Hundreds of dogs and owners walked the doggy distance at Belmont Shore in Long Beach Sunday afternoon at the 22nd annual Haute Dog Howl-oween parade.
Originally founded by Justin Rudd, this year marks the parade’s 22 year of operation. Rudd is the creator of Rosie’s Beach in Long Beach, the only off-leash all-day dog beach in L.A. County.
“Justin Rudd is the most community-oriented volunteer in our community,” said Long Beach councilwoman Kristina Duggins, who was present at the parade. “This is such a great way to celebrate Halloween, bringing people together and you can see that everyone is happy to be here.”
The parade is part of a larger fundraising event for Community Action Team (CAT), a nonprofit founded by Rudd. Parade participants paid $10 to be a part of the parade and spectators paid $5 for a front row seat. All proceeds set to go to CAT.
The event also brings in volunteers from local schools. Cal State Long Beach business major Jaide Ramirez volunteered this year for the first time.
“Even though I’m not a dog person, it’s still really cute and good to see the community showing up,” Ramirez said.
Many of the participants, both human and canine, were Long Beach locals and have participated in the parade for years. Angela Quaglia, her partner Dustin Driver and her dog, dressed as Bob Barker from “The Price is Right,” have been attending for three years.
“It’s just a fun way to be involved in the community and it’s fun to be with other dog lovers,” Quaglia said. “Not to mention you don’t’ get a lot of opportunity as a grown-up to be whimsical.”
Long Beach resident Lori and her 12-year-old rescue TJ have also been attending for a number of years.
“Justin Rudd’s activities are always fun, and it’s a safe environment for people to see how cool [TJ] is,” Lori said. TJ’s costume this year was a scuba diver due to his love for bubbles.
While some paradegoers were experienced, it was other’s first time, like Celina and Miguel Rodriguez and their two-year-old rescue from Pomona.
“We found out about it yesterday and we were like ‘Let’s sign up.’ We usually go to Rosie’s Beach, so she likes coming out here,” Celina said. “It’s really creative. There’s a lot of cool floats and homemade costumes. I was just saying how next year we got to do a float.”
Also attending for the first time was Marlene and Robert Augur from Lake Forest and their dog Mito, short for Mitochondria.
“We had a son in July 2018 who was born with mitochondrial disease, and our son unfortunately passed away after 18 months,” Robert said. “Shortly after, we got [the dog] and we named him Mito. When people ask us about his name it’s an opportunity to talk about our son and raise awareness.”
The trio often attend fundraisers together and run an Instagram account to raise awareness. At the parade the group dressed as Mario, Luigi and Bowser.
This year’s event brought about 400 four-legged-friends and their owners to Belmont Shore to participate in the parade. A pet adoption and vendor fair continued after the parade until 4 p.m.
