By Lori Montgomery
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 5, 2006; B05
D.C. Council member Marion Barry yesterday canceled plans to move the city's Martin Luther King Jr. parade from mid-January to April Fool's Day, calling the date change "silly," "crazy" and unacceptable.
"Not April first. April Fool's Day? We'd be laughed out of the world," Barry said.
Barry (D-Ward 8) decreed that the parade will be held a week later, on the afternoon of April 8, five days after the anniversary of King's "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech to striking Memphis sanitation workers in 1968 and four days after the anniversary of his assassination. That way, Barry said, people can enjoy the parade without worrying about frigid weather.
"We're going to have 40 or 50 bands in there. We hope to have some floats," Barry said. "I'm excited."
Controversy erupted over the parade after word spread that Barry's office had rescheduled it from Jan. 16, Martin Luther King Day, to April 1.
The parade, which was first held in Southeast in 1979, is traditionally hosted in mid-January by the Ward 8 council member.
Yesterday, Barry denied approving April 1, saying an aide had tentatively chosen that date without having "the whole picture."
According to Barry and others involved in parade planning, a committee appointed by Barry voted just after Christmas to move the parade from frigid January to warmer April. The committee recommended April 8, but then Barry spokesman Linda Greene learned that April 8 is the day of the National Cherry Blossom Festival Parade. So Greene spoke with Barry and committee members, she said, and "we all agreed to go with April 1."
At a meeting Tuesday night, the committee endorsed April 1, Greene said, ignoring critics who called it disrespectful to King's memory. "April Fool's means nothing to African Americans," Greene said. "I don't even know what it means. A lot of people don't."
Greene said Barry signed off on the date. Barry said he didn't. Either way, the former mayor concluded yesterday that holding a King parade on April Fool's Day would not look good. So he switched it back to April 8, scheduling a 2 p.m. step-off so as not to conflict with the cherry blossom parade at 10 a.m. downtown.
"When Linda told me about the problem, I said, 'No way,' " Barry said. "April first would be crazy."