Editor’s Note: I’ve decided to break this up this Danville City Council meeting article up into two parts. This is Part #1, featuring everything up to the end of the public comment section. We’ll have what happened in the business section of the meeting in Part #2. This is a long article, but it’s worth the read. – BruceH
We’re LIVE! at Danville City Hall for tonight’s Danville City Council meeting. It’s gonna be fun a frustrating giant waste of time! Ugh.
Here’s the side of the gallery with mostly flag supporters.
Here’s the side of the gallery with mostly flag opponents. Dolores Reynolds & Harold Garrison, HELLO!
WDBJ’s Danlelle Staub, HELLO! (her first Danville City Council meeting).
We’re underway. Mayor Sherman Saunders leads the invocation and Pledge of Allegiance. Sadly, I don’t think prayer will stop this upcoming public comment section.
We’ve got a special guest tonight, new Danville School superintendent Dr. Stan Jones. He steps to the podium and gives a quick speech. Folks, Stan Jones Gets It. I have nothing but admiration and full support for him.
And now, it’s time for the public comment section. Saunders reminds everybody that after we played round #1 of “Flag or No Flag”, council adopted rules limiting speakers to 5 minutes.
Oh dear god. It’s already getting crazy. Avon Keen starts off saying that the legal arm of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference just may be thinking about a possible lawsuit of their own to get the flag removed. Lots of luck on that, Avon. If you had any legal argument that the flag should come down because you believe it’s “hate speech”, you’d have used it by now.
Next, Tyler Millner makes a quite odd combination of lawyer and preacher. He starts off with his interpretation of the laws as related to the Confederate Monument, then segues into a preacher type of voice. We award him style points for that, but it becomes more comedic than serious.
Royce Agee is our first contestant on the flag supporter side.
You’ve got a nice city hall. It would be a shame if something was to happen to it. You know, an accident. Yeah. NOT REALLY, but I’m starting to laugh now.
Agee is coming across as a semi-gangster in his style of communication. He’s sorta reminding the council that the law is on the flag supporters side. I start off as being disappointed, yet end up somewhat amused. He comes on as a tough guy, semi-threatening that the city “doesn’t want to break the law”. After the meeting, I have fun with him. He’s a good guy.
Frank Harvey from the Sons of Confederate Veterans makes some decent points and he’s the first speaker to be credible.
Carolyn Laviscount is up next. She makes little sense once she calls it the “City museum” and calls the flag of symbol of hate. Maybe to her, but she doesn’t specify that. Thud. Sheila Baynes is next to speak and she starts off on the wrong foot by saying the Laviscount made good points. NO SHE DIDN’T! Baynes encourages all council members to take a public stand on their opinion on “Flag or No Flag”. That ain’t gonna happen, Sheila.
We’re having technical problems as my phone starts to overheat. That’s why I’m not able to post a lot of LIVE! photos. I start to “type my next line and things like “Our NEXT NEXT NEXT NEXT NEXT AAAAAAAAAAAAA IRAQI NEXT NEXT AAAAAAAAAA” destroy the coding for the photos I already posted. Yes, that’s actually what the keyboard typed. The phone published that for about 2 minutes. Ugh. Phone restart and cooldown time while the speaker parade continues.
By the way, Leoard Harville is here tonight. God knows, we can add a few cars to this trainwreck in progress with Leonard here.
We’re all cooled down (and so is the phone). Glenn Scearce is next.
The one. The only. The Glenn Scearce.
He’s all over the place yet again. He says it would be cheaper to pave over the GW track. That’s not possible due to the water problems, but facts don’t matter. Next, he says students should focus on grades before they play sports. Without passing grades, a student is ineligible for sports. Again, facts don’t matter. I give up. He hasn’t even touched the Confederate flag issue.
Since I’m doing five things at once, my phone starts melting down again. ARGH!
Ed Clark plays “Flag or No Flag”.
Ed Clark is next. He’s not helping to bring any credibility to this issue. If I took a drink every time he said “Cultural Genocide”, I’d be passed out by now. Come to think of it, that’s a damned good idea. We’re getting absolutely nowhere. Dear god, make this stop. My contact lens just popped out. I honestly think my eyes have rolled so much.
The next flag supporter points to the black people in the audience and said they their own people sold them into slavery. Yes, it’s that bad here. The next speaker is a flag opponent. His point seems to be “They lost the war.” Ugh.
Cecil Bridgeforth mixes the flag and the school system and ends up with a mixed bag of what the hell was he talking about.
Illegal shift. Five yard penalty, repeat second down.
Larry Wilburn is up next. He’s on the museum board and was one of the leaders in starting the request of asking for the flag’s removal. Wilburn channels Ronald Reagan badly and is against the flag. Reagan spins in his grave a little faster after that.
Tony Lundy stands up to speak right before Sherman Saunders was about to close the hearing. He speaks calmly and rationally. Lundy & Frank Harvey have been the most impressive speakers tonight, regardless of what side of the issue that you are on.
Tony Lundy. This guy is good.
The public hearing is closed, and Sherman Saunders recognizes Larry Campbell. Campbell comes from the council dais to the podium in a most unusual moment. This has to have been pre-arranged. Campbell says that he was called into the police department on Tuesday afternoon . Chief Broadfoot told him that there was a credible blackmail threat against him and this threat had been validated by other law enforcement agencies.
Update: I have seen the report from the Virginia Fusion Center. Campbell and two other people were threatened with a “doxxing” attack if they continued to advocate against the Confederate flag. “Doxxing” is where a person’s personal information is released. This can include things like Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, credit reports and other sensitive data. This is not a physical threat to Campbell in any way.
Larry Campbell swears he caught a fish THIS big. Heh.
Campbell says he will stand and give his speech no matter what threats could be made against him. Seriously, I’m in shock. Campbell passes out copies of this Fusion Center report to the other council members. Alonzo Jones makes a statement from his chair, explaining his vote last time was to uphold the legal opinion issued by the city attorney. Jones says he would personally like to see the flag removed.
In passing, City Attorney Clarke Whitfield says that the State Attorney General’s office will not issue an opinion on the flag issue, so the whole frickin’ issue is dead. With that revelation, we have officially wasted 109 minutes of our time on absolutely nothing. Nothing will be changed because there is no way to change the standing of the legal opinion. If I could have flipped the work table over, I would have. If Whitfield had said that before this public comment section… GAH!
In a conversation between Saunders and Whitfield, we find out that all further flag discussion will be in a closed session so that attorney/client privilege can apply. Boom. The work session now becomes meaningless unless you want to hear financial reports and street update issues.
OK. Time for a recess. WRONG! Council rolls right into the business section in Speed Round style. We’ll roll right along with them in the second part of this article. That’s coming up soon on SouthsideCentral!
you can dog Glenn Scearce all u want but he was right on target with his comments. he says what others want said at least myself and thoughts I have thought about. and, yes, he DID mention the flag briefly at the end with reference to south Carolina. dog him if u want .
Mayor Saunders needs to be quicker with the gavel. Put us out of our misery and just slam that thing down without looking around and hesitating.
Danville is now on notice of violence. The blacks will rise again. White knights must be reddy.
Say that under your real name, coward.
Waiter, check please.
LOL !!
Waiter, popcorn please.
sound like wasted dollars if the flag issue is forwarded to a court ! —all because of a piece of cloth and resentment of it a.k.a. confederate flag. and unwillingness to let it be—“wasted dollars” should this happen
This has come and gone in Richmond at their fine arts museum. No lawsuit.
This is the petition where the same flaggers who likely were in attendance tonight flock to protest that supposed violation of the same law.
The difference is that people in Richmond have the courage of conviction and did the right thing. Danville should rest easy and know if there is a fight here, there is a fight where they would be on the right side of history even if they lost the case. That’s the key difference between the BoS in Pittsylvania and the CC in Danville. The BoS chose the wrong side of history and lost on an issue they had no business litigating. The CC has a chance now or in the future to take a stand and to know that other communities do stand up to these threats and do what’s right in the face of them.
I would also say that in addition to all the legal theories that have come through, one to strongly consider is the recent precedent of Walker v. Texas from the Supreme Court. The issue is only tangential to the one here, but it does go directly to the issue of a monument erected prior to the enactment of the statute and the applicability of the statute to that government speech.
I am very concerned about Mr. Campbell’s story. Something does not add up. Was his life threatened or is he being blackmailed? What speech was he supposed to give? Who would know about it nationwide?…..appears some groundwork being laid to justify some future trouble?….help us SC solve this puzzle please.
The more I look at this threat, I’m discovering that it’s not a Deep Dark Secret In His Past type of blackmail. It’s probably something called “doxxing” (like dox for documents). Hackers have gotten your credit card #, date of birth, credit record, addresses and things like that then would expose that on the internet. Embarrassing, but not a physical threat.
[…] We’ll start where we left off in Part #1. […]