Gayle Anderson reports from South Los Angeles to talk about the annual Kingdom Day Parade.
After two cancellations caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the annual Kingdom Day Parade, traditionally on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, is scheduled to happen today five months later than usual.
The parade was scheduled for January 17, but was scrubbed for the second year in a row due to the pandemic. With lower COVID numbers following the winter surge in virus cases, the parade is set to start at 11 a.m. followed by a festival at Leimert Park.
ABC7 will begin televising the festivities at 11 a.m.
The theme of the parade will be “Healing America.” The parade will follow its traditional three-mile route, beginning at Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Western Avenue, proceeding west to Crenshaw Boulevard and then south to Vernon Avenue. The event will include the traditional lineup of marching bands, equestrian units, floats, elected officials and local dignitaries.
Actor Bill Duke and actress and model Judy Pace are among those expected to take part in the procession. Mayoral candidate Congressperson Karen Bass is scheduled to serve as the parade’s grand marshal.
Visit the Los Angeles Kingdom Day Parade website for more information about the parade.
You can call this a “Double Holiday” because this year marks the second year Juneteenth will be observed as a federal holiday.
June 19 commemorates the day in 1865 when enslaved people in Texas were told by Union Army Gen. Gordon Granger that they had been liberated. Granger’s announcement came almost three years after the Emancipation Proclamation. President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, as the nation approached its third year of bloody civil war. The proclamation declared “that all persons held as slaves” within the rebellious states “are, and henceforward shall be free.”
President Joe Biden’s announcement last year did not give every government agency enough time to act accordingly and cease operations. However, this year all federal agencies, some state governments and some stores will be closed the Monday following Juneteenth celebrations throughout the weekend.
Post Office and Mail Services
U.S. post offices will be closed and mail will not be delivered from the USPS on Monday.
On Sunday, certain UPS locations will remain open but will only deliver through their Express Critical services, pausing all other deliveries until Monday.
FedEx will be operating under their regular hours on Sunday and Monday.
Banks
Because the federal bank reserve will be observing Juneteenth on Monday, most banks will be closed including Bank of America, Wells Fargo and JP Morgan. However, TD Bank will be closed Sunday, as is their normal schedule, and will be open Monday.
U.S. financial markets
Wall Street will observe the holiday on Monday. The New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq will be closed and not have active trading hours.
School and government agencies
All federal offices and schools will be closed on Monday. However, not every state recognizes Juneteenth as a state holiday, meaning some state government offices may remain open.
States that currently do not recognize Juneteenth as a state holiday include: Alaska, Arizona, Florida, Tennessee and Wisconsin.
Retail
Most stores and restaurants will remain open on Juneteenth for regular hours.
Nike confirmed to Axios that they will close their retail and distribution centers on Sunday and close corporate headquarters on Monday.
Nike, Target and Best Buy were among the stores who made Juneteenth a company holiday with paid time off in 2020. Although corporate headquarters of companies like Apple, Twitter, Target, Lyft and Zillow will be closed Monday, the retail stores and services will be operating under normal hours.
For more information about the Juneteenth holiday, take a look at the Pew Research Center website.
To learn all about Juneteenth its entirety, visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture website at the Smithsonian, as their website contains in-depth detail of why Juneteenth is an important day.
This aired on the KTLA 5 Morning News on June 20, 2022.