We are an organization that has the power to impact our community and we do want to have that relationship moving forward,” said Josh Martinez secretary of ABQ Pride Board.Īfter the vote, KOB 4 spoke to APD Community Ambassador Chase Jewell about Sunday’s vote to ban APD from pride. “Moving forward, I will take this on myself to work with officer Chase, the community ambassador with APD, because we do want to heal this. The motion passed with a large majority.īut just because APD is banned from Pride this year, that doesn’t mean the police will never be at Pride again. But this year, 2022, that won’t be able to happenĪll but one member raised their hands in support in Sunday’s meeting. And in 2021 they had a booth at Pride Fest on the Expo New Mexico grounds. In 2019, they shared pictures of officers interacting with the crowd. In previous years, APD rode down the parade route with the rest of the floats. “The news is here, where is APD? This is not a private thing where they didn't know it was going on, they had opportunity to be here today or send a representative today,” Romero said. While I hear your point, and I agree with Lolo's stuff but I think we should, in some sense, have them at Pride this year just to build that relationship to show the community we are with them, and they are with us,” board member Mathew Maturio said.īut a big point of Sunday's discussion revolved around how APD was invited to be a part of the conversation, but did not send anyone. Other board members argued police should be included. “I think it is disrespectful to our community but also to our ancestors you know people forget that Stonewall wasn't, ‘hey let's get together and play I will survive,’ it was a riot! It was an intersectional riot that lasted three days,” said Frankie Flores, New Mexico Pride 2022 titleholder. This motion lead to heavy discussion among board members.