Just a little over a week after voting to limit the display of flags on school grounds, the Sunol Glen Unified School District’s board will be meeting again Wednesday.
It’s unclear if Wednesday’s special governing board meeting plans to address the decision which has since made national headlines. It is possible that some parents may rally at or outside the meeting, as some have called for a recall after last week’s vote which effectively banned pride flags on-campus.
The issue originally arose in June, when the Sunol Glen School flew a pride flag in celebration of Pride month. After some complaints, the school board president proposed a resolution limiting the display of flags to only the U.S. and California state flags.
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The board passed the resolution 2-1 on Sept. 12. The vote has faced pushback from Molleen Barnes, Sunol Glen School’s superintendent and principal, who called the decision “disturbing” and has also said 90% of her staff were against the resolution.
Some parents have also pushed to recall the two school board trustees who voted to pass the resolution.
One of those two board members, Linda Hurley, has released a statement about her decision, writing, “My vote to fly only the American and state flags was not meant to disparage the LGBTQIA community but to legally protect our small school from legal action for breaking the Supreme Court Decision, Shurtleff vs. the city of Boston, October 2021.”
The Supreme Court case Hurley mentioned found that the city of Boston was in violation of the First Amendment because it allowed some groups to display their flags above city hall, but refused to fly a Christian group’s flag.
