Middletown Pride parade, festival canceled because of virus
MIDDLETOWN – Organizers of the second annual Middletown Pride parade have canceled the event because of the coronavirus.
“This was both a hard and an easy decision for us,” Mayor Ben Florsheim said. “Hard in the sense that we hate to cancel an event that so many people have been looking forward to and working on, but easy in the sense that it was clearly the right call from a public health standpoint and the Pride committee never wavered in their commitment to put our community’s safety first.”
The event drew 150,000 visitors to Middletown last year and was cosponsored by the city, the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce and Wesleyan University. It was originally scheduled for June 20 during Pride month, but was postponed in April to Aug. 29 out of an abundance of caution.
The cancellation announcement came on the morning that some businesses in Connecticut were allowed to reopen.
Ultimately, organizers felt that they needed to protect the safety of the community by canceling the event.
“The day of the inaugural Middletown Pride event held last June was a fabulous day in Middletown. We were so looking forward to building on that success, but we have collectively made the responsible decision to cancel this year’s event,” chamber President Larry McHugh said.
Despite this year’s cancellation, organizers have already started planning for next year’s celebration on June 19, 2021.
“Even though we can’t gather in person this year, Middletown is still a city that is proud of our diversity and of the unique contributions of our LGBTQIA residents past and present,” Florsheim said. “We will still celebrate and uplift them all the same this June, and look forward to an even bigger, better Pride event in the summer of 2021.”