Laramie PrideFest starts with proclamation, sign lighting and march

First Street Plaza will be the center of Laramie PrideFest’s public finale Saturday, June 7, when the Pride Proclamation and Visibility March is set for 9:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. and moves through downtown Laramie to the courthouse. The route puts the celebration in the city’s most recognizable civic corridor, not off to the side, and gives the event a visibility that reaches beyond PrideFest regulars.

The build-up began Monday evening at the First Street Footbridge, where the downtown sign lighting ran from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. Tuesday’s Pride Proclamation at Laramie City Hall ran from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Taken together, the three events made up a tightly linked sequence of public moments spread across downtown Laramie, with each stop serving a different audience: city government at City Hall, passersby and businesses near the footbridge, and marchers gathered at First Street Plaza.

Laramie PrideFest says 2026 is its 10th year of programming and is using the theme The Internet Made Me Gay. The organization has framed the week around queer joy, love and liberation, and the event layout makes that message hard to miss in the places residents already use every day. A 2025 city proclamation described PrideFest as the most visible event in Laramie for LGBTQ+ people, their friends, allies and families, a description that fits the way this year’s events are spread across City Hall, First Street and the courthouse block.

That civic visibility also rests on older city action. On May 13, 2015, Laramie City Council passed a non-discrimination ordinance covering actual or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity in employment, housing and public accommodations, making Laramie the first city in Wyoming to adopt such a policy. A 2025 city proclamation said Laramie, Casper and Jackson were the only Wyoming municipalities with that ordinance at the time.

The downtown procession also follows a pattern that has become familiar in Laramie. In 2024, the city’s Pride Month proclamation was read from First Street Plaza, followed by a march to the courthouse and then Pride in the Park at Washington Park. Earlier Pride coverage has tied the event to the legacy of Matthew Shepard and to the effort to widen inclusion in Wyoming, especially in a smaller-city setting where public space matters. In that context, PrideFest’s opening and closing points are more than logistics. They are a reminder that in Laramie, visibility itself is part of the celebration.