All Saints Rector Ed Bacon named this year's 'Thorny Rose' recipient

All in good fun ... All Saints' Rector Ed Bacon (pictured below in front of the Maryland Hotel Wall) to be "honored" at this year's Doo Dah Parade!

All Saints Rector Ed Bacon named this year's 'Thorny Rose' recipient
By Janette Williams, SGVN
Posted: 04/18/2012 03:22:03 PM PDT
PASADENA - For standing his Civic Center ground over a controversial church expansion, All Saints Rector Ed Bacon has been named this year's Thorny Rose, the Doo Dah Parade's annual nod to the biggest pain in the civic neck.

As Doo Dah organizers describe it, the prickly honor is presented annually to "an individual or organization that has created the strongest dose of discomfort and controversy in the community."

The recognition comes two days after the City Council unanimously voted to approve the church's $45-million expansion, part of a 15-year master plan on the 2.8-acre campus opposite City Hall. In their citation, Doo Dah officials cited Bacon's six-year "vision" to expand the church's role.

"The plans called for bringing progressive architecture to Pasadena's historic Civic Center," the citation said. "When the rector took it public many people railed against it as too big, too extreme, and too `out there.' Of course, the preservationists got involved. First they swooned, then they got a hold of themselves and threatened roadblocks at every turn. But Ed Bacon and his supporters battled on."

As is the tradition for Thorny Rose winners, officials said, Bacon, or a church designate, will be given an invitation to receive the award in public and be driven along the route of the 35th Pasadena Doo Dah Parade on April 28 at its new Colorado Boulevard location in East Pasadena.

The only Thorny Rose awardee to pass up the invitation was Wayne Lusvardi who was the eighth recipient (represented by a giant rubber chicken) and last year's award winners, Pasadenans for a Livable City who sued the city over the IED development in the Playhouse District.

Past recipients who did attend include inaugural recipient, the late Star-News columnist Charles Cherniss; former City Councilman and Pasadena Chamber of Commerce president and CEO Paul Little - twice; persistent council critic Roy Begley; the PUSD School Board; Mary Dee Romney; West Pasadena Residents Association; Ann Lau and the Falun Gong, and the Friends of Hahamongna.

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