Sunday, with homosexuals, Boy Scouts, civic groups, marching bands and politicians participating in the event .

"Welcome to New York City's inclusive St. Patrick's Day parade," event founder Brendan Fay announced to a crowd of several hundred marchers. "We're here to celebrate the spirit of Ireland and our Celtic heritage."

Revelers universally derided Manhattan's better-known St. Patrick's Day parade that bans gay marchers.

"They don't let other groups march," said Yuri Cantor, 26, of Manhattan, who was marching with about a dozen self-described anarchists who carried a black banner featuring the anarchy symbol inside a green shamrock. "It's really quite repulsive - that type of behavior and sentiment."

Cantor embraced the unity of the Sunnyside parade while distributing flaming pink fliers advocating "the elimination of imposed social hierarchy ... We stand for the creation of a new society without borders and against the bosses, both orange and green."

As divisive as that might sound, the dissidents were welcomed with open arms.

"We don't exclude anyone," said Woodside resident Lillian Gross, of the Western Queens Independent Democrats.

"We believe in civil rights," added her friend, Gaye Fruscione, 42, of Briarwood.

The Manhattan parade does not, said Keith Mulet, 19, who marched with Astoria's Generation Q, a drop-in center for gay youth that carried a rainbow-emblazoned banner.

"They're ignoring that we exist. Just ignoring us doesn't mean we're going away," Mulet said. "We have every right to be gay and Irish."

And in remarks before the procession, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said to raucous applause that homosexuals were guaranteed another right: "We need to make sure the city opens itself up to everybody. Opportunity means marriage should be available to everyone."

While the mayor did not march, other politicians did, including City Councilman Eric Gioia (D-Sunnyside), state Assemblyman Michael Gianaris (D-Astoria) and New Paltz Mayor Jason West, who was arrested after officiating several same-sex marriages .

Reach reporter Matthew Monks by e-mail at news@timesledger.com or by phone at 718-229-0300, Ext. 156.

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Queens St. Pat's Now a Must-Show

Gay City News

March 10-16, 2005

Winnie McCroy

The cold winds sweeping through Sunnyside, Queens on the afternoon of March 6 may have kept some celebrants inside their homes, but it did not prevent a host of politicians, including Mayor Michael Bloomberg, from showing up for the sixth annual St. Pat’s For All gay-inclusive parade.

The event has become a political barnstorming alternative to the controversial Fifth Avenue parade in Manhattan, controlled by the Ancient Order of Hibernians, a group that has steadfastly refused to allow gay and lesbian-identified contingents to march.

This year it was also a chance for the mayor to reconcile with the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community after his February 5 decision to appeal a pro-gay marriage ruling the day before by Supreme Court Justice Doris Ling-Cohen, a move that has made politics very local for the city’s queers.

Unlike many, though not all, Democratic leaders, Bloomberg marches both in Queens and on Fifth Avenue. The LGBT community had successfully convinced most Democrats to boycott the March 17 parade, though Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, during her 2000 election drive, departed from that emerging tradition.

Clearly pleased that Bloomberg had arrived to participate in the parade, its longtime organizer, Brendan Fay, an Irish gay and AIDS activist, said, “I think it is very good that the mayor is coming to our all-inclusive parade,” adding, “but we wish he would really support our collective equality and work with us on the marriage issue.”

Fay said he intended to use his time with the mayor to challenge him on his appeal of the Ling-Cohen ruling that ordered the city clerk to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

“We’ll have to loudly communicate to this mayor that if he’s really with us, if he wants to walk in our parade, he has to walk with us as well on all the other days,” said Fay.

In his February 5 statement, Bloomberg said he personally supports same-sex marriage rights and would push for legislation recognizing it in Albany. He has also asked that his appeal be expedited by being heard immediately in the state’s highest court, the Court of Appeals. No decision on that request has yet been made by the court.

Noting that Bloomberg will also march on May 17 in Manhattan, Fay said, nonetheless, “it is right that he come, celebrate with us and listen to our concerns and our issues.”

Of course, Bloomberg did not have the field to himself. Two of his potential Democratic rivals in November—City Council Speaker Gifford Miller and Manhattan Borough Pres. C. Virginia Fields—also came out for Sunday’s march, and two others—former Bronx Borough Pres. Fernando Ferrer and Brooklyn Congressman Anthony Weiner—attended a post-march celebration at the Saints & Sinners bar in Woodside.

In Sunnyside, as workers filled balloons for an orange, white and green arch, the colors of the Irish national flag, and volunteers searched for marchers to carry colorful puppets, a Queens Democratic district leader, Daniel Dromm, a longtime gay activist who was a co-founder of the borough’s June LGBT pride festivities, took a moment to express his own mixed feelings over Bloomberg’s participation.

“On one hand, it is good that we have the office of the mayor represented here,” said Dromm. “On the other hand, I have been upset with his stand on many issues. I don’t see how you can say you support gay marriage and then you go out and fight against it. He’s been bad on the Equal Partner Benefits bill, he’s been bad on the Dignity for All Students bill, and also I don’t like his education stuff.”

Dromm referred to laws enacted by the City Council over mayoral vetoes that provide benefits to the partners of LGBT employees working for contractors doing business with the city and an education measure that addresses bullying in the public schools and includes specific protections for queer youth. Bloomberg is currently challenging the contractor law in a lawsuit.

Many of Sunday’s participants echoed the sentiments articulated by Dromm, who is a public school teacher.

From a stage set up at the end of the parade route, Bloomberg attempted to explain his marriage appeal decision in words that emphasized his support for LGBT rights.

“This is a time of the year when we really should be making sure this is a city of opportunity,” the mayor said. “Opportunity means jobs, opportunity means no crime, opportunity means good schools and I happen to believe that opportunity also means that marriage should be available to everyone. The city is trying to do what we can to understand what the state law really means, and we have to make sure that the city opens itself up to everybody, and I think this parade is one of the ways to do it.”

Bloomberg’s words, however, did not silence his Democratic critics.

Christine Quinn, a lesbian city councilwoman from Manhattan, who marched with Speaker Miller, whose mayoral bid she strongly supports, said, “I think of course it’s nice that the mayor comes, but we can’t forget that he also marches down Fifth Avenue in a parade that doesn’t let us in.”

Quinn then went after the mayor for being a political hypocrite.

“In some ways, this parade is in the talk-is-cheap category,” she said, adding that if the mayor “really believed that law is so unclear that it needed to be decided on by the state’s highest court, he could have issued the marriage licenses and appealed.”

Asked how the mayor’s decision resonated among the city’s LGBT community, Quinn replied, “His decision to appeal was extraordinarily disappointing.”

In her remarks, Fields, the Manhattan borough president, also distinguished between participating in the Queens parade and joining the Manhattan event.

“I am here today to support the lesbian and gay community and to say again that exclusion from the parade is something that I hate,” she said. “And I don’t believe that any group should be excluded from the parade because of maybe different beliefs, lifestyles or ideology.”

City Councilwoman Margarita Lopez, a lesbian who is running for Manhattan borough president, said she turned out Sunday due to her “enormous respect to the Irish community” and “because it’s a parade that’s inclusionary.”

“The parade sends a message that everyone is welcome,” Lopez said. “Be black, be white, be Latino, be a woman or a man or be gay, you are welcome in this parade.”

Author Malachy McCourt noted that “it’s very unfortunate that all people who are of human descent can’t get together and celebrate all our ethnic heritages one way or another, and that’s what I think is beautiful about being here. Very decent, good people have organized this and it’s a great memory of Mychal Judge,” the gay fire department chaplain killed at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

As groups including the All City High Schools Marching Band, the New York Irish Dance Academy, Staten Island Stonewall, Dignity USA and Dignity New York and the Boys Club stepped off into the march, other elected officials echoed the sentiment that having an inclusive St. Patrick’s Day parade was very important.

Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum said, “This is the first parade of the season and the fact that it’s inclusive is extremely important. I believe that all parades should be inclusive—we should include everyone who wants to march regardless of anything, because parades are fun and they’re all about celebrating.”

As the parade made its way down Skillman Avenue, the crowds cheered the marching bands, performers and many groups that had assembled. A lively bunch of anarchists, dressed in black and green and waving black flags that featured a shamrock overlaid with the anarchy symbol, kept the end of the parade festive with drumming, flag waving and good-natured chaos.

Some of those same protesters will join the activists who plan to protest the Fifth Avenue parade at 10:30 a.m. on March 17, at the east side of Fifth Avenue and 58th Street.

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Mayor's Heckler Works for State Senate Leader

Newsday

March 8, 2005

Joshua Robin

A man who heckled Mayor Michael Bloomberg at a gay-inclusive St. Patrick's Day parade is a staff employee in the office of State Senate Minority Leader David Paterson.

Allen Roskoff, a longtime gay rights activist who called Bloomberg a "bigot" several times Sunday at the Woodside event before the mayor's security detail confronted him, is a special assistant to Paterson, a Democrat, according to state records.

"Allen's characterization of the mayor as a bigot is not representative of our office," Michael Jones-Bey, chief of staff for Paterson, said after learning from a reporter what Roskoff had said.

Roskoff, who is paid $85,000 a year as a liaison to the gay and lesbian communities, previously worked for several city and state officials in a public career that stretches to 1972.

He is also an unpaid operative for City Council Speaker Gifford Miller, a likely mayoral contender.

In the telephone interview, Roskoff, 55, defended his heckling of Bloomberg, a Republican, saying, "when I am on my own time, I represent myself."

"I was there totally independent of my doing anything here," he added, speaking from his downtown Manhattan office.

Roskoff said he objected to Bloomberg's stance on same-sex marriage. The mayor has said he personally supports that right, but last month, he nonetheless appealed a State Supreme Court court ruling that would allow marriages here.

Bloomberg said at the time that he wants the state's highest court to decide on the ruling's legality before the city issues licenses.

Roskoff yesterday accused the mayor of talking "out of both sides of his mouth."

A Bloomberg spokesman declined to comment.

Steve Sigmund, a spokesman for Miller, said, "The bottom line is Gifford Miller is a positive person, so he thinks that kind of language is unnecessary and inappropriate."

Staff writer Glenn Thrush contributed to this story.

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Applause Greets Bloomberg at St. Pat's For All

The Sun

March 7, 2005

Jill Gardiner

The annual Queens St. Patrick's Parade, also known as the St. Pat's for All Parade, has become something of a political minefield for Mayor Bloomberg.

Yesterday the mayor was greeted with applause at the event, the only St. Patrick's Day parade in the city that permits gay and lesbian groups to march with their banners, yet when he left, some participants painted his appeal of last month's ruling on same-sex marriage as woefully hypocritical.

The mayor of New Paltz, Jason West, who made national headlines for marrying 25 same-sex couples last year, said the mayor had "decided to side with those for whom bigotry and hatred and exclusion are more important."

"I think that Mayor Bloomberg is an embarrassment at this point," Mr. West, 27, said as the parade wended its way through the middle-class neighborhood of Sunnyside. Last year the New Paltz politician said he hoped his New York City counterpart would join his cause.

After nearly a year of public pressure, Mr. Bloomberg, a Republican, announced in early February that he supported giving legal recognition to same-sex marriage - a position that even some prominent Democrats have not taken. "People have the right to love, to live with, and to marry whoever they want," the mayor said.

In the next breath, however, Mr. Bloomberg declared that he would appeal a ruling by a state Supreme Court judge in Manhattan that would compel the New York City clerk to issue marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples. The mayor said it simply did not make sense to issue licenses without a verdict from the state's highest court, the Court of Appeals. Without it, he said, the city would run the risk of having to nullify the certificates.

Before taking a helicopter to Staten Island yesterday for a second St. Patrick's Day Parade, Mr. Bloomberg told the crowd he shared their view on same-sex marriage and that they differed only on how to achieve that goal.

The mayor's stance on the issue has given his opponents in the upcoming mayoral election more ammunition, adding to a stockpile that includes Mr. Bloomberg's insistence that the city should subsidize a domed stadium on Manhattan's West Side and what other candidates characterize as his failed overhaul of the public-school system.

Yesterday, nearly all of the mayoral candidates split their time between the Queens and Staten Island parades, shaking hands and showing their faces in two politically important swing areas of the city. The speaker of the City Council, Gifford Miller; the borough president of Manhattan, C. Virginia Fields; the former borough president of the Bronx, Fernando Ferrer, and Rep. Anthony Weiner all made appearances in Queens - the last two at a bar called Saints & Sinners, just as the parade wrapped up.

While the Staten Island parade route was packed with cheering crowds, the "inclusionary" Queens parade had only a few stragglers holding signs on the sidewalks and some vendors offering green balloons, necklaces, and hats. The event gets a regular procession of elected officials and political candidates who want to show their support for gay issues and serves as mechanism to protest the city's largest St. Patrick's Day parade on March 17 along Fifth Avenue, which bars gay groups.

At Staten Island, Mr. Bloomberg said this was the first of three weekends of St. Patrick's Day events and proclaimed: "Everyone has a little Irish today." He also said people were "screaming" along the parade route in support of the stadium.

During the earlier parade, the local Democratic district leader, Daniel Dromm, said he was glad the mayor came - Mayor Giuliani never attended - but said he wanted a regime change in City Hall.

"I don't see how somebody who believes in gay marriage can then turn around and, you know, appeal the decision that was made," he said.

The founder of the parade, Brendan Fay, said the mayor had gone out of his way to be at the parade every year and to invite the leadership to Gracie Mansion. Mr. Fay said, though, that he was still disappointed with the mayor's stance. The mayor of Nyack, John Shields, who was wearing a Kelly-green scarf and a black top-hat adorned with a gay-pride rainbow, called Mr. Bloomberg "cowardly."

"I think Mayor Bloomberg is trying to ride both sides of the fence, and I think he's a cowardly elected official," said Mr. Shields, who is openly gay. He is appealing a court ruling that said he could not administer gay marriages.

The issue has been a tricky one for Mr. Bloomberg. The ruling by Justice Doris Ling-Cohen put him in the position of having to choose between courting Democrats, the overwhelming majority of city voters, or appeasing Republicans, whom he needs to win the primary and to rally behind him in the general election. It is, though, also shaping up to be a thorny issue for some of his Democratic challengers, who will need support from conservative Democrats who don't support gay marriage.

Yesterday, Council Member Christine Quinn of Manhattan, who brought a plate of waffles to a news conference last year to chide the mayor for "waffling" on gay marriage, said, "It's certainly nice that the mayor came" but parade appearances "fall into the talk-is-cheap category."

The Queens parade's lone bagpipe player, John Maynard, said he is gay but he agreed with the mayor's appeal. Riding the No. 7 train back to Manhattan after the parade, Mr. Maynard said: "I go along with it. It's probably a good way to do it. If you get the courts, you can settle it once and for all."

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Gay-Friendly Irish Distiller Punished

New York Blade

March 19, 2004

Atiya Jones

The annual March 17 St. Patrick’s Patrick Parade, a New York tradition, seemed to go on without any problems this year. But again this year, the Ancient Order of Hibernians, the group that organizes the parade, has brought the issue of Irish gay participation to the fore.

For the past several years, the Fifth Avenue parade has been mired in controversy over the issue of not allowing an Irish gay group to participate. This time, the controversy concerns the parade’s organizers dropping of one of its sponsors, Boru Vodka.

Boru Vodka, the Queens-based Irish vodka company, was dropped as a sponsor from the Fifth Avenue parade because of its involvement in the gay-inclusive St. Patrick’s Day Parade, actually held on Sunday, March 7, through Sunnyside, Queens.

John Dunleavy, 66, one of the chairs of the Fifth Avenue parade, told the New York Daily News, “If they want to support that parade run by the gays, that’s fine with us. But we want no part of it, even though it’s a very good vodka.”

Brendan Fay, a co-chair for the inclusive parade, was shocked by the statements made by Dunleavy and James Barker, another chair of the Fifth Avenue parade. “Michael Bloomberg was at our parade too,” he said. “Are you telling me that they don’t want the mayor to walk in the Fifth Avenue parade?”

The inclusive parade is usually funded by donations from people in the community. So organizers were delighted to find out that Boru Vodka wanted to sponsor this year’s parade. Boru gave the parade $2,400, which paid for an all-city youth marching band, a large Brigid of Ireland puppet, and DeJimbe, a band that fuses African drum and Irish pipes.

“They were happy to see their money go to those things,” said Fay. “We couldn’t survive without sponsors like Local 1199, Dignity NY, and Boru Vodka.”

This year’s inclusive parade highlighted Irish women’s leadership in the peace process and political life of Northern Ireland. It’s the only St. Patrick’s Day parade in the city that celebrates not only diversity in the Irish community, but throughout Queens as well. Other ethnic groups, including Koreans, Mexicans and Peruvians, all participated in the parade.

“It’s not a ‘gay parade,’” said Fay. “ It reflects the diversity of the community.”

Fay finds it embarrassing such a prominent representative of the Irish community could speak so negatively about Irish people and an Irish company simply for trying to help another parade.

While Barker has gone on record saying that he doesn’t want to talk to anyone who organizes the inclusive parade, Fay says he’d like to meet with Barker and Dunleavy so that they can learn what the parade is really about.

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The Streets Were Paved With Green

March 11-18, 2004

Christa Weber

The streets of Sunnyside were green with pride on March 7, as the fifth annual "St. Pats For All" inclusive parade made its way down Skillman Avenue to 61st Street. There were no protesters this year as members of the gay community joined Irish dancers, puppeteers, stilt walkers, community groups reflective of the ethnic mix of Queens and thousands of spectators, the largest crowd to date.

"This is an all-inclusive parade that brings the community together and reflects the ethnic and spiritual diversity of the borough," said Brendan Fay, co-chair. "I’m very proud that the parade is in Queens because it’s one of the most diverse geographic sites in the US. Immigrants, myself included, arrive in Queens with their hopes and dreams."

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has marched in the parade since his election, and New Paltz Mayor Jason West (who has performed marriage ceremonies for the gay community) both marched in the parade, along with many local politicians honoree Frank Durkan, an Irish civil rights activist, and Siobhan Kyne, a leader of the Irish community in Queens.

The seed that grew into the idea for the parade was planted five years ago in an Irish pub in Woodside when Fay and Eileen Duncan came up with the idea of a celebration that welcomes everyone. That was in response to Manhattan’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade on Fifth Avenue which excludes gay groups from marching under their banners. The all-inclusive parade, co-chaired by Fay and Barbara Heffernan Mohr, is the only parade to welcome lesbians and gays.

Everyone got the chance to be a little Irish this year as ethnic groups like Peruvians, Koreans, Mexicans, Ecuadorians and Native Americans marched with international musicians like DeJimbe, a band from Dublin that blends Irish music with African drumming, the Niall O’Leary School of Irish Dance and the Lavender and Green Alliance, a New York Irish lesbian and gay group.

Women’s leadership was celebrated and Northern Ireland Assemblywoman, Patricia Lewsley, the newly-elected chair of the Social Democratic Labor Party, and Bronagh Hinds, Northern Ireland Women’s Initiative’s Northern Ireland director and 1999 European Woman of the Year, attended to highlight Irish women’s leadership in the peace process in Northern Ireland.

This year’s parade was the first to have corporate sponsorship, a fact reflective of how quickly the all-inclusive parade has grown. Local 1199 (Health and Hospital Workers Union) and Boru Vodka, a Queens-based Irish distributor, both helped make the day a success. The post-party was held at the Tower View on Roosevelt Avenue, where Salvivo, a local band from Sunnyside, gave everyone a reason to dance.

"This parade is becoming yet another tradition in celebrating St. Patrick’s Day in New York City," said Fay. "It is a moment to be filled with the spirit of the city and the borough, the spirit of inclusion, hospitality and diversity. It sends the message that inclusion is good and allows us to learn to walk together."

On March 6, the Rockaways hosted its own all-inclusive St. Patrick’s Day parade, which has traditionally been one of the largest in New York City. Two of the area’s favorite politicians, Councilman Joe Addabbo and Assemblywoman Audrey Pheffer, were on hand to greet the thousands of spectators. Dr. Geraldine Chappey, a democratic district leader, was also out showing off her Irish pride.

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Same-Sex Marriage Focus of St. Pat’s Parade

Times Ledger

March 3, 2004

Alex Davidson

Barbara Mohr and Brendan Fay energize participants at the fifth annual Sunnyside St. Patrick’s Day Parade.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg joined City Council Speaker Gifford Miller and many Queens politicians Sunday in Sunnyside for a St. Patrick’s Day parade that turned into a rally calling for the legalization of same-sex marriages.

Bloomberg marched alongside Mayor Jason West, the 26-year-old top official in the village of New Paltz, N.Y. who became the state’s first mayor to marry same-sex couples Feb. 28.

The elected officials came to Queens as part of the fifth annual all-inclusive St. Patrick’s Day parade, the only celebration of its kind in which gays and lesbians can participate.

“What we are seeing in America today is the largest flowering of the civil rights movement this country has seen in a generation,” said West, a member of the Green Party. “And I am honored and surprised that I was put into a position to be able to articulate some of that movement.”

West, almost two weeks after initiating the same-sex marriages, has since been charged with 19 misdemeanor counts that allege he wrongly interpreted state law by allowing gays and lesbians to wed without proper licenses.

Bloomberg, a Republican who has stayed relatively quiet on the same-sex marriage issue, said he came to the parade to support the event’s diverse participants. He only offered a hint of his stance on whether or not gays and lesbians should under current law be allowed to wed.

“It (the parade) is a chance for us to say that we want civil rights for everybody,” Bloomberg said. “And clearly there are issues and if you want to get them changed, if you are successful in getting the law changed in Albany, then you can rest assured that this city will enforce the law.”

The all-inclusive St. Patrick’s Day parade in Queens was started in 2000 as an alternative to the celebration that takes place March 17 on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. Gays and lesbians were excluded from those festivities and as a result Sunnyside parade co-founder Brendan Fay said he was inspired to hold an event that welcomes all people of Irish descent.

“I am very proud of what the parade has achieved,” Fay said. “I think that what we have done is create a celebration that sends a strong message of hospitality.”

This was the first year that no protesters lined the parade route’s streets, Fay said. He said it was significant that Bloomberg marched in the parade despite the mayor’s unclear position on same-sex marriages.

In speaking to the crowd, which included the Patricia Lewsley, a member of the Northern Ireland Assembly, Miller said the current state constitution could be interpreted to allow for legal same-sex marriages. He criticized Bloomberg for not taking the lead on the issue and forcing the state to initiate legislation allowing for gays and lesbians to wed.

“I will just say that I think that this is a time when we have to stand up for equal treatment for all New Yorkers,” Miller said. “And it is very clear that gays and lesbians are not able to have the same rights under the law currently as other Americans.”

He added: “If we create second-class citizens, we are not standing up for equal protection of the laws.”

Advocates for same-sex civil marriages marched on City Hall last Thursday as dozens of gay and lesbian couples tried to obtain licenses from City Clerk Victor Robles. All the couples were denied their requests, but the issue has been left to the State Supreme Court following several lawsuits contending same-sex marriages are legal.

U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-Kew Gardens) said he favors the legal avenue for gays and lesbians to obtain their marriage rights. He said other means of obtaining the right to wed might give the perception that the law is something that could selectively be followed.

“I would prefer that this (same-sex marriage) be seen as being done in an orderly fashion,” Weiner said. “Fundamental to my argument that I make to those who oppose full gay rights is this: Someone else’s right to marriage doesn’t change your relationship with your husband or wife and it doesn’t undermine society in any way.”

The parade, which started at 43rd Street and Skillman Avenue, weaved through Sunnyside and ended with a fair at the Tower View in Woodside. People lined the streets to see West, Bloomberg, Miller, and cultural and social groups such as an Irish soccer club, representatives from the Mexican and Peruvian communities and Irish dancers and puppeteers.

Barbara Mohr, a co-organizer of the Queens parade for three years, said the diverse parade marchers make the parade unique among other St. Patrick’s Day celebrations.

“The purpose of this parade is inclusivity,” she said.

Councilwoman Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan), one of three openly gay members of the City Council, said the all-inclusive parade was integral to advancing the rights of gays and lesbians in New York City. She criticized Bloomberg for what she called “waffling” on the issue of same-sex marriage.

“I think this is the most important parade in the city. It is the only truly inclusive St. Patrick’s Day parade in the five boroughs,” Quinn said. “This parade is the only event where the entirety of the Irish-American community is embraced.”

She said: “It is the only event that says, yes, there are Irish lesbians and gay men.”

Reach reporter Alex Davidson by e-mail at news@timesledger.com or by calling 718-229-0300, Ext. 156.

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New Paltz Mayor Joins Gay Irish March

Irish Voice

April 15, 2004

Georgina Brennan

JASON West, 26, the New Paltz, New York mayor who made headlines granting marriage licenses to same-sex couples last week, will be an honored guest at the gay organized St. Patrick’s parade in Woodside on Sunday, March 7.

West was arrested by the Ulster County district attorney on Tuesday for his role in marrying gay and lesbian couples which the official said was illegal. 

“The local Green Party are great supporters of the parade, and they asked Mayor West to join our Irish and we are delighted he will be there,” said parade organizer Brendan Fay, 45. “It is a continuation of his ideas about equality and fairness,” added Fay.

West took office nine months ago as New York State’s first Green Party mayor. Since then, other than repairing potholes, his tenure has been run-of-the-mill. 

That was, of course, until last week, when he decided to perform same-sex marriages after New Paltz’s town clerk had refused to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. 

Announcing his decision, West said state law allows him to perform the ceremonies and does not require a license for the marriage to be legally binding. About 300 couples put their names on a waiting list to be married there and the village was soon bombarded with couples eager to be married. 

“It is an issue that deserves to be discussed publicly in New York State,” the part-time mayor told reporters last week. “It’s time that I added my voice and the voice of the people of the village of New Paltz to that growing chorus for fairness, equality before the law and basic family values.”

The controversial mayor will be marching in the fifth annual Queens St. Patrick’s Parade and Irish fair with New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg beginning at 12:30 p.m. on Skillman Avenue and 43rd Street in Sunnyside. 

Two of the Irish community’s most prominent leaders, trial lawyer Frank Durkan from Bohola, Co. Mayo and community leader Siobhan Kyne will lead a parade that is highlighting Irish women’s leadership in the peace process and in political life of Northern Ireland.

The march is also calling for an end to the persecution of the McAllisters, the family from New Jersey which the Justice Department is seeking to deport because Malachy McAllister was involved with the IRA.

This year’s parade marks the first time that politicians from Ireland are marching. Bronagh Hinds, director of Northern Ireland Women’s Initiative, is taking part, and it is also the first to end with an after party at the Tower View in Woodside.

Among the sponsors of the parade this year are Local 1199 and Boru Vodka, a Queens-based Irish company.

Unlike the main New York City parade up Fifth Avenue on March 17, the Queens parade allows groups to march under their own banner. 

“Unique among Irish gatherings in the nation, ours is open and to all who wish to share in the spirit of the day. We go out of our way to welcome the unwelcome!,” said Fay.

“More than a parade, we have become a unique expression and exploration of what it means to be Irish in New York City at the beginning of the 21st century. We expect, as in previous years, to have many from our diverse communities participate,” said Fay.

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St. Patrick's day in Woodside

Queens Courier

March 6-12, 2003

Christa Weber
 
The streets of Woodside were awash with Irish pride this past Sunday, March 2, during Queensâ?? fourth annual all-inclusive St. Patrickâ??s Day parade. Originally organized by Brendan Fay as a response to Manhattanâ??s traditional parade on Fifth Avenue which excludes gay groups from marching under their banners, the parade ran down Skillman Avenue. It also ran through some pretty bad weather. While the rain, evocative of Irish mists, kept the number of participants relatively low, it didn't discourage such notable folks as Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Gifford Miller from flaunting their green spirit. The diverse group of marchers also included the Mexican Civic Committee and the Korean American Community Empowerment Council.

The parade, believed by many to be the best St. Patrick's Day salute because it demonstrates the city's diversity and acceptance of its citizens' differences, has drawn its share of criticism. Some local Skillman Avenue residents went so far as to put up derogatory signs in their windows declaring the parade "blasphemous". The Mayor has been additionally criticized because, while he did march in the inclusive parade, he has not refused to march in Manhattan's parade. Many see this as a sign that he is in support of the exclusion of homosexuals from the traditional festivities. But even so, the tone of the responses to the Woodside event seem to be overwhelmingly positive. People feel good being included. After all, on St, Patrickâ??s day, aren't we all a little Irish?

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Mayor Marches In Sunnyside

Queens Gazette

March 5, 2003

Thomas Cogan

Photos Walter Karling A rainy afternoon didn’t keep members of the Variety Boys and Girls Club of Queens from joining in the fourth annual Sunnyside-Woodside St. Patrick’s Day Parade last Sunday, March 2. Mayor Michael Bloomberg (c.) was joined at the Sunnyside-Woodside St. Patrick’s Day Parade by (l. to r.) Congressmember Joseph Crowley, Assemblymember Eric Gioia, Council Speaker Gifford Miller and Congressmember Anthony Weiner.

here’s the mayor," a mother said to her young daughter, as they stood at the corner of 56th Street and Woodside Avenue on Sunday afternoon. Mayor Michael Bloomberg probably didn’t hear the woman say that, but did notice her and the little girl dressed in bright green rain gear, standing by themselves behind a wooden police barrier. He turned from the parade that brought him to that junction and went over to shake their hands. He turned around and squatted between them for a photo op, making several photographers scramble to accommodate him and the two surprised spectators. Then he went back to the parade. He had only five blocks to go to become the first front rank politician to march the entire course of the St. Patrick’s Parade; indeed, at that point, he was the only politician of any sort remaining.

It finally rained on this, the fourth St. Patrick’s Parade, the one that calls itself "all-inclusive." Rain was a threat last year, and even came down a little, just before the parade began, but then it let up and spared all participants, Senator Hillary Clinton and Bloomberg included. Not this year. Though the sun actually shone before nightfall, at 1 p.m. in the afternoon rain was falling steadily, letting those about to march know that this time it would have to be endured.

By then, the politicians had gathered at Skillman Avenue and 43rd Street, Congressmembers Joseph Crowley and Anthony Weiner, City Council Speaker Gifford Miller, City Councilmembers Helen Sears, Melinda Katz and Eric Gioia and Assemblymember Brian McLaughlin among them. They all arrived knowing what they would find. Unlike last year, when Clinton and Bloomberg caused great surprise by showing up, this year the mayor let everyone know he would be at the parade and would not just give it a sendoff, as he did in 2002, but would march too. Before noon, there were signs of preparation that one would not have noticed on previous St. Patrick’s Parade days. Department of Sanitation vehicles scrubbed Skillman Avenue clean and several men in black traversed the area at 43rd Street, checking everything out. Within an hour, the object of their concern, the mayor, arrived amidst the usual surge of reporters, photographers and television cameramen. He was dressed in a rain jacket, ready to march.

He spoke briefly, but only after some other speakers got in a few words. Brendan Fay, organizer of the parade for all four years of its existence, could have reminded listeners of the recently departed Fred Rogers as, with rain pouring on him, he hailed this "beautiful day for Queens, Ireland and the city of New York." He was followed by State Senator Tom Duane Manhattan, who said he’d love to march on Fifth Avenue but would not as long as the St. Patrick’s Day Parade on March 17, to which he referred, prohibits the inclusion of gay and lesbian groups. Bloomberg, who has displeased those groups by saying, that he will be marching in the March 17 parade, tried to see the good in the weather by saying, "It makes you feel you grew up in Ireland," but had to admit, "Sorry folks, that’s the best I could do."

Police from Manhattan and the 108th Precinct in Queens were anxious to get the parade started, and finished, so after a vanguard of uniformed students began to march up Skillman Avenue, the mayor soon followed. He was in the company of politicians, Fay and other parade stalwarts behind a white and gold banner proclaiming inclusiveness. After them came the New York All City High School Marching Band and Korean and Mexican groups, as well as the Gay & Lesbian Big Apple Corps, a marching band with rainbow decorations on their white uniforms. Peace activists marched, several of them bearing tributes to Philip Berrigan, the former Josephite priest and anti-war protester, who died in early December. The Lesbian & Gay Fighting Irish of Notre Dame/St. Mary’s and the Sunnyside United Dog Society (S.U.D.S.) made their presence known.

There was just a little hostility. "Go back to Bermuda!" somebody shouted, and one man stood in the doorway of a coffee shop between 46th and 47th Streets and booed lustily. But between 50th and 51st Streets, some people waved and called to the mayor, and he responded by breaking from the parade for the first time to say hello and shake hands. He was at the spot where Clinton took her leave in 2000 and 2002, and the irony was that he was not leaving but the other politicians were—taking a rain check. Bloomberg proceeded to the turn at 56th Street and on to Woodside Avenue, where the little girl and her mother awaited him, then on to the end, at Woodside and 61st, Street where security forces and other officials guided him to the van that bore him away.

The rest of the parade soon reached the final too, soaked, bedraggled and small. The parade to be held in Manhattan March 17 may get wet too, but will remain large and unyielding, and include Bloomberg to boot. But the Sunnyside parade gained the participation of an inclusive Republican mayor. For next year, organizers look forward to a nicer day and another appearance by other politicians, possibly the junior senator, Hillary Clinton.

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