Jacksonville library cancels sold-out pride prom event, says it can’t provide adequate safety

Beatrice Palmer cleared her schedule for Friday evening.

Among a typical busy week of drag gigs, she planned to make an appearance at a prom night before her next show.

The local drag entertainer and producer wanted to be there for the 100 teenagers who signed up to attend the Storybook Pride Prom at Riverside’s Willowbranch Library dressed as their favorite book characters or in drag Friday night.

After the Jacksonville Public Library canceled the night of music, dancing and costumes Monday morning, Palmer wants to reschedule the event.

“Keep in mind, I was only hired on to make an appearance. I wasn’t an organizer. I wasn’t doing a performance. I wasn’t behind this at all. I wasn’t even getting paid,” she said. “I did this because I cared.”

Chris Boivin, the library’s assistant director of community relations and marketing, said they canceled the prom because the library did not think it could provide enough “safety and security for everybody involved.”

The decision came Monday morning, Boivin said, after the library received hundreds of phone calls supporting and protesting the Storybook Pride Prom. Hundreds commented on and shared the library’s Facebook post canceling the dance to express their disappointment.

Some were glad.

Raymond Johnson, founder of Biblical Concepts Ministries in Jacksonville, encouraged people in an email titled “emergency alert” to contact city officials and local pastors and demand the event be canceled........


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