Petaluma pool hall offers chance to play, celebrate Pride every month

The pandemic was changing the lives of county residents in 2020, when Petaluma Pride had initially intended to host its first annual Pride Festival.

A few years later, as safety protocols eased, Petaluma Pride began organizing more frequent events that would bring the community together and shine a light on notable causes.

Since then, the nonprofit itself has grown thanks to the help from supporters from all around in Petalma and Sonoma County.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Sonoma County has 56% more same-sex couples than the national average. Sonoma County Pride also reports the county is the second “gayest” metropolitan area in the nation with 7.63 same-sex couples per 1,000 households, behind San Francisco with 12.4.

With the hopes of bringing more of the LGBTQ+ community together, Christopher Kren-Mora, president of Sonoma County Pride, reached out to Michael Bombace, general manager of Buffalo Billiards, in 2021 hoping to collaborate on monthly pride event in downtown Petaluma.

Bombace jumped at the opportunity to help.

For years, Buffalo Billiards has hosted events, birthday and holiday parties, company outings and pool tournaments since opening in 1992. The downtown business seemed like the best space to expand Sonoma County Pride’s monthly calendar.

The large venue on Petaluma Boulevard North is 11,000 square feet and can entertain up to 250 people. There are pool and ping pong tables, arcade games and an outdoor area. Plus, Buffalo Billiards has a full menu that includes appetizers, burgers, sandwiches and pizza. Their beer list also has plenty of local and national favorites to choose from.

Working with locals to do something positive for the community is something Bombace has been wanting to do for years.

He began working at Buffalo Billiards in 2018 and before that, he worked in Healdsburg.

“Healdsburg just really dies down after 9 o’clock, there’s really nowhere to go … but Petaluma has such a nightlife that I really wanted to tap into it a little bit more,” he said.

The first Pride Night at Buffalo Billiards started roughly two years ago in the summer and since then, the first Thursday of each month atBuffalo Billiards is dedicated to the free event.

Pride blooms in Petaluma

In 2019, Hanan Huneidi, a Penngrove resident and director of special education in Redwood City, launched Petaluma Pride. Hunedi’s vision was to create a nonprofit that would celebrate the town’s diversity and act as a resource to those in the LGBTQ+ community.

“Our whole vision, intention and, really, drive is to ensure that youth in Petaluma see representation in the community and know that it’s okay and safe and wonderful to be whoever they are,” she said. “I think a lot of us have agreed that if we had seen that when we were younger, our journey within ourselves would have been a lot different.”

Other members of the nonprofit include Josh Simmons, Brandon Allen and Jennifer Horos.

Karen Nau, Petaluma’s District 3 councilwoman who has been a Petaluma resident for over 50 years, has gotten to know Petaluma Pride since its inception and is excited at what they’ve achieved thus far.

“Petaluma is proud of our LGBTQ+ members in the community,” Nau said. “Petaluma Pride … has come a long way, it is an asset to our community.”

As a teacher, Nau has had numerous students with same-sex parents and a transgender student at a time when she said that there were little resources, like books, that could help faculty or students become more educated on the subject.

A 2022 CDC survey of just under 8,000 U.S. high school students found that 1 in 5 of them identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual or questioning – a number that has doubled since 2012.

In 2022, the Trevor Project surveyed nearly 34,000 LGBTQ+ youth ages 13 to 24 across the United States, with 45% of respondents being LGBTQ+ youth of color and 48% being transgender or nonbinary. The study found fewer than 1 in 3 transgender and nonbinary youth found their home to be gender-affirming. And 56% of LGBTQ+ youth reported that their mental health was poor most of the time or always due to the COVID-19 pandemic

Like many organizations, the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted Petaluma Pride’s plan to host their first annual Pride Festival in 2020. The group pivoted and instead, hosted a series of small, outdoor gatherings in local parks where masks and social distancing worked in their favor.

One of the first events that Petaluma Pride hosted was a quarterly event at Griffo Distillery and Tasting Bar off of Scott Street.

“Jenny Griffo is an amazing ally and she is so good to us and she’s always very welcoming, so she’s always let us do events there,” Huneidi said.

The nonprofit’s first Pride Festival was held on Oct. 8, 2022.

Now, the festival has has expanded into a three-day event this weekend, from Oct. 13-15. The weekend will be kicked off with a dance party on Friday. On Saturday, the festivities included a farmers’ market at Walnut Park, Pride walk and gathering Theatre Square. Then, there was a burlesque and drag show at the Big Easy. And Sunday, brunch was at the River Front Cafe.

The Petaluma Pride team hopes to have a parade as part of the events at future festivals, but Huneidi noted the high costs and city permits associated with a big town event weren’t feasible this year.

Local partners and sponsors like Petaluma Farmers’ Market, Petaluma People Services Center, Positive Images, Sonoma Pride, Planned Parenthood Northern California, Amor Para Todos, Petaluma River Park Foundation and more helped Petaluma Pride fund and supported this year’s offerings.

Pride Night at Buffalo Billiards

Kren-Mora and Sonoma County Pride handed the reins over to Huneidi and Petaluma Pride earlier this year for future Pride Nights at Buffalo Billiards.

“Chris reached out to me and said, ‘Hey, we’re thinking of doing an event in Petaluma, would you like to partner with us?’” Huneidi said. “So, for the majority of the time, they really led (Pride Night at Buffalo Billiards), they put it on and we would take it over for them if they were out of town or something like that … but the idea was always that we were going to take it over for them, so a couple of months ago, he was like, ‘Are you ready?’”

Since 2021, Buffalo Billiards has seen a robust audience month after month, proving to be a symbiotic relationship for both the business and the nonprofit.

“(Pride Night) is so much fun here. They come in, they invite everybody, and we usually do an extended Happy Hour for them,” Bombace said. “We have a really good relationship.”

On Pride Night, Buffalo Billiards puts out a special Happy Hour menu for its guests and sets aside a couple of pool tables specifically for event attendees. The employees, Huneidi said, are incredibly welcoming and the atmosphere is convivial.

“It’s been great, we have such a good turnout. (In September), we used it as a time for anyone interested in volunteering for the Petaluma Pride Festival to gather and we had a drag queen show up – it’s been really good,” Huneidi said.