Organizers cancel city’s Labor Day parade

Pittsburgh’s Labor Day parade — often cited as the country’s largest, with a consistent showing of more than 100,000 people — will not take place this year, Allegheny County labor leaders announced Friday.

Citing the unsafe nature of holding such a large gathering in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, Darrin Kelly, president of the Allegheny-Fayette Central Labor Council, said protecting the well-being of the council’s members and the community at large is what led leaders to make the decision.

Labor leaders were anticipating a crowd of nearly a quarter of a million people this September, probably the “biggest congregation of people in this country” during the pandemic, Mr.

Kelly said. They feared that large gatherings that day would “put a lot of people in harm’s way,” he added.

“This has not been an easy time, but this was the right decision,” said Mr. Kelly, flanked by Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald and dozens of workers. “We will be on the front lines, no matter what. Our members will protect this community.”

Instead of holding the nation’s “biggest and most extravagant Labor Day parade” that’s traditionally been a symbolic rallying cry for workers and union leaders, the council is opting instead for a membershipwide weekend of service, which will include such actions as cleaning parks and trails and holding a virtual reading session on labor history, Mr. Kelly said.

It will culminate in a “Day of Giving” that will include a blood drive and food distribution in partnership with the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank. Mr. Kelly said they’ve urged all leaders of the council to donate on behalf of the membership.

Mr. Fitzgerald, who has marched in many of the parades, lauded the decision to cancel the event and deemed it a result of having to operate in a different world since March, when COVID-19 started by upending St. Patrick’s Day activities.

“We know it’s a huge sacrifice,” Mr. Fitzgerald said of the Labor Day decision. “So many people are making sacrifices.”

“I know [Labor Day] is a great day for the men and women who love to come together with their families, have picnics, have get-togethers, gather, compare notes, just have a good time of communicating and socializing and being together,” Mr. Fitzgerald added.

The timing of the announcement, Mr. Kelly said, was to make sure workers knew as early as possible — because in addition to the parade, Labor Day is typically an occasion for other gatherings, picnics and events.

It was those gatherings, too, that led leaders to make the decision, Mr. Kelly said — noting that many retirees and children attend them with family.

Mr. Kelly said there has been no pushback from his membership over the decision to cancel the parade, which has — in recent years — brought out some 200 unions and other units and many notable figures in Democratic politics, including former Vice President Joe Biden, who is now the party’s presumptive presidential nominee.

Asked if labor leaders were in talks with Mr. Biden’s presidential campaign about a potential appearance this year, Mr. Kelly said, “We were always the main option” for him on Labor Day, “but it’s not something that we formally had lined up.”

It was “something that was talked about,” Mr. Kelly added.

Mr. Biden, a native of Scranton who has been an ally of labor unions, marched in the parade in 2018 and joined local Democrats in haranguing the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision that ended compelled union dues for public employees.

When he attended the parade as vice president in 2015 and 2016, his appearances were met with political speculation — the former, amid rumors he was going to announce a run for president, and the latter, alongside Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, who was in the thick of running with Hillary Clinton for the White House.

Mr. Kelly said that although the parade is an important symbol for those who are raised in labor, he isn’t disappointed in the cancellation “because this is what our community demands of us, and we’re more than happy to answer that call.”

In the hours after the announcement, the council was “overwhelmed” with inquiries from people who wanted to know more about how to participate in the weekend of service, its Twitter account posted. More information will follow in the coming weeks, the council tweeted.