Woonsocket Pride Festival

spreading locally in March of 2020, people across Rhode Island came face-to-face with systemic inequalities like never before. Both the illness itself, and the resulting economic fallout that we’re still facing today, impacted historically-marginalized communities much harder, including LGBTQ+ folks. In addition, the stay-at-home orders threatened to leave Rhode Island without a Pride festival for the first time since 1976 . To help maintain some hope in an otherwise very difficult time, Rhode Island Pride reached out to eight cities across RI to coordinate virtual Pride Flag Raising ceremonies. Seven of them responded enthusiastically. The lone standout was Woonsocket, whose hostile, extremely conservative administration stonewalled the organizers and refused to return calls or emails. But with pressure from local activists and the lone queer voice on the city council, the former May...