ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (WFLA) — Officials with the City of St. Petersburg raised the Pride flag over City Hall on Thursday morning in honor of LGBTQ+ Pride month.
Residents gathered for a special community pop-up celebration with food, games and giveaways to kick off Pride month. The city hoists the rainbow flag at City Hall each year as a show of support and inclusion for LGBTQ+ residents.
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St. Pete is known for hosting one of the largest Pride parades in the southeast, with hundreds of thousands of attendees, and weeks of events leading up to the June 27 celebration. St. Pete Pride Board President Byron Green-Calisch said that these joyous gatherings uplift the community, but are also a reminder of the discrimination that LGBTQ+ people have historically faced, and how there is still work to be done, even here in Tampa Bay.
He acknowledged that the organization has faced its share of difficulties in the past few years amid changing laws and shifting cultural attitudes regarding LGBTQ+ people – a recent Gallup poll found 65% of Americans support of same-sex marriage, down 6% since 2023 – and said that those struggles won’t detract from their mission.
“We have lived through some of the darkest times, but there is still something in us that makes us turn towards the light,” Green-Calisch said. “Not because the darkness isn’t real, and not because the struggle is over, but because we are a people who have always known that joy is not a reward for surviving. Joy is the resistance itself.”
St. Pete officials raise Pride flag
State Rep. Michele Rayner, who describes herself as the first openly queer Black woman to hold public office in Florida, echoed this, and praised city leadership for supporting the LGBTQ+ community, even when it’s not politically convenient.
“We have a mayor and a city council that is inclusive, not only in word, but also in deed,” Rayner said. “Because how many cities do you know that would shut down a city block to make sure that, in the face of a governor that says, ‘I’m gonna snatch money away from you,’ let’s just go ahead and lean in, just a little bit more.”
“Because we understand that Pride is not only about rainbows and parades, and we love those things,” Rayner continued. “But Pride is always about a protest. It is always about resistance, and in this moment, we must resist. Our joy is our resistance.”
Mayor Ken Welch, who is running for reelection this year, decried attempts to foster division in the community with perceived “attacks” against LGBTQ+ residents.
“Today, here in St. Petersburg, that is not who we are,” Welch said. “We send a different message. We send a message to our LGBTQ+ friends and family that you belong here. You are valued here, and you are loved and respected here in the city of St. Petersburg.”
June is recognized as LGBTQ+ Pride month to commemorate the 1969 riot at the Stonewall Inn in New York City, a clash between police and LGBTQ+ patrons that lasted six days. The uprising is considered the beginning of the gay and transgender liberation movement in the United States.
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