"The good news is that the parade will go on," said city Managing Director Ben Lee.

In the past, these services were provided free-of-charge by the city. That changed last July when the city adopted new rules stating that private parades had to pay for these services.

And even though organizers knew this was coming, the cost of traffic control was far more than what they expected.

Lee said it was frustrating that the City Council had reduced the city’s operating budget.

"There are these types of instances where we need the flexibility to have the discretion to provide for police escort," Lee said.

Alex Garcia, O'ahu chairman of the State of Hawai'i Organization of Police Officers, said traffic control will be handled by volunteers and on-duty officers.

"We are still trying to get volunteers," he said today. "I don’t know how many we have. We have been signing them up all day. The parade will go through."

The parade was canceled only once in its 88-year history — during World War II. In recent years, it has drawn nearly 100,000 people along its 4-mile route from downtown to Kapi'olani Park.

This year, the parade will feature 3,000 marchers, 50 vehicles, six marching bands, six floats and five horse units.