Naperville City Council members voted to approve a grant to help pay for this year’s Naper Pride Fest, a two-day event that took place for the first time in 2021.
After initially being divided on how much grant money to provide Naper Pride Fest, Naperville City Council members this week agreed to provide $69,155 to help pay for the second annual event.
The Special Events and Cultural Amenities Commission recommended the city award a total of $964,317 in grants to 54 city organizations. The grant money comes from Naperville’s food and beverage tax revenue.
One of the groups selected to receive a grant is Naper Pride, which organizes the two-day Naper Pride Fest celebrating the LGBTQ community. The event first took place in September at Naper Settlement.
But a calculation of funding recommendations from city council members reduced the amount that Naper Pride would receive.
The commission had recommended that Naper Pride receive $69,155 for operating costs. By the time council was poised to vote on the grants on Tuesday, the suggested amount had dropped to $47,533. The remaining $21,622 was set aside for five other organizations.
But Councilwoman Theresa Sullivan suggested the city use leftover money from previous years to make up the difference. As a result of Sullivan’s idea, the city council unanimously approved the $69,155 grant amount for Naper Pride.
Still, Naper Pride was the only group to see a reduction from what the commission recommended, a point emphasized by Councilman Ian Holzhauer. “To see Naper Pride kind of singled out as the one organization in this position really bothered me,” he said.
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Mayor Steve Chirico pushed back at the idea that Naper Pride was being singled out, noting how supportive the city has been of the festival.
“I don’t want anybody to have the impression that anybody is being singled out,” Chirico said. “The ones who probably feel most singled out are the ones who got zero year after year.”
Several Naper Pride representatives spoke in support of the festival at Tuesday’s meeting. While they expressed appreciation for the money they’ve been given in the past, they said they felt deserving of the recommended amount like the other 53 organizations.
In addition to the grant money for operating costs, Naper Pride Fest also will receive $16,978 for city services.
Naper Pride organizers received $83,000 in special events funds in 2020. But that money was returned to the city when the festival was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The event received $115,000 in 2021, with $6,800 of unused money returned.
“We do absolutely understand that this is a gift, and with a gift, there is no right to expectation,” Josh Stell said. “Having said that, we have never come before you and requested that you reduce an amount granted to another organization in order to enhance ours. Yet in each of the last three years that we have applied for SECA, that has happened to us.”
