DECATUR — For Josh McElravy, Decatur’s annual Labor Day parade serves as a reminder that the day is more than a marker of the changing of the seasons.  

"It’s our celebration of labor," McElravy, the business manager for Laborers Local 159, said. "It’s not the end of summer; it’s not the beginning of school — it’s our day to celebrate workers." 

Laborers Local 159 was one of more than two dozen unions who marched with their supporters in this year’s parade, which winded its way through downtown for more than an hour on the sunny Monday morning. 

The streets were filled with hundreds of marchers while the heavy equipment used in the construction trades, firetrucks used by the city’s unionized firefighters and other tools of workers’ labor were prominently featured. However, many of the children who lined up along the parade route were more concerned with collecting the handfuls of candy being thrown their way. 

The theme of this year’s festivities was "It’s Better in a Union."

The AFL-CIO has been embarking upon a national bus tour under that banner for the past couple of months highlighting the "freedom, fairness and security" that leaders say organized labor delivers for working people.

"If you’re in a union, you have somebody there fighting for you," said Amy Rueff, treasurer of the Decatur Labor & Trades Assembly. "And so we want people to know that you don’t have to be pushed around in your job, that when you’re in a union, you have a voice and a bigger purpose, and it makes for a better job and better working conditions."

The grand marshal for this year’s parade was Bill Francisco, the executive assistant of the general secretary-treasurer of International Union of Painters and Allied Trades in Washington D.C. The Macon resident is a 28-year member of IUPAT and served as business manager of Painters Local 288 in Decatur prior to taking the job with the International Union in July of 2023.

After the parade wrapped up, union members and their families gathered in Fairview Park for their annual picnic. Rueff said they expected to serve about 3,000 people this year.

As was the case in past years, the Decatur Trades & Labor Assembly presented $16,100 in grants from its We Are One Community fund to 19 local charities and organizations.