Yearly Miss Gay Bloomington pageant postponed until 2008

Bloomington’s annual Miss Gay Bloomington pageant has been postponed. The event, which was supposed to take place this Sunday, has been rescheduled for sometime in February at Jake’s Night Club and Bar.\nJason Ervin, the pageant’s former owner, recently announced he was handing ownership rights over to former Miss Gay Bloomington Britney Taylor. Taylor, as new owner, needed more time to plan the show and deal with the pageant’s financial issues, she said. Instead of Sunday’s scheduled competition, Taylor will host a “review show” of past winners at 9:30 p.m. Sunday at Jake’s. \nIrving said he had been planning to leave the pageant and Bloomington for a long time. He said he had no intentions of sticking with it for as long as he did and said that now was the right time for him to move on.\nThe Miss Gay Bloomington pageant has been an annual event since it’s first pageant was held at Bullwinkle’s in 1984. Due to the closing of Bullwinkle’s, the pageant was moved to Jake’s in 2005 and then to the Buskirk-Chumley theater in 2006.\nTaylor said that the postponement of this year’s pageant was for the best. Since she has recently been named owner, she and Ervin both felt that it would only be fair to give her more time to plan the pageant. Taylor said she plans on making February’s pageant bigger and better.\n“We need more time to give the pageant what it needs for what it represents,” Taylor said. “Miss Gay Bloomington is one of the oldest pageants of its kind in the country. I just felt the pageant needed to be held to a certain standard.”\nJazmyn Taylor, last year’s pageant winner, agreed postponing the show was a good decision.\n“In the end, I think the postponement was for the betterment of the contest,” Jazmyn Taylor said. “It’s going to be run by formers who understand things better.”\nFinancial and insurance issues were cited by both Ervin and Britney Taylor as reasons for postponing the show, but neither would elaborate. Britney Taylor also said there have been minor conflicts within the Miss Gay Bloomington family and that she hopes to resolve these issues with her new leadership.\nBritney Taylor said she feels that a rift has grown between the city of Bloomington and the pageant. She hopes to re-establish that connection.\n“Miss Gay Bloomington would not exist if the people of Bloomington don’t want to be there to represent themselves,” Britney Taylor said.\nThose who were planning on going to the pageant this Sunday might be excited to hear of the review show that’s being put on by Miss Gay Bloomington at Jake’s Bar and Grill in place of the pageant. \nThe review show will feature two drag shows, one at 9:30 p.m. and another at 11:30 p.m. The IU dance troupe Hip Hop Connexion The Sequel will also be performing. The cover charge is five dollars, and patrons must be 21 to attend. \n“If you are gay in Bloomington, and even if you aren’t gay and are willing to watch drag, come out and support us at Jake’s,” Britney Taylor said.