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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 *Children's Activities ran from 9:30-5:30 and included 5 workshops. *Rochester Wild Wings, Inc. presented Birds of Prey at the Children's Activities shelter. *HipChiks Buffalo Belly Dance group performed. *Callila Underhill, celtic singer w/acoustic guitar performed. *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) *Juggler John led a drumming circle. *Christopher Miller, professional photographer, volunteered his services throughout the day. We had 3 RPPD team members volunteer to take candid shots also. *Providing coffee and bagels for RPPD members (at 7AM) workshop presenters and guest speakers throughout the day free of charge. A tradition started by Linda Hanley in 2001. *Selling coffee throughout the day to festival attendees brought in added revenue and required very little work. *Our food vendor, Bart's Hots of Spencerport, provided free beverages to the RPPD team and our guest speakers throughout the day. *Renting tables, chairs and a large tent provided coverage from the rain for our guest speakers and auction & raffle tables. This added expense was well worth it. All of the shelters & lodges have picnic tables with attached benches and are very heavy to move which we did in previous years to use for our "welcome" table, info table, raffle/silent auction tables, food collection table, plus some of us brought our own tables and chairs. It added an extra hour to our set-up and clean up time. This year the company came set up the tables and tent and broke it all down afterwards for us! *Taking the time to contact and network with various authors (I started doing this 2 years ago): A.Moura,D.Morrison,Starhawk, C.Penczak, G.Bone & .Farrar, P.Monaghan,E.McCoy,G.Wood,M.Weinstein asking if they would kindly consider donating an autographed book. This brought in much needed revenue at our silent auctions and raffles the day of our event. They were so generous and willing to help support PPD events. *Having a "Free Speech Zone" designated for Christians who regularly come out to try and "save" us Pagans. This was the first year we did not have to call the police for assistance. One person showed and he was very respectful. We offered him bagels and coffee, which he declined. *Fostering a cooperative working relationship with other PPD event LC's in NYS: Central NY,Elmira, Buffalo/Niagara, Adirondack - RPPD has donated metaphysical baskets each year. Central NY and RPPD have sent volunteers to each other's events to help out for the past 3 years. *NOT charging a fee for merchants to vend at our event. They are so appreciative that they only have to pay for a one-day permit ($25.00). It is worth it to us to be able to promote and support the small businesses, covens, groups. Many don't have a storefront and in turn they generously donate items for our raffles and silent auctions at our event; and at our Dessert & Divination fundraisers held throughout the year generating good revenue for RPPD. Fostering cooperative support and good working relationship. *Various RPPD team members taking time throughout the day to ask the merchants if all is okay and if they need anything. *This year Linda made up Certificates of Appreciation for everyone (chairpersons, RPPD team members, workshop presenters, entertainers, volunteers, etc). More specifically stated was all that they have contributed over "x" number of years to RPPD. *Presenting plaques to our Guest Speakers. Each plaque was a beautiful oak finish wood with a gold plate with their name acknowledging our appreciation for all they have accomplished, etc. It brought them to tears. Trish Telesco wrote in an e-mail that she often wondered if she was in fact making a positive difference in the Pagan communities with her writing. Gavin and Yvonne Frost were overcome with emotion. None had ever been honored or acknowledged in this way. *Gavin and Yvonne graciously agreed to a book signing at one of our metaphysical shops. They also presented a workshop at Psychic's Thyme, donating proceeds from ticket sales back to RPPD. We charged $10.00 for their workshop that ran from 7-9PM with a reception, book signing and chatting afterwards *Trish Telesco is delightful, referring to herself as "low maintenance" when asked if she needed anything, beverages, etc. She warmly greeted the public, signed books and took time to chat with everyone throughout the day. *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. *Decorating with a harvest theme and creating a magickal and welcoming atmosphere. *Signs on the road clearly directing people to RPPD and to the entrance of our event. *Signs on each lodge and shelter listing workshops and times at that location. *Security stationed 500 ft from the welcoming table greeting those attending our event and thanking those leaving RPPD for coming out. *Various RPPD team members attending to our guest speakers throughout the day, asking if they needed beverages, etc. *No-Photo ribbons - orange. Anyone who did not want their picture taken was given one to wear. *RPPD Photographer Badges for those who were taking candid shots - identified them as part of the RPPD team. *Badges for our RPPD team, workshop presenters and guest speakers. *Thank you gifts for our workshop presenters hand-made by Myriah, Workshop Coordinator. *Two hour rotating shifts for security, pairing up, assigned areas, and periodic breaks helped with efficiency and covering the area. Security was also assigned to help check in and direct merchants to their site which took a huge burden off the Merchant chairperson. *Having enough two-way radios helped keep us all in contact. We purchased 3 more sets this year. We have a total of 12 radios all labeled as property of RPPD and each is numbered. *Merchant space was increased to 20'x20' this year and all were v-e-r-y happy. *We incorporated an hour into our schedule to allow for lunch. At the Children's area parents were encouraged to come and join their children for lunch and this worked out very well. *During the lunch hour Callila Underhill performed very beautiful Celtic songs. *Having a full PA system, with wireless microphone and professional size speakers made it easy for everyone to hear announcements & entertainers. "Big" Mike McFadden has donated his services as MC and all of his equipment for the past 5 years. *We provided 15 media packets and badges for potential attendees. *Packets were made up for each workshop presenter which included a letter welcoming them to our event, a program, a schedule, history of RPPD, etc. *Attendees: Just so there is no question as to our attendance figures I have broken it down this way: we used a counter and 430 people came through our entrance, we had 27 merchants 90 people all together worked at these booths - they came early and were not counted as coming through the gate, we had 12 security staff, 17 RPPD staff and volunteers, and 5 worked at the food vendors tent none were counted coming through the gate. *Putting out a jar for monetary donations for AIDS, Rochester for those who forgot to bring a food item.
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, plenty of shopping. 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!
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.
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 |
