Chicago Pride Parade. (Gotta Be Worth It / pexels)

Chicago police will be canceling days off and staffing an “abundance” of officers along the route of the city’s Pride Parade this Sunday.

Police Supt. Larry Snelling on Friday discussed his department’s safety plans ahead of the annual parade, noting the event typically receives threats that officials are working to investigate and prevent.

“We do our research and we put plans in place to make sure that none of those threats can be carried out,” Snelling said during a news conference Friday at the Center on Halsted. “The plan is for this parade to go off as well as it should, as well as it can.”

Snelling did not disclose any specific threats and said some of them are more serious than others. He said police coordinate with federal officials and the CPD’s joint terrorism task force and take each threat seriously.

The parade will begin at 11 a.m. Sunday — an hour earlier than normal — and will extend along a shortened route, kicking off at Sheridan and Broadway and ending near the intersection of Diversey and Sheridan.

“Our city is a haven — not just this space and this street — but our entire city is a haven for those who are experiencing LGBT discrimination around the world,” Ald. Bennett Lawson (44th Ward) said. “As we welcome folks here this weekend, I think we want to remember that. We want to keep it safe.”

Snelling said police will be stationed throughout the entirety of that route and he has canceled officers’ days off so that the department has enough people available to run shift changes and keep officers fresh throughout the day.

Additional officers will also be stationed in communities where violence can also occur.

Snelling said more so than the parade itself, he is concerned about the potential for disruptions or violence following the event into the evening hours.

“What we’ve also seen is people who just decide to converge on that area and carry out more acts of violence, vandalism, things of that nature,” Snelling said. “So I’m just here to tell you now: That’s not going to be tolerated. We will put an end to that and if arrests need to be made, we will do that. We hope we do not have to do that.”

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