CAIRO — This year’s Cairo Christmas Parade has been canceled, the Cairo-Grady County Chamber of Commerce announced this week.

“We are still in the middle of a pandemic,” said Courtney Salapa King, the Chamber’s interim director. “We still have to take precautions, and there was absolutely no way that we could abide by the guidelines of social distancing and so on with that many people in one place.”

In recent years the annual parade has attracted as many as 10,000 spectators and more than 130 entrants. King said the safety in hosting such a large gathering, particularly at a time of year when many people will visit family and potentially risk further spread of the novel coronavirus if an outbreak were to occur, was questionable.

“Grady County has always been a community that supports one another and we protect each other, and that’s what we’re doing,” she said. “I know a lot of people don’t see it as that, but there’s just no possible way that we can be comfortable with exposing and risking that many people.”

Other considerations that went into the decision to cancel the event included the burden of asking local businesses to pour resources into parade floats during an unstable economic period.

An alternative event will be held in lieu of the traditional parade, though King was tight-lipped on what that event could entail.

“People will be able to ride around and look. I will say that much,” she said.

King did say that the alternate event would not involve a large gathering. Chamber officials are currently developing a theme for the event.

Reaction to the Chamber’s announcement has been sharply negative.

“People have been really brutal, but thankfully, I have thick skin,” King said.

“It’s a hard pill to swallow, especially when people look forward to it every year,” she continued. “It’s a family tradition, and I think that’s what the toughest part of it is.”

The interim director said the cancelation was not a “political stance,” as some critics of the decision have said.

“A lot of thinking and loss of sleep and anxiety went into making this decision,” she said. “It wasn’t easy at all.”

King also noted that Cairo isn’t the only town in southwest Georgia to have canceled its Christmas parade due to the pandemic.

“Everybody in this region has essentially canceled their holiday activities that would involve a lot of people in one gathering,” she said.

Though the annual parade was rescheduled once in 2017 due to inclement weather, King was not aware of any time it was outright canceled in its decades-old history. 

The decision to cancel the parade was made in consultation with the City of Cairo.

While the announcement is a blow to local morale this year, King said Grady County residents have plenty to look forward to in 2021.

“My goal for next year is to have a parade that is bigger and better than it’s ever been,” she said. “We will bounce back.”