BALTIMORE — The annual Mayor’s Christmas Parade in Baltimore is less than two weeks away, and this year the organizers were met with some challenges.
Tom Kerr said it’s because the Baltimore Ravens game is the same day and the city initially said they weren’t going to have enough police officers to staff both events.
“Mayor [William Donald] Schaefer started the parade in 1973. The Hampden Village business association puts it on,” Kerr said.
Kerr said the Mayor's Christmas Parade has been the biggest parade in the state for the past 49 years.
This year, less than two weeks until the big day, Kerr said he got a call from the city asking him to move the date.
“The city called at five o’clock in the morning on Monday and said what’s the new date for the parade? I said, what are you talking about?" Kerr said.
"He said well we don’t have enough police to cover the parade because there’s a football game the same time. He said what are you going to do? I said what are you going to do, you’re the one who supplies the police. It’s not our fault."
Kerr said there will be 115 groups, balloons, floats , and equestrians in the parade and they're expecting around 15,000 people to attend.
“We have over 60 people who work on the parade. All the high schools from Baltimore and Baltimore County are in the parade,” Kerr said.
He said the same issue happened years ago, but they were notified in enough time to work out the problems.
“I wanted to go have a drink. I couldn’t believe I was hearing this. I don’t know if the right hand knew what the left hand was doing there,” Kerr said.
City councilors James Torrence and Odette Ramos met with city administrators and the mayor’s office to explore other law enforcement agencies to staff the parade. They said the parade is still happening on the planned day and time.
Kerr was happy about the solution but still upset about the miscommunication.
“This is a big thing for the city, one of the good things in the city. We want to have it continue,” Kerr said.
The Mayor's Christmas Parade will happen on Sunday December 4 at 1 p.m in Hampden.
