Our parade season is upon us. First up, last Saturday’s Gasparilla Children’s Parade. Next up, this Saturday’s Gasparilla Pirate Festival, aka “the adult parade.”
The former reminds us of what parades are like at their best–even with six-figure crowds, logistical inconveniences and serious clean-up. It can be done. When parents are with their kids. When the scene looks like vintage Tampa: African-American, Anglo and Hispanic. When there’s no need for alcohol zones or safe houses.
The latter, the one that features alcohol zones and the need for a safe house, has been cleaning up its act the past couple of years. I live near ground zero, and I do notice–although I wasn’t one of the neighborhood video vigilantes who graphically captured Gasparilla and helped force the helping hand of authorities. Gasparilla had become an annual paean to excess: an ad hoc vomitorium, an exercise in alley sex and an outdoor rite of pissage for too many teens.
But thanks to TPD taking it much more seriously, it’s been better policed and prepared for. Word is out: This isn’t a day without rules. This applies to teens–and their parents, the ones who have to come get them if they’re arrested. It’s a shame it came to that, but it beats those other shames.