Ordinance Amending City of Boston Code, Ordinances, Section 1, to Codify City Policy Regarding the Display of Flags on City Hall Plaza. On motion of Councilors Bok and Louijeune, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Flynn as co-sponsor. On motion of Councilors Bok, Louijeune and Flynn, the rules were suspended; the ordinance was passed. Councilor Arroyo in the Chair.
Thank you, Counsel Arroyo. So dark at zero nine, 552.0960 will be referred to the Committee on Government Operations. They'll stay in committee, basically. Mr. Clarke, please read. Dawkins 0961909. Each year. Policy regarding the display of flags on City Hall Plaza. The Chair recognizes this council blocking of the floor council block. Thank you so much, Mr. President. Mr. President, if I could suspend Rule 12 and add you to this docket. Sitting in here. No. Objection. So order. Excellent. And a. Well, I'll also be speaking through the chair of government operations essentially and passage, but I'll leave that to the chair. So, you know, I think I. Many of us have the experience of walking out of government center to stop and looking up and seeing the three city flagpoles and then seeing behind them city hall . And if you walked out, if you weren't a city councilor, you were just a resident of the city of Austin, and you walked out and you looked up at the flagpole and you saw a flag you didn't happen to know of flying on the third pole. You might well say to the person with you, Oh, I wonder why the city's flying that flag today. I wonder what flag that is. And I think the reality of the situation is that when people see our three flagpoles, they're with the the US flag, the state flag, and often, but not always the city of Boston flag and city hall behind it, they identify those flagpoles with city hall. And that has been the kind of history of that site. What the Supreme Court basically said to us and the decision that came down a couple of months ago was, yes, that's true. And it clearly looks like these flagpoles should be operated as kind of an extension of city hall and express in the city's messages. But the way you guys were running your program to manage the third flagpole opened you up to a different interpretation because we were running a, um, a program where people could basically just fill out an application and say, Hey, I want my flag up there. And we would raise it. And in the context in which we're doing that, taking all comers, it's that not acceptable under the First Amendment to pick out one entity and in this case can't and say you can't raise your flag. And I think, you know, the court gave us a thoughtful and reasonable judgment on that front. And fortunately, it also laid out a roadmap in the decision by Justice Breyer for how the council could and really the city could reassert the fact that those flagpoles are an extension of city hall and are a place where we express the messages of the city of Boston. And the way I would think about this from a kind of First Amendment perspective is that you could have any sign you wanted and walk down Cambridge Street in protest. And your First Amendment right is to have that sign in your hands saying whatever you want to say. If you want to hang that sign up on City Hall, our property management department would be within its rights to take it down and saying, Oh, that's not something that the mayor of the council put up on the building. And so basically what this is about is identifying the flagpoles as a site of government speech in the same way that what we do with the lights or with anything hanging from city hall, etc., is a site, a government speech expected expressing the messages of the city of Boston. And I think that's important because I think that our residents, when they see the flagpoles, they do expect those messages to be coming from us. And obviously, both this body and the mayor are the duly elected representatives of the people of Boston. And so the ordinance that's before you today would basically follow the Supreme Court's recommendations. And it's been reviewed by the city's Supreme Court legal counsel and to set up a policy that would follow what the court suggested, which is that we clearly be making a kind of codified city decision when we raise a flag on that third flagpole that isn't the city of Boston swag. And so this creates to pass for that one runs through this body by through a resolution and the other runs through a mayoral proclamation that said either side of the fifth floor can do that and. And you know, I think there's a couple of reasons to seek suspension of passage today. One is that it? Having been told, hey, you need to have a different policy on this if you want to operate a flag raising program. I think that it makes sense for the city to have that policy in place as soon as possible and kind of end this interregnum. And also know that, you know, there are communities that we often on this council wanted to support and raise flags for. I think there's a lot of folks who would love to see a mayoral proclamation enabling us to raise the Dominican flag next week on Restoration Day. I heard recently from Councilor Flaherty that, you know, there might be an opportunity later in the month to support Ukraine with the flag raising. These are all decisions that would, under this new policy, have to be made by other council resolution or a proclamation of the mayor. But none of that can happen unless we actually codified this new policy in statute. So I think it gives us an opportunity to follow the law. Be clear, based on the Supreme Court decision that we got and go back to a mode and sort of on better footing this time where we as the represented city of Boston Express, you know, all of the all of the cultures and messages that we'd like to include and celebrate using that flagpole as an extension of that . So I'm really grateful to my colleagues that Councilor Councilor Lujan, who's one of the one of the legal minds of the council and to President Flynn. And I can also say that, as I mentioned before, both the Supreme Court council that the city retains for Supreme Court advice and also the law department has reviewed this legislation in detail. So thank you, Mr. President. And as I mentioned, it's, I think, the business of the chair since of the current operations, but we are seeking through him suspension of passage today. Thank you, Counsel. BLOCK. The chair recognizes Constitution. Constitution. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I won't speak long because I think Counsel Robert covered most of it. But, you know, we as a city city council, we love our flag raisings. For too long now, too many of our communities haven't had the opportunity to raise a flag because of this outstanding Supreme Court litigation that has been costly and time and has taken a lot of our time and attention. Justice Breyer gave us good guidelines on which we could have flag raisings that really our speech that we endorse here as a body or endorsed by the mayor, both in terms of celebrating the diversity of our city and the richness of our cultures and the causes that we support. And I think the language in the ordinances was reviewed and edited and made as inclusive as possible. So I think this is a good path forward so that we can start raising flags. Council said next week the Dominican flag. There are many flags that, you know, celebrations that we have for the remainder of the year, for next year that we want to start getting started on. So I think this is a fair ordinance in response to the Supreme Court's decision, and it allows us to get back to the business that we're doing in supporting the speech that we want to support on City Hall Plaza. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Lui. Jen. I recognize Council President Ed Flynn. Thank you, Counselor Arroyo, and glad to partner with my my colleagues. And, you know, when city council is in with Mayor Wu's team as well, I think flying a flag on city hall. Has the opportunity to bring us together as a city. We celebrate various countries. We celebrate their contributions and sacrifices to the United States, whether it's whether it's Mexico, whether it's Ireland, whether it's. Um, another country. But it's about bringing people together. It's about recognizing the sacrifice that immigrants have made to our city and to our country and the other. The other aspect I'd like to highlight, too, was I always love looking up when I see a flag and seeing the P.O.W. and my flag, which is often in many city and state buildings, and that's the prisoner of war missing in action. And that's to remember service members that are unaccounted for. Still to this day serving serving overseas. But that flag is also a reminder to. They are family, that our city did not forget them or our country did not forget them. So when I see that, when I see that flag, I have a smile on my face because I know that those military families are being thought of by our city government or by our federal government. Thank you, councilor. Thank you. Council President Clinton. In order for me to speak on it, I. The chair recognizes. Counsel Baker. Counsel Baker. You have the floor. You sure? Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just had a question. So through you to either one of the the the lead sponsors, every flag raising will have to have a resolution come through here. What is the mayor's if so, if the mayor wants a flag raising, that will have to be a resolution that comes through here and a vote on it. But the chair recognizes counsel, board counsel. What can you respond to that question? Yes, thank you. No, it's it's either a mayoral proclamation or a city council resolution. So the idea being that the way that the council expresses sort of the sense of the body formally is by resolution. The way the mayor expresses is through proclamation. I think folks have often seen folks receiving know their equivalent on the mayoral side with that folder in the proclamation. And so it's basically the idea that either body the key thing from the court's decisions perspective was that we needed to kind of express it as officially our message, like from the city of Boston. So the idea is we we use either the council's way of sort of expressing official things or the for the mayor's way. And one more question. Would the what the mayor's proclamation have to be voted in this body here. Which the chair recognizes council? Look. No, it would follow the same the current path by which the mayor promulgates proclamations, which is unilateral on her side. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I, I think I'm a little concerned about taking votes on up or down on different flags. I'm going to support this here today. But I think where we potentially can be the brunt of the joke on this one here, because I think the I think what will come in front of us all the time will be those really controversial ones. And we'll have to vote on them and we'll be in the paper when it comes to Satanic Temple and whatever other sort of fringe groups come in front of us, that that that want to have their flag sewn. I'm trying as I'm trying to see around that. So again, I'm feeling like I'm going to support this. But I do think there is potential in the future for. Ask to be in the middle of a Supreme Court fight that we don't necessarily want to be in or should be in. So I do have some concerns and. I'll figure out the vote when I. When it's in front of me. Thank you, Castle Baker. I'm going to go to council break, and then I'm going to go back to council. Council balked at. You need to say something immediately. I was just hoping. Because it's directly on Councilor Baker. That she recognizes council. So so just because it's another point of clarification, part of what's shifting here is that whereas for before there was like an intake form for people to raise their hand and say, hey, I want my flag raised because these are expressions of the, of the city. Like there there is not an intake form type thing. So basically like there's only going to be a resolution to even be voted on. That could lead to a flag raising by the city council. If a member of this body introduces said resolution. So to Councilor Baker's point about sort of like people putting things up for to kind of force draw votes like it would only be if somebody on this council move such a resolution that it could be voted on. I just want to clarify that. Thanks. Thank you, Councilor BLOCK. The chair recognizes Councilor Braid and council bread. You of the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. And thank you to Councilors Barclay Vision and yourself, President Flynn, for initiating the formal codification of the city policy regarding regulating our city. Manage public spaces for government speech. I think one of the things that we basically didn't have, we didn't have a formal codification of a policy to or over oversee the flag raising issue. So that got us into trouble. And it begs the question, you know, as we think one of the issues that we've been working on, as in offices, is to review the re qualification of our ordinances. And I think this is an opportune time to, uh, to look at all of these issues. I know this is a slight sort of segway or a sidebar to the conversation about specifically to the flag raising issue. In Chapter eight of the Ordinance of 1975, the city established a uniform procedure for the adaptation and probably promulgation of forms and regulations by the city departments adopting the State of Massachusetts, Massachusetts State Administrative Procedures Act . So, you know, after 50 years, I think the Supreme Court has, in the case of the flag raising issue, has given us a timely reminder that we need to maybe initiate a review of how all of our department regulations are adopted and promulgated. And, you know, in the context of reviewing our codification of our ordinances, I look forward to digging deeper into that and trying to get some consistency. You know, with this an issue with clarification of the flag raising issue, I'm sure there's other issues that we need to attend to as well. Just do it in a matter of Good Housekeeping and putting everything in order. Thank you. Thank you. Counsel. Brady in the chair recognizes counsel. Royal counsel. Royal, do you have the floor? Thank you, counsel. President Flynn, as chair of government operations, I will be seeking suspension of Rule 33 so that this matter can be adopted today. I think much of sort of the nuance on the new legal sort of findings as well as why it's important, have already been discussed. So I'm going to keep it very short just to say that this ordinance doesn't conflict with any city of Boston code or ordinances. And I'd also like to thank the original co-sponsors of the ordinance councilor back in the region for bringing this to the floor so that we can clearly establish guidelines for the display of flags by the city of Boston. And I think it's already been said, but this has already been vetted by both our law department and our council that we use for Supreme Court cases. All right. And so I think this is ready to go today, which is why I'm offering it up as a suspended passed. Thank you to the makers. Thank you as well to you as an original co-sponsor present one. Thank you. Thank you. Counsel Royall the chair recognizes counsel Murphy. Counsel Murphy, you have the ball. Thank you. Counsel. President So I did have some concerns when I first saw this that this would be a violation of free speech. And I do have to say thank you to Counselor Bach for using my concerns there. When you talked to me through that, the one question that I still have and if one of the original sponsors could reply, why does the mayor need us also? Why can't it just be a decision by the mayor? Why are we the council also weighing in on the flagpoles, which I thought were the mayor's flagpoles, because I know in the past we have this balcony out here and maybe that's a different conversation the council can have on if we want to hang flags off our council back balcony. But if someone could just clear that up, that would be helpful. Thank you. Thank you. Councilor Murphy, the chair recognizes Councilor Bourque to respond to that question from counsel. Murphy Thank you so much, Mr. President. I think so. First of all, obviously, there's no requirement that the Council ever take resolution action to lead to it to a flag raising. And so certainly it could become the pattern and practice that we ceded that to the mayor. I think that that said, I'll be a little bit of an institutionalist here. I think that this council represents the city of Boston just as much as the mayor does. And so when we're talking about an ordinance that we would codify into our municipal code, I think it would be it would sort of be a shame for the council to kind of cede its right to also establish a message of the city of Boston, even if in practice, we end up deciding that it's it makes more sense to let the mayoral proclamations become the default or something. I think that it would sort of be a a seeding of sort of like. Are kind of like rights and prerogatives to also express messages on behalf of the city of Boston, which I take us to be doing every time we file a resolution on something. So I think that's the that's the reason. And that said, obviously, like, you know, when you think about even just timing things, right, like if this were to pass today and we're talking about the the being able to raise the flag as the city for the Dominican Restoration Day on Tuesday because we don't have a resolution before us here. Obviously, that would be done by mayoral proclamation. So and I think obviously there will often be times where the council's Wednesday meeting schedule is such that it makes more sense to do it by proclamation. But I will just say that I would feel queasy about giving up our prerogative as a duly elected body representing Boston to also be a decision maker on this. So thank you, Mr. President. Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Does anyone else have any questions or comments on this? Um. Would anyone like to add their name? Please raise your hand. The Mr. Kirkland, please add counsel of Royal Counsel and counsel of Colorado, counsel in front of his name as Andersen. Please have counsel. Varro counsel. Clarity. Please. Please. Council world. Council is blocking motion and are seeking suspension of the rules and passage of docket 0961. All those in favor say aye. I opposed say no. The ayes have it. Docket 0961 has passed. She wanted to be a spy, so. Sorry. It was. It's okay. Thank you. DAWKINS 0962 lucky numbers 0962 consoles turn off at the following order for a hearing to discuss safety concerns associated with double decker sightseeing busses and reclaiming a double decker bus. Public safety measures in the city of Boston.