A supervisor in Community Development District 2 has accused personnel in The Villages District government of confiscating and locking up residents’ patriotic banners over the Independence Day holiday.
Supervisor Bryan Lifsey made the accusation Friday morning during the CDD 2 meeting at Savannah Center.
Residents of the Village of Alhambra are angry that their patriotic holiday banners were seized July 2 and not returned until July 6.
They spoke out on the sore subject at Friday’s meeting.
Villager Theresa Fox said she and her neighbors who are part of the Alhambra Social Club have been putting up banner flags for nine years and they were “shocked” when the flags were taken down without their consent.
“These beautiful symbols of freedom are not ‘lawn ornaments,’” Fox said.
Assistant District Manager Carrie Duckett said the 15-foot feather flags placed on District property near the entrance gate were in violation of the CDD 2 holiday decoration policy approved in 2020. She said the previous decoration policy was “outdated” and needed to be revised due to liability and safety concerns about the feather banners, which are growing in popularity. The new policy states that feather banners be no taller than 6 feet and placed at least 10 feet away from multi-modal paths. Part of the concern is that a high wind could knock over a tall banner and injure people or property.
“They could hit a vehicle or pedestrian,” Duckett said.
Residents considered the policy an affront to their patriotism.
“What’s next? If you say a flag on a pole can fly off a pole and hit somebody in the head, will that American flag be banned, too?” asked Village of Alhambra resident Sharon Briscoe.
Lifsey said the Alhambra Social Club was willing and able to have corrected the problem if they had known the policy had been changed. He said it was ludicrous to believe the decorations could not be returned in a timely fashion because there was only one key that could have freed the locked-up banners. The District employee with the lone key reportedly left town and did not return with the key until Tuesday.
Bruce Brown of District Property Management said the “one key” accusation was not true. He said the feather banners that were taken down were placed in the Alhambra storage facility. It was not immediately clear who owned the decorations, delaying their return, Brown said.
Brown, a veteran of the Coast Guard, noted that feather banners were removed elsewhere in The Villages over the Independence Day holiday.
“We are more than happy to work with you, but the policy is what the policy is,” Brown said.
Official urges taking second look at enforcement of policy
Van Salyar of the Village of Springdale was also taken aback when his patriotic decorations were seized over the Fourth of July holiday.
“I just felt like the Gestapo came in and took down the flags,” he said at Friday’s Community Development District 4 Board of Supervisors meeting.
“All of sudden they disappeared. They’ve been put up for years and years,” Salyar said.
CDD 4 Supervisor Cliff Wiener said it might be time to look at the enforcement of the holiday decoration policy, which CDD 4 also adopted in 2020.
“The policy is OK. The problem is it’s not being enforced everywhere,” said Wiener.
He noted that he is a resident of the Village of Piedmont and some patriotic feather flags were taken down there. He also pointed out that other feather flags remained standing in the Village of Calumet Grove.
“I understand the problem. It looks like some people got theirs taken down because they got caught. But others don’t get theirs taken down,” Wiener said.