Who will lead the Sacramento Pride parade? A pastor, an activist and Ms. Sacramento Leather

A local pastor, an activist and a Ms. Sacramento Leather will serve as grand marshals of this year’s Sacramento Pride parade.

The Sacramento LGBT Community Center announced last week the event will be led by Ebony Harper, Tiffany Lorenz, and Community Grand Marshal Pastor Casey Tinnin. The trio was selected by more than 5,400 online voters — the first time the public has had a say in the contest — and will lead the Pride Parade, expected to draw 22,000 viewers as it winds its way from Southside Park to Capitol Mall.

The parade is scheduled for 11 a.m. Sunday.

According to Community Center spokesperson Krystal Peak, Tinnin was the clear winner of the online contest, which ran for almost two months and featured seven contestants. Tinnin, who is openly gay, has served as pastor at the Loomis Basin Congregational Church of Christ since November 2016.

He is the founder of The Landing Spot, a support group for LGBTQIA+ young people and their caregivers in Placer County, and received national attention earlier this month for pushing Rocklin School District to approve curriculum inclusive of LGBTQ people.

Harper works as a program associate at the California Endowment Health Foundation, which works to expand healthcare access for underserved individuals and communities. She won the nationwide Black Trans Advocacy Award this year, and earlier this month was awarded the Four Freedoms Award from the Stonewall Democratic Club of Sacramento for her activism for the rights of transgender people and other marginalized groups.

Last year, Harper led the creation of the Chyna Gibson Memorial Mural, a work memorializing Gibson, a black trans woman and Sacramento resident killed in 2017. “[The mural] humanizes our narratives,” Harper said. “It says that we are people, and that we are somebody’s daughter.”

Harper also made headlines in 2018 when she was tazed, arrested, and placed in men’s prison while protesting the death of Stephon Clark at the hands of Sacramento police. She is still being charged with misdemeanors, although she said the case has been pushed back several months.

“I think this case is more of a politics game because they know that I’m well known,” Harper said. “You would think that because I’m getting awards and my community is celebrating me in various ways they would want to support me.”

Harper noted that this year’s Pride marks the 50th anniversary of the 1969 Stonewall uprising in New York organized by Marsha P. Johnson, a black trans woman. “I think this year it’s important that a black trans woman be a Grand Marshal, and I’m happy that I came through in that way,” she said. “I just want to affirm my people.”

The final Grand Marshal is Lorenz, who in 2018 became the first Ms. Sacramento Leather since 1998 — a title which requires her to provide representation, outreach and service to members of the Sacramento Valley area leather, fetish and kink communities, according to the contest’s website. During her reign, she has produced Gender Flux, an educational, gender-inclusive event at The Bolt Bar in Sacramento, and collected leather donations for kink community members affected by the Camp Fire in Chico and Paradise.

“I never thought I would be a Grand Marshal,” Lorenz said. She found out she was nominated by her Leather Club when voting began, and was notified yesterday of her victory. She’s still not certain what her duties at Pride will be.

“I haven’t heard yet. I just know that I’m riding in a car,” she said.

During the parade, each Grand Marshal will sit in a designated car to greet eventgoers and will give a brief speech upon arrival to the festival, Peak said. “The marshals reflect different parts of the LGBTQ community and the diversity within the community.”

Peak said Pride organizers are updating a safety plan to account for possible attendance by fans of “Hick-hop” artist Adam Calhoun, including hiring enough private security guards and training volunteers with appropriate de-escalation tactics. “We want to make sure that the march and the festival are as safe as possible,” she said.

Attending SacPride 2019? Things to know before you go:

• The festival will run from 11 a.m. – 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday on Capitol Mall between Third and Seventh streets. Buy a weekend pass here for $15; at the event you’ll only be able to buy a day pass. Children under 10 can enter for free.

• Parking will be available in the Capitol Garage at 10th & L Streets, the East End Garage at 17th & Capitol, and at 1801 L Street at 18th & L. Regional Transit is providing free rides all weekend for those who show a Pride Ride flyer.
• The main entrance for the event is on 7th and Capitol Street, and other entrances will be on 5th Street on L and N Streets, and at 4th and L streets.

• A Lost & Found will be set up at the Information Booth between 5th and 6th street.
• Eventgoers are discouraged from bringing pets. Marijuana use, nudity, and coolers are prohibited.

This story was originally published June 4, 2019 at 1:29 PM.