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San Francisco police will be allowed to march in uniform at the 2022 LGBT Pride parade June 26, apparently ending a dispute with organizers.
Mayor London Breed, in announcing Thursday that all public safety officers will participate, said, “They are family again.”
The police chief and command staff will wear the full uniform, and the rest will wear matching shirts, according to ABC7 News. This compromise comes after members of the police force and fire department were told last week that they could only participate in the parade if they wore matching shirts with their logos instead of uniforms.
“We will do what our public safety members do,” said Jonathan Baxter, a spokesman for the San Francisco Fire Department.
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The city’s Pride director, Suzanne Ford, spoke last week about the hesitation to have officers participate.
“Having police in the parade is difficult for them,” Ford said. “So we want to honor and make sure that we protect and make people feel safe.”
The relationship between San Francisco police and members of the LGBT community reached a boiling point in 2019 when a protest on the parade route ended with people being arrested as well as being allegedly shoved and injured by police.
Organizers of the parade had been criticized for the event’s rejection of officers in uniform, with Breed threatening not to participate in the event if the parade board did not reverse its decision.
“I’ve made this very hard decision in order to support those members of the LGBTQ community who serve in uniform, in our Police Department and Sheriff’s Department, who have been told they cannot march in uniform, and in support of the members of the Fire Department who are refusing to march out of solidarity with their public safety partners,” Breed said.
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Other cities, including Seattle and Albuquerque, New Mexico, have also discouraged police officers from attending Pride events this year.
