Van City Pride 2017: A Rainbow of Characters!

by MK Scott

It had been 5 years since I had visited our neighbors up north in Vancouver, BC for Pride and this time I wanted to bring my fiance', Brian for the parade. Even though there were no Justin (Trudeau) sightings, the mood of this parade was still miles from any Pride you would see in the US of A. Van City Pride is still way less corporate and it even had some Seattle-based companies marching like Starbucks, Microsoft, Amazon, and Nordstrom. The parade is all about community and support from the government. It was also nice to see Seattle's Rainbow City Band marching and also Van City's legendary queen Joan-E as announcer.

(OUTview NW) INTERVIEW: Joey Arias on Pride, Drag and Bowie!

By MK Scott 

Seattle Pridefest on Sunday, June 25th at Seattle Center promises to be a great show to enjoy the
heat from Aleksa Manila to Ms Pak Man and the always fabulous Mary Lambert.

Pridefest has always done well with out of town legends in years past from Jackie Beat to
Amanda Lepore and Lady Bunny. This year brings bon-a-fide legend, Joey Arias to the main stage.
My relationship with Arias goes back to 2010, when she was in town for the screening of 'Arias
with a Twist” at SLGFF. I was elated to chat with her about her return to Seattle.

(OUTview NW) PRIDE ISN'T CHEAP: Capitol Hill Chamber responds to question about lack of Pride banners on Capitol Hill!

by MK Scott

During all this Capitol Hill Pride chaos, has anyone one wondered where the traditional Pride banners are that used to line Broadway?

The tradition was started in the mid-1980's by Bill Swigart and was taken over by the Capitol Hill Chamber of Commerce. I went directly to Executive Director, Sierra Hansen for a response.

Hansen explained that the company that used to put up the banners had retired. The city also requires a permit to turn off the Metro Trolley lines (which costs about a $1,000) in order to put up the 26 banners, and another $1,000 permit to take the banners down. In addition it costs $6,000 to print the banners raising the price tag to $8,000.

When I asked Hansen if there were any steps to reach out to notify the community of the extra cost, she replied that they had conducted a survey in early 2017, and the banners were not a priority that the Chamber wanted to spend money on. Other steps to notify the community never happened.

Hansen was enthusiastic about if anyone in the community wanted to take this project on to ensure this tradition continues.

Seattle Gay News publisher, George Bakan said he would get involved as a sponsor and would welcome the community to come together and support the project for next year.