The concept of an organization like the Northwest Chinese Alliance was first discussed in December 2010 between Cathy Chinn and Michael Zhang, then presidents of Northwest China Council and Chinese Friendship Association of Portland, on how to jointly promote the understanding of Chinese culture in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest, and to showcase Oregon and the Pacific Northwest to the global community. This discussion then evolved into a solid plan of involving Portland metro Chinese community organizations to work together and showcase Chinese culture in the Rose Festival Grand Floral Parade.
In late 2010, phone calls went out to the different Chinese community groups. The first meeting, held in December 2010, drew many participants with high level of interests and commitments. Things just snowballed from there.
By the time we performed in the 2011 Portland Rose Festival Grand Floral Parade in June 2011, we represented 16 major Portland Chinese community groups. Our team had a superior performance and was featured in the Rose Festival Edition of Oregonian newspaper. We were all very proud of our achievements, but above all, we were proud that we could put this together in a very short time and with very little capital.
After a decade of leading this organization, the founders agreed in late 2019 to transition to a new performance model by expanding the organization to include board directors with extensive skills in dance creation and performance, as well as in development, marketing and volunteer recruitment. This new format has enabled our organization to have much better controls over planning and implementations of our Portland Rose Festival Grand Floral Parade performances and achieving a greater level of satisfactions for the board and the performance teams.
In late 2025, We proudly welcomed the Huayun Arts Group, created and led by Ms. Lihong Dai and a group of 20+ dancers. They represent the Northwest Chinese Alliance to perform at many Portland Oregon cultural events and join our regular volunteer dancers at the Portland Rose Festival Grand Floral Parades.
We are deeply indebted to the 16 founding organizations that contributed our initial seed capital. Over the years, we have had multiple performing partners, supportive sponsors, committed artistic and performance directors, lovely dancers and many parade day photographers and volunteers. We could not have done this without the support of our community. Thank you vey much.
