OURfest Is Sunday. Here Is What Changed on Safety Since June.

OURfest takes over the Gayborhood on Sunday. Twelfth and 13th Streets close from Locust to Spruce, noon to 7 PM, free, with more than 200 organizations, performers and queer-owned businesses on the blocks. And for a lot of people, the question going into this weekend is not about the lineup. It is about what happens if the police show up the way they did on June 7.

That chain is new information to most people reading this, and it is the single most useful thing to know before you walk onto those blocks. The rest of this is why it exists.

The worry going in is earned. It is also, this year, being met with something more concrete than reassurance: a spelled-out chain for reporting trouble, a police department that has been told in public exactly what went wrong, and a commissioner who has pledged there will be no repeat.

What happened in June

Philadelphia’s official Pride celebration moved to the Benjamin Franklin Parkway this year. Thousands of people then did what this city has done for decades and finished the day in the Gayborhood, at gatherings Philly Pride 365 did not organize or sanction.

What they found was a neighborhood locked down. Blocks around 13th and Walnut that had been open to crowds in past years were penned with metal barricades, squeezing thousands of people onto narrow sidewalks. The city deployed roughly 600 officers for Pride, about 150 of them in the Gayborhood. As the night went on, police moved in mounted units, dirt bikes and rapid-response teams to clear the streets. Fifteen people were arrested, 14 on disorderly conduct-related charges and one for aggravated assault on an officer. Officers worked with their faces covered, which department policy prohibits. Phones caught all of it.

On August 5, City Council’s Committee on Legislative Oversight put the department on the record. Commissioner Kevin Bethel called June 7 “not a perfect day” and largely defended the response. Councilmember Rue Landau, the first out LGBT+ member of Council, called his testimony painful and perplexing. Naiymah Sanchez of the ACLU of Pennsylvania told the room: “What we witnessed was an atrocity to our rights.” We covered that hearing in full in ‘Not a Perfect Day’ Is Not an Apology.

• Sunday, June 7Pride is held on the Parkway. Crowds gather in a barricaded Gayborhood. Police disperse them with horses, motorcycles and batons. Fifteen arrests.
• Monday, June 8Protesters march through the Gayborhood against the police response, picking up onlookers from the sidewalks and bars.
• Thursday, June 11Landau’s resolution authorizing oversight hearings passes City Council unanimously.
• Wednesday, August 5The Committee on Legislative Oversight hears Bethel and roughly 20 community members.
• Sunday, October 11OURfest, the first one since June 7, fills those same blocks again.

What the organizers changed

Philly Pride 365 has staffed these events with its own private security team for years without an incident, and this year the path for a problem is laid out in advance. If something happens on Sunday, you are not meant to go looking for a cop.

The design is the point. Every rung on that ladder is one more chance to settle something without a police interaction, which is exactly what went missing in June. The exception stays the exception: a medical emergency or someone in immediate danger is a 911 call, not a chain.

“The number one goal is safety, accessibility and security.”

Tyrell Brown, Philly Pride 365

Brown asks something of attendees too: go with a plan. Know which performers you want to catch and which organizations you want to visit, show up with that intention, and let the festival handle the rest.

What the police say is different

Bethel spent eight years as the department’s LGBT+ liaison before he took the top job. He has acknowledged that Pride weekend did not go well and says the department is learning from it. What that means in practice, by his own account and the department’s:

• Two events, not one. The department now plans separately for the Parkway and the Gayborhood and works with the organizers of each, instead of treating one as the event and the other as overflow. Bethel conceded police should have expected a Gayborhood crowd, given what the neighborhood is.
• Taser arcing is banned. The tactic of firing a loud, visible electrical arc to push crowds, used in the Gayborhood that night, is out, and the department is moving to a taser model that cannot do it.
• Training on Pride and policing. Officers assigned to future Pride events are to be trained on the history of Pride and policing, a history that starts with a riot against police at Stonewall.
• Masks are still a violation. Five officers may face discipline for working with their faces covered.
• More preparation, more communication. On June 7 there was no plan to have police in the Gayborhood until mid-afternoon. Bethel has pledged the June response will not be repeated, and has said the department’s job is not to police this event but to keep it safe.

A plan is not the same thing as trust. Sunday is where one gets tested and the other gets rebuilt, or does not.

Going Sunday, the practical version

• When and where. Noon to 7 PM, 12th and 13th Streets from Locust to Spruce. Free. This year’s theme is OUT for Good.
• Do not drive. Streets inside and around the footprint are closed. Take SEPTA to Walnut-Locust.
• If you need quiet. Disability Pride PA runs a headphones-on silent disco and a decompression zone. LUV Gardens has accessible seating and pop-up performances away from the loudest blocks.
• Families. A dedicated area runs noon to 4 PM with the Attic Youth Center and other youth-serving groups: alcohol free, smoke free, in reduced-noise space. Chaperones are suggested for anyone under 15.
• Age limits. Vice Alley, the leather and kink block, is 18+. The outdoor party at Woody’s is 21+.
• Charge your phone, pick a buddy, agree on a meeting spot. On closed streets in a crowd this size, you will lose your people at least once.