As Floats Are Prepared for Their Moment in the Sun, Sierra Madre Pulls ‘A 100% Community Effort’

Just days before the 136th Rose Parade, cities, groups, schools and organizations are kicking into high gear toward New Year’s Day, with most of their floats having been in construction since early spring.

A number of this year’s 39 floats are being sponsored by national and international companies, whose budgets could be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, while others are smaller-budget affairs, which exist only through community donations and volunteers.

The 93rd annual Sierra Madre float, for example, comes in with a budget closer to $53,000, but with design dreams just as ambitious as any corporation’s.

Workers were busy Saturday evening at the Sierra Madre Float Barn (which the City provides for a $1-a-year lease), with the first stages of the actual decoration.

“This is really a community effort,” said Anna McKenzie, lead florist and project coordinator for this year’s float effort, “¡Fiesta!”

“We are 100% community-driven,” she continued, “and we base everything we do on our donations, and everyone volunteering their time.”

This year, according to McKenzie, more than 500 volunteers will have worked on the float before its debut on New Year’s Day.

This year’s float is 35 feet long and 18 feet wide, depicting a traditional Mexican backyard party—celebrating three birthdays and a new baby— and features The Mariachi Divas performing live. The design, created by Steve and Belle Gagne and illustrated by Sharon Gahlla, features vibrant piñatas, traditional ballet folklorico dancers, and a mariachi band, embodying the parade theme of “Best Day Ever!” The float has two engines —one for driving, the other for the hydraulic system. It also houses a 100-gallon water tank for a fully functional water feature.

Live professional dancers, dressed in full Mexican regalia, will accompany the float on its route east along Colorado Boulevard.

According to the Sierra Madre Rose Float Association, it takes a calendar year to build the float, at 2 days a week, beginning in March. The association members come from all backgrounds and walks of life to contribute their skills. The association also averages about 15 core members who show up weekly to help build and decorate.

Newbies are taught skills like welding, screening, and color therapy, and then return each year to volunteer.

Jacqueline Page, a clinical children’s psychologist from Memphis, Tennessee, has been traveling to Pasadena and working on the Sierra Madre floats since 2011.

“I think I read something about it somewhere,” she said, creating tree rings with black seeds on a stump, “and then once I was here, I was hooked.”

Like scores of others, agreed McKenzie.

Throughout the year, the association also hosts a myriad of fundraising events, such as dedicating roses to loved ones, plant sales, and a “legendary”  bingo night.

The group also awards a scholarship to a local student and selects  a special Sierra Madre Rose Court based from students with a GPA of 3.0 or better, and who perform community service.