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The Greater Rochester Pagan Pride Project, Inc. |
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Rochester Pagan Pride Day Festival |
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HISTORY OF THE ROCHESTER PAGAN PRIDE DAY FESTIVAL
As you will see from the history outlined below, Rochester Pagan Pride has grown by leaps and bounds over the years due to the tireless efforts of our Local Coordinators, volunteers, sponsors and attendees, without whom RPPD wouldn’t be possible.
It has been said by some, that we should never doubt that a small group or even one person can change the world.
It is our belief that grassroots organizations such as Pagan Pride are the way to affect change in this confusing time in history.
As for the future, RPPD will continue to enlighten, engage and envision a future in which tolerance, diversity and freedom are in.
*Guest Speakers: Gavin & Yvonne Frost and Trish Telesco. *We had 27 merchants. *There were 3 rituals: Opening Ritual written and conducted by Coven of Sangha~Sho (Tomas DeFiore, HP), mid-day ritual written and conducted by The Circle of All Paths (WolfDancer, HPs)and closing ritual written and conducted by Circle of the Green (Lisa Hutchings, HPs) *NOT being exclusive. It is my personal opinion that anyone regardless of religious affiliation, race, creed, sexual orientation, or spiritual path has a right to attend RPPD. They also have a right to participate in RPPD as long as it is relative to Paganism. We have had Christians present workshops on herbalism, clergy from the Santeria tradition present a workshop, Rochester Wild Wings, Inc. is a Christian group, a Satanist presented a workshop on Zen Buddhism, - no one ever had a problem prior to this year with our welcoming all to our event.
2007 - Rochester Pagan Pride Day 2007 was wonderful! Our event was held on Saturday, 9/22, and it was a beautiful, sunny day in peaceful Ellison Park. Lots of people, good food, wonderful staff and vendors, and plenty of shopping. Visitors thru the gate: 631 Staff Members/Volunteers: 32 Workshops: 18 plus our Guest Speaker, Gail Wood. (20 speakers and a helper horse) Merchants: 29 vendor booths staffed by an average of 3 folks per booth. Protesters: 2 Police: 2 That all worked out in the end, but it was a bit tense for a little while there. They were just very loud and insulting to everybody who had to walk by them in the parking lot. Food Donations to our Charity, AIDS Rochester Inc: 507 pounds Cash Donations to our Charity: $210 (approximate - last count about an hour before the day ended) We used Mardi Gras beads, if folks gave $1 they got a strand of beads. Some folks got more than one for giving more than $1, and a few folks gave more and only took one strand. Very cool! RPPD T-shirt sales: $130 Coffee sales: $2.65 (our electric source didn't work as well as we'd wanted it to, but it was dealt with, at least we know better for next year) Raffle/Used Books Sales: Over $200 50/50 Raffle: total of $62, with the winner receiving $31 Our food vendor sold out of everything they had brought, which had been an increased amount over last year, and they were extremely happy when they left at the end of the day! Assistance provided to one vendor who's vehicle broke down, a lady and her son who got stranded at our event with no way to get home (area resident), a vehicle had a gas leak in the parking lot and the owners were located and they took care of the problem, another had a flat tire and that was also taken care of. Our staff/volunteers were wonderful, extremely helpful people who gave so very much of themselves on Saturday. We had folks who came over from CNYPPD to help out, too! Thank you, Teresa and Es! Our merchants have been sending in notes about how much they enjoyed the day, how relaxed and comfortable and positive it was.
2008 - A very Big deal this year was that we received our not-for-profit organization status (501(c)(3). Our Festival was held on September 20, 2008 in Ellison Park, Rochester, NY. Attendance was 813 + 4 raptors and 3 horses . We collected 398 lbs of food plus $102 for our designated Charity, AIDS Rochester, Inc. Postings were done on community calendars of all our local television stations (WHAM, WHEC, WROC, RNEWS, WXXI), radio stations (WCMF, WBEE), newspapers (D&C, FreeTime), as well as open community bulletin boards (InfoRoch, CraigsList). The day was beautiful, perfect weather, our 37 vendors liked being able to choose their own spots within the designated vendors' area. The 24 scheduled workshops were well attended. Food vendor just about sold out again this year. Actually had zero protesters, and we had done up a beautiful new sign for the Free Speech Zone too! Our new T-shirts sold well, (39 out of 75 gone that day), as did the PP Bracelets (4 left out of 65) which folks just loved and wanted to buy a lot of them, but we just didn't have enough for that to happen. We'll be ordering a whole lot more for 2009.
2009 - Most everything went well, we got to use the speaker system that our musical guests, Merry Mischief, had brought for their performance to make announcements about happenings. Once again, all our vendors enjoyed being able to pick their own sites within the designated area, which made up a huge circle that we put our ritual circle in the middle of. The Memorial Tribute Ceremony that we held brought a lot of folks together who might otherwise not have spoken to each other, which I think was a good step in the right direction towards healing a couple of rifts in the local community. We gained a new security team this year, courtesy of one of the local Druid groups, and they had a good sized group who were all extremely helpful to everybody during the event. They are already committed to doing it again next year, and are very excited about doing it (some of them are in the process of going for formal security training). We opened almost on time, with a great Ritual at 10:15 am (hey, only 15 minutes late!) And Yep, it rained! A steady, misty drizzle that lasted until about noon. But then the sun came out, and and the rest of the day was beautiful. We had 648 visitors (counted with clickers at the two entry points, and not including our vendors, volunteers, and performers), 25 merchant booths, two special guest speakers, 2 musical groups, 1 bellydance troupe, 3 rituals (opening, closing, and a special memorial tribute ceremony for a long standing member in our local community), 13 workshops, a drum circle, a fantastic group of volunteers, and 1 wonderful food vendor. Oh, and no protestors again this year! We collected $70 in cash donations for our Charity, AIDS Rochester Inc., and we collected approximately 444 lbs. of food donations! Our silent auction received a huge number of donations from our vendors, as well as a very large number of autographed books from noted pagan authors! Practically everything went, as did our raffle items. Our used books sale and garage sale did really well this year too from what I saw. I mean, when you only have to pack up less than half of what you started with, that's great, right? Our volunteers who had to schlep everything around sure thought so! When darkness descended and all of the work is done, our volunteers and one of our special guests sat down for a great dinner together in one of the lodges that we rent at the park. We started doing this last year, and it's wonderful. We get to eat (which most of us don't do very much of during the day), talk about how the day went, relax a little, laugh a lot, and unwind.
2010 - 856 visitors, 22 vendors (61 vendor staff), 16 RPPD staff, 11 workshop presenters, and 25 entertainers = 969 people total! Oh, and our mascot dog, Isis! 410 lbs. + $43 cash donations Our Special Guests were The Dragon Ritual Drummers (www.dragonritualdrummers.com) Everything went very well! The weather was perfect (73 and sunny), the workshops were well attended (well, 8 out of 10 were), food was great, people were great, entertainment was phenomenal (Rochester Morris Dancers, Desert Rhythms Belly Dance Troupe, DragonWolf Inferno, and of course, our Special Guests, The Dragon Ritual Drummers. The American Red Cross Bloodmobile Bus was there, and got quite a few donations despite having only a couple of weeks lead time. 10 out of our 22 vendors took advantage of our Festival Special Sign-up Rate for 2011. We had our 2 protestors, but they stayed on the other side of the main road as they had been instructed to do by the Monroe County Sheriffs Department two years ago. It just keeps getting better and better. There were a few folks who came and asked about presenting workshops next year. Volunteers showed up at the last minute and offered help. Set-up and tear-down were more efficient than last year. We were done and out of the Park at 9 pm, which included having had dinner!
2011 - It was a perfect day, from start to finish this year. The weather was absolutely perfect! To begin our recounting of RPPD 2011, we start with our Official Attendance Count of 718! That’s just the visitors through the gates! Does not include Staff, Volunteers, Workshops Presenters, Vendors, or Special Guests! More to come!
As you can see from the history outlined above Rochester Pagan Pride has grown by leaps and bounds over the years due to the tireless efforts of our Local Coordinators, volunteers, sponsors and attendees, without whom we wouldn’t be possible. It has been said by some, that we should never doubt that a small group or even one person can change the world. It is our belief that grassroots organizations such a Pagan Pride are the way to affect change in this confusing time in history. As for the future, RPPF will continue to enlighten, engage and envision a future in which tolerance, diversity and freedom are insured. Blessed Be. 2006 – 554 PEOPLE 2007 - 774 PEOPLE (and a helper horse) 2008 - 813 (plus 4 raptors and 3 horses) 2009 - 648 visitors + 37 Workshop Presenters + 20 staff + 59 vendor staff 2010 - 856 visitors, 22 vendors (61 vendor staff), 16 RPPD staff, 11 workshop presenters, and 25 entertainers = 969 people total! Oh, and our mascot dog, Isis! 2011 - 718 visitors + (still tallying this part up!) |