RED BANK: DRAG QUEENS STRUT THEIR STUFF
Octavia Anyae danced amid the audience at a “Drag Queen Open Mic” to conclude Pride month in Red Bank’s Riverside Gardens Park Friday night.
RED BANK: FAMILY-FRIENDLY DRAG EVENT SET
The Pride flag flying at Red Bank borough hall earlier this month. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
While other locales have their knickers in a twist over LGBTQ issues, Red Bank is going all-in with a “family friendly” drag queen event in celebration of Pride month.
RED BANK: LBGTQ PRIDE, IN VIVID COLOR
Red Bank’s third LGBTQ Pride in the Park event drew hundreds of colorfully clothed celebrants to Riverside Gardens Park Sunday.
Organized by the borough’s Parks and Rec department, the gathering featured health information booths, juggling lessons, hula-hooping and dancing. Check out additional photos below. (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
RED BANK: LGBTQ+ SAFETY PLAN LAUNCHES
Mayor Pasquale Menna and Monmouth County Acting Prosecutor Lori Linskey at Red Bank’s National Night Out in August. Below, the decal to be displayed under the Safe Spaces program. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
Red Bank businesses will soon be able to proclaim their spaces as havens for individuals targeted in bias crimes.
Under a new program unveiled Wednesday by Monmouth County Acting Prosecutor Lori Linskey and local law enforcement officials, the borough will begin offering businesses and institutions decals that designate their workplaces as places of temporary refuge to anyone threatened with a hate crime.
RED BANK: PARK PULSES WITH LBGTQ PRIDE
Vivid color brightened up Red Bank’s Riverside Gardens Park under gray skies for the second LGBTQ Pride event Saturday.
Organized by the borough’s Parks and Rec department, the gathering featured line dancing, hula-hooping, juggling and tons of love. Check out additional photos below. (Photos by Trish Russoniello. Click to enlarge.)
RED BANK: PRIDE RETURNS TO PARK
For the second time in three years, Red Bank’s Parks & Rec department hosts a free Pride event in Riverside Gardens Park Saturday, featuring a DJ, family activities and more in celebration of LGBTQ pride. Check out details here.
As in 2019, the colorful logo on the park lawn was created by the public utilities department. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
RED BANK: BOROUGH FRESHENS ITS PRIDE
One year after adding the colors of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer (LGBTQ) rainbow flag to a crosswalk at Broad and Monmouth streets, Red Bank’s DPU gave the intersection a freshening Wednesday to mark National Pride Month. (Photo by Allan Bass. Click to enlarge.)
RED BANK: ZIPPRICH, TRIGGIANO ‘OUT’ LISTED
Two members of the Red Bank council have been named to Insider NJ’s second annual “Out 100 Power List‘ of LBGT leaders in New Jersey.
RED BANK: BOROUGH SHOWS ITS LGBTQ PRIDE
Red Bank is showing its pride this week, with a repainting of the crosswalk at Broad and Monmouth streets in the colors of the LGBTQ rainbow flag.
On Saturday, the Parks & Rec department hosts a Pride event in Riverside Gardens Park, featuring live music, family activities and more in celebration of LGBTQ pride. Check out details here. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
RED BANK: A VIGIL FOR VICTIMS, AND PEACE
Children carried three bouquets of flowers — one for the five police officers slain in Dallas last week, one for victims of senseless violence, and one for “peace in our hearts and our country,” in the words of Mayor Pasquale Menna — at a vigil in Red Bank Sunday night.
About 40 residents, local clergy and a contingent of borough police officers participated in the brief ceremony, held at the Veterans Memorial on Monmouth Street at Drummond Place.
Additional photos are below. (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge) More →
RED BANK: MENNA CALLS FOR TOWN VIGIL
Red Bank Mayor Pasquale Menna is calling on area residents to participate in a silent vigil Sunday evening for the five law enforcement officers slain in Dallas Thursday “and for civilian victims of violence in our country,” he said in an alert distributed Saturday.
Participants are asked to gather at 7 p.m. at the Veterans Memorial, at the corner of Monmouth Street and Drummond Place. Three wreaths will be on display, Menna said: one for the officers killed, one for victims of senseless violence, and one for “peace in our hearts and our country.”
Attendees may leave flowers at the site. (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
RED BANK: SECOND VIGIL HONORS VICTIMS
As participants present lit a candle from a single flame at a vigil in Red Bank Thursday night, Pastor Terrence K. Porter of Pilgrim Baptist Church urged each of them to think of a single victim of Sunday’s Orlando nightclub attack, America’s bloodiest-ever mass shooting.
“The candle you light is a reflection of that image in your mind,” he said.
The memorial service, held at Johnny Jazz Park on Drs. Parker Boulevard, was the second such service in town in two nights, and was organized by the West Side Ministerial Alliance and other other religious groups. Additional photos are below. (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
RED BANK: VIGIL CALLS FOR LOVE, GUN LAWS
Dozens of Red Bank area residents gathered for a candlelight vigil in memory of the victims the nightclub attack that took place in Orlando, Florida early Sunday morning, in which 49 were killed and 53 wounded in America’s bloodiest-ever mass shooting.
Several speakers, including Rabbi Marc Kline, of the Monmouth Reform Temple in Tinton Falls, called for tighter gun laws. “We need to do more than mourn and grieve,” he told the gathering, held outside Red Bank’s borough hall on Monmouth Street. A later reference to a Senate filibuster then underway for gun-law reform drew strong applause.
Additional photos may be seen below.
A second vigil, organized by the West Side Ministerial Alliance and other other religious groups, is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. today at Johnny Jazz Park, corner of Drs. Parker Boulevard and Shrewsbury Avenue in Red Bank. For further information, call 732-747-2343. (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
RED BANK: VIGIL FOR PULSE VICTIMS PLANNED
As they did in response to the murders of nine churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina last year, Red Bank residents and others will gather again this week to mourn.
Mayor Pasquale Menna has called for a community-wide candlelight vigil “in remembrance of the victims in the senseless nightclub attack” that took place in Orlando, Florida early Sunday morning, in which 49 were killed and 53 wounded in America’s bloodiest-ever mass shooting.
LGBT YOUTH MAKE RED BANK PROUD
“The heat of her breath fills the hollows of my bones with helium and lifts my ribcage just long enough to feel again.” That’s how Chris Hennessy, 19, of Oceanport, began her poem ‘Helium’ at Two River Pride, Red Banks first celebration of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transexual youth at the Two River Theater Wednesday night.
Its difficult not to get emotional when pouring my rage and confusion and hope out to an audience of strangers, only to realize just by the looks on their faces that they feel that pain too, that none of us are alone anymore, Hennessy said.
Her poetry was followed by two hours of performances from youth and musical groups, such as the Giving Voice Choir (above). (Photo by Danielle Tepper. Click to enlarge)