Pride Festival in Champaign introducing two new events this year

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (WAND) - Pride Fest in Champaign County began this past Sunday, and they're excited to have two new events this year.

The nine day festival will include a new Youth and Family Pride Party on Friday, September 30th at the University of Illinois YMCA.

Director of Operations at Uniting Pride says they're really looking forward to introducing everyone to the new party.

“A couple of things I’m excited about, we have a brand-new youth and family party. We’ve always had youth and family programming as part of Pride Fest, but this year we’re giving that group of folks their own party. There’s going to be all kinds of great stuff. Crafts, and art, and face painting, balloons, a DJ, games.” mentioned Nicole Frydman.

Another event people have to look forward to is the Champaign Community Crawl. This event will happen on the very last day of the festival. Uniting Pride' goal with this, is for people to visit and connect with downtown businesses in Champaign. 

“Brand new this year, it’s in partnership with the Champaign Center Partnership. So, this is in downtown Champaign and the idea is there are tons of awesome affirming businesses down there, and we want to get the community to go visit those businesses, patronize those businesses, and have a little fun while we’re doing it.” said Frydman.

They are still looking for volunteers. If you are interested, visit: unitingpride.com