Pride celebrates the accomplishments and history of the LGBTQ+ community. Produced by Trillium Health, Rochester Pride is one of New York State's largest pride festivals north of New York City. This year, Rochester Pride encourages the community to be true to themselves, find inspiration from icons in the LGBTQ+ community and utilize every color of the spectrum to highlight individuality and diversity.

We’re getting ready to celebrate our 51st annual Pride festival in Rochester, NY next weekend. There are local competing theories as to why our Pride festival takes place in July, the most prominent seeming to be:

  • Rochester’s Pride celebrations predate the post-Stonewall era formal Pride events
  • Celebrating in July prevents conflicts with all the big city events that take place in June, allowing for more people to celebrate

As a Rochester transplant, I tend to subscribe to the latter theory. The first sounds too much like a “we did it first” reaction, but I love the enthusiasm.

Local NPR station WXXI had an hour-long show today previewing the event, available online: Previewing the 2023 Rochester Pride Parade and Festival