On June 25, Hollister will hold its fifth annual Pride Day, giving city residents an opportunity to show its support for the local LGBTQ+ community. The event will be held in the 300 block of Fifth Street in front of City Hall from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and include remarks delivered by many federal, state and city leaders, information booths hosted by community service organizations, food trucks and a raffle.
Pride Day commemorates the 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York, considered to be the turning point in the LGBTQ+ fight for equal rights in the United States. According to Hollister District 2 City Councilmember Rolan Resendiz, San Benito County’s first openly gay elected official, that fight is ongoing and is one of the most important civil rights issues of our time.
“It is an opportunity to celebrate who we are,” he said. “We want to educate people and have them support us, and we need to support each other. I think we all have an obligation to be on the right side of history on this issue.”
The first Pride event in Hollister was organized in 2018 by Raymond Andrade, a peer mentor at the LGBTQ+ Resource Center. This year, the peer mentors began meeting weekly starting in March to plan this year’s event with help from Resendiz and City Recreation Supervisor Tina Garza, as well as Louise Coombes, the Esperanza Center’s Mental Health Services coordinator.
Resendiz also worked to line up a distinguished group of speakers, including 18th District Rep. Zoe Lofgren, District 30 Assemblymember Robert Rivas, state Senator Anna Caballero, San Benito County District 2 Supervisor Kollin Kosmicki, Hollister Mayor Mia Casey and San Juan Bautista Mayor Leslie Jordan.
El Nopal Bakery is donating rainbow-colored conchas, and La Catrina is supplying burritos. Food will also be available from three of the area’s most popular food trucks: El Guapo, Hapa Bros and the Steak Stop. There will also be performances by an Aztec dance group and Hollisiter’s Mariachi Juvenil Corazon Jalisciense.
One feature of the event is the “Pride Passport.” Getting the passport signed off by each of the 10 booths set up by local service organizations gets you a raffle ticket for prizes including Govee Smart LED Light Bars, a Samsung Galaxy Tab A7, Family Packs from Great America and Raging Waters, an Echo Pop speaker and Amazon gift cards.
The service organizations include San Benito +, Hollister Parks and Recreation, San Benito County Health, Community Solutions, Suicide Prevention Services of the Central Coast, The Q Corner, The LGBTQ Youth Space, First 5 San Benito, Youth Alliance, and the YMCA.
“We want all the attendees to go to each of these tables,” Coombes said. “We are hoping they will just engage and discover what kind of resources are available to everyone.”
Hollister’s Pride Day will bring to focus what remains, as Resendiz noted, an ongoing struggle for equal rights.
A brochure made for the event sums up the themes of the day: “Understanding the importance of the history and events of our community and the struggles that queer people have gone through allows us not only to honor and celebrate that community today, but to bring to light the issues and rights that LGBTQ+ people are still fighting for. The struggle for these rights and against social stigmas is an ongoing one and can only be achieved through understanding and education.”
Alejandro Dones, a Pride Day participant, said that, having grown up in Hollister, he found that it had not been much of an open space or accepting area for LGBTQ+ youth.
“It’s really important to have events like this that show in smaller outskirt areas that we have a community out here as well,” he said. “Not having to go to pride events in bigger cities to feel like you’re seen. You need to be able to feel like you’re seen and comfortable here in your own home town as well.”
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