MOBILE, Ala. (WKRG) — The 2024 Mardi Gras season preparations are already underway and the lineup for the Joe Cain parade has been set excluding two prominent floats that have been in the parade since it began more than 50 years ago.

“That’s crazy, isn’t it, the oldest group in the parading society being booted to the back,” Cain Raiser Spokesperson Lynne Locklin-Hatch said.

The Cain Raisers are the two floats that follow right behind the Joe Cain Merry Widows. They have 88 riders and 50 associate members waiting their turn to one day ride in the float.

The Joe Cain Parade only allots 36 floats.

“We recently got unceremoniously kicked out of the parade,” Locklin-Hatch said.

Kicked out, due to a paper that did not get notarized before the Cain Raisers former president, Steve Wright, passed away in August after a battle with ALS.

Wright has been the president of the society for the past 12 years.

“We named a float in his honor, named it the “Steve” because he had done so much for the organization,” Locklin-Hatch said.

Now, the “Steve” will not float in the 2024 Joe Cain Parade.

The president of the Joe Cain Parading Society, Steve Cain, sent WKRG the letter that he sent to the Cain Raisers’ attorney. In the letter, Cain states that when Wright was sick but still attending parading society meetings, he was aware of the by-laws stating that a notarized affidavit was required to pass the presidency to a new person.

Cain said that Wright failed to turn in the right paperwork, meaning now they could no longer participate in the parade.

“That’s kind of what really hurt is that this could possibly dissolve us as a group,” Locklin-Hatch said.

The City of Mobile does not have any control over the process of choosing who can participate in the parade.