All the city has to do is hoist the Pride flag

Machinery is making an exciting racket downtown

Lots of cities do not fly the POW/MIA flag every day but only on the six days when Congress has ordered its prominent display: National POW Recognition Day, Armed Forces Day, Memorial Day, Flag Day, Independence Day and Veterans Day.

On those six days, the POW/MIA flag flies over the White House and the U.S. Capitol, along with several other federal buildings.

But in Glens Falls, the POW/MIA flag is raised every day on the two city flagpoles on either side of City Hall, flying right below the U.S. flag. This is not the norm nationally and is not legally required but is a practice the city’s leaders have decided to follow.

The U.S. flag and the POW/MIA flag fly from the city flagpole in City Park.

As the Supreme Court recently affirmed in the Shurtleff case, governments have the right to express themselves through the display of flags.

Our city flies the POW/MIA flag to honor military veterans captured or missing overseas who have never returned home or whose remains have never been identified. The flag does not represent any one group but a national aspiration — to bring our soldiers home — and expresses a national sense of loss.

Similarly, the Pride flag represents a national aspiration — the welcoming of all citizens to participate in our social, cultural and political life, particularly LGBT Americans, who have often been excluded.

The flag expresses the personal pride of LGBT Americans and the pride of the country in accepting them without reservation. It, too, can and should be flown on the City Hall flagpoles, at least for June, which is Pride Month. There is room for a third flag, below the POW/MIA flag.

The Common Council has been tying itself up with arguments, following a suggestion in February that it authorize flying the Pride flag in June. 

I watched the videotapes of their discussions online. Mostly, I heard them worrying that flying the Pride flag would expose the city to requests from various organizations, some unsavory, that their flags be flown.

The Common Council can pick and choose which flags it displays and when, as it has already done with the POW/MIA flag. That was the point of the Shurtleff decision.

The two flags also fly on the other side of City Hall.

The Pride flag represents an idea, an aspiration, of different colors forming a stunning whole — a rainbow. It has been displayed at the White House and the New York state Capitol and City Hall in New York City and numerous other public buildings across the country.

I also heard in the Common Council meetings a strange, unsatisfactory “compromise” proposed by Mayor Bill Collins — erection of a new flagpole that would be used for “other” flags.

In what inconspicuous spot would this new flagpole be placed, and what would this act of avoidance cost city taxpayers?

The whole point is for the city to endorse and embrace the unity the Pride flag represents, and that happens by putting it at City Hall.

Councilwoman Diana Palmer has been supportive of the effort to display the Pride flag. She has given the other Common Council members copies of the flag policy for the city of San Jose, California, which was cited as constitutional in the Supreme Court decision. The policy allows the display of “ceremonial flags” in four categories: flags of other governments recognized by the U.S.; flags of sister cities; flags of professional sports teams with a connection to the city; and flags displayed in conjunction with “official actions, ceremonial items or proclamations of the City Council.”

Under a similar policy, the Common Council could proclaim June as Pride Month in Glens Falls and hoist the Pride flag at City Hall.

Or Collins and other reluctant members of the Common Council could continue to raise irrelevant arguments and make unworkable suggestions, until June has come and gone and they have accomplished the nothing at all that they desire.

Busy 

Glens Falls is busy with the roar of machinery, digging up pavement and moving dirt. I consider that sound the song of progress. It bodes well for the city.

Work continues Friday on the new market center on South Street.

Sidewalk work is happening on Elm Street.

Improvements are happening on Elm, too, on the other side of Hudson.