Pride in Newry Festival - All systems go

The inaugural meeting last night of the Pride in Newry Festival was a resounding success. The festival will celebrate the diversity of culture and communities across our area. A steering committee was formed to organise the event due to take place on Saturday the 29th of September.

A presentation was made by the Newry Rainbow Community on their aims and hopes for the event.

The attendance bodes well for the concept of the festival in terms of the broad range of interests, organisations, skills and backgrounds present, reflective of the inclusive nature of the event.

The enthusiasm, positivity and desire to get something "big" going in our city was extremely encouraging.

This event is a broad platform to showcase the wide range of cultures and communities in Newry and it will celebrate all that's good about our city and show that we are all indeed proud of where we live.

At the meeting it was emphasized that Pride in Newry will maximise the potential to ignite the imagination of the people and communities in our district and ensure that the event is inclusive of our City's deep reservoir of culture, arts and talent.

Plans are to make this an extremely successful major public event that can attract thousands of people into Newry City centre to participate in and view the parade, concert and outdoor entertainment. The events will showcase our new public spaces and contribute substantially to local businesses.

It is hoped that when the economic benefit of this event is realised it will convince local businesses and Newry & Mourne District Council to support and expand the event in future years making it an important major annual event in the tourism package of Newry & Mourne and South Armagh.

Speaking at the meeting Rory Rafferty, NRC Chairman stated "We believe that Pride in Newry making such a public statement of diversity and culture will underpin Newry's standing as a 21st Century City and will affirm the decision made ten years ago to grant Newry its City status!"

Another meeting was arranged for 27th of June at 7pm in the Bellagio Suite in Bellinis so if you could not make the last meeting feel free to come along to the next one.