Capital Pride is blaming its last-minute decision to cut this year’s parade route in half on an unexpected shortage of available police officers to provide security for the annual event.
Callie Metler, executive director of Capital Pride, said organizers had asked for 33 officers to patrol the parade route on Saturday, the same number as in 2023.
Metler said despite carefully planning the event over the past six months with the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) and the City of Ottawa, organizers recently learned only 16 officers will now be available, forcing them to shorten the route significantly. On Facebook, the group said it only learned of the situation on Tuesday.
This year’s parade will begin at its usual starting point at Elgin Street and Laurier Avenue W, then travel south along Elgin Street to Gladstone Avenue where participants will turn west toward Bank Street, where a street festival will take place between Gladstone and Slater Street.
The original route followed Gladstone past Bank to Kent Street before turning north and ending at Kent and Laurier.
Metler said the shortage of officers came as a surprise to organizers.
“Ultimately, the reasons that the Ottawa Police Service are citing is burnout, lack of resources, and having to attend many protests locally in the past little while,” she said.
OPS blames ‘high volume of events’
In an email to CBC, Ottawa police said: “Due to a high volume of events happening this weekend, we have had to make adjustments to our resources to ensure the safety and effectiveness of our operations across the city.”
OPS did not specify which other events are straining their resources, but added they have “worked closely with Capital Pride to adjust the route to a more manageable length. This adjustment ensures we can maintain an effective police presence and support a safe and successful event.”
Callie Metler, executive director of Capital Pride, says the length of this year’s parade will be half what it was last year due to a lack of available police officers to patrol the route.
Matthew Cox, president of the Ottawa Police Association (OPA), the union representing sworn officers, confirmed staffing is a concern.
“We are short staffed across the organization in every section and have been for quite some time,” Cox wrote in an email to CBC.
“Our members are tired of giving up days off away from family for all the different events/demonstrations that take place working in the Nation’s Capital.”
Cox added there’s still “a bad taste in some [OPA members’] mouths” after Capital Pride’s decision in 2017 to ban uniformed officers and police vehicles from the parade.
Because many of the officers staffing these events are on paid duty, or outside their regular shifts, they can choose whether or not they want to accept the assignment, Cox explained.
Groups vow to march despite controversy
Metler said the route change is not related to Capital Pride’s recent pro-Palestinian statement or the fallout that resulted, including the decision by a growing list of organizations to drop out of this year’s parade.
On Thursday, 50 local businesses, unions and other organizations released a joint statement in support of Capital Pride, saying they will still march in the Parade. The statement criticized those who have dropped out for putting the “safety of 2SLGBTQIA+ communities at risk.”
“2SLGBTQIA+ communities understand what it means to be targeted simply for existing,” wrote Carling Miller, the executive director of Kind Space, one community centre that signed the statement.
“For more than 75 years Palestinians continue to be gaslit about their very existence as a people. Like all people that have been targeted for destruction because of our identities and the bodies we inhabit, our liberations are linked.”
The statement also said anyone who was planning to march on Saturday, but whose organization has dropped out of the parade, is welcome to join the Queers for Palestine group.
The Capital Pride parade starts Saturday at 1 p.m. Laurier Avenue W, Bank Street, Gladstone Avenue, Elgin Street, and Slater Street will be partially closed or reduced to fewer lanes between Aug. 23 and Aug. 25.
The City of Ottawa has the complete details on its website.