pride parade canceled

Pride Houston parade and festival canceled due to rise in COVID cases

The beloved parade is a no-go this year.

After putting the party on hold as the state and nation dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Pride Houston has been forced to cancel again.

Unfortunately, it's still for COVID-related reasons.

CultureMap news partner ABC13 is told that Pride Houston's parade and festival planned for September 25 are canceled amid a spike in COVID-19 cases and the spread of the highly contagious delta variant.

That doesn't mean there won't be a celebration at all. Though the city of Houston advised organizers to pivot due to the rise in hospitalizations, the group will effort a Pride block party in Montrose on October 2.

While details are limited now, the block party will be concert-style and likely be staged as an outdoor event with a 5,000-person maximum capacity.

The delta variant has become dominant and is the most transmissible so far.

According to data pulled by the Texas Tribune, the state's positivity rate, described as the ratio of confirmed cases to tests, went above 10 percent for the first time since February. Gov. Greg Abbott previously identified that threshold as dangerous.

Nearly 43 percent of Texans have been fully vaccinated, which lags behind the national vaccination rate of 48.8percent, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Pride Houston is not the only event that has had to pivot or cancel its plans because of the lingering pandemic.

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Continue reading on our news partner ABC13.

festivals closings

Thanks, Queen Bey

Pop icon Beyoncé donates $100,000 to University of Houston Law School

Photo by Erza Shaw Getty Images

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Pop megastar Beyoncé Knowles-Carter has donated $100,000 to the University of Houston Law Center Criminal Justice Clinic through her BeyGOOD Foundation. The gift will allow the clinic to hire fill-time faculty to head it, benefiting the students who study there.

“I am delighted that the BeyGOOD Foundation has made this very generous gift to the UH Law Center,” said Leonard Baynes, dean of the UH Law Center. “Not only will this funding help establish a full-time criminal justice clinic that provides pro bono legal services in our community, but it will also supercharge our already excellent criminal law and justice programming.”

The clinic is one of nine at UHLC. It helps students learn to navigate the criminal justice system, especially on behalf of clients that are underserved by skilled attorneys. People of color are affected disproportionately by a lack of good, ethical representation.

Beyoncé, the most decorated artist in Grammy history and easily the biggest musical star native to Houston, has a long history of advocating for criminal justice reform. She was a staunch supporter of the police reform following the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, asking law enforcement to “stop killing us” in a web post. In 2020, she penned an open letter to the Kentucky attorney general asking for justice in the death of Breonna Taylor.

Through her BeyGOOD Foundation, established in 2013, Beyoncé has focused mostly on expanding the prospects of Black-owned business and offering education opportunities to students. Forwarding the cause of legal representation in Texas while also helping out marginalized communities compliments her other philanthropic work.

“At UH Law, we envision a legal profession where ‘everyone has the opportunity to prosper,’ as BeyGOOD envisions, and we will achieve this vision by providing access to strong and effective legal representation in criminal proceedings,” Baynes said. “And together, through this gift, the BeyGOOD Foundation and UHLC will shepherd the next generation of criminal justice attorneys in the city of Houston, the state of Texas and the nation.”