{"id":23803,"date":"2025-01-29T19:28:50","date_gmt":"2025-01-30T02:28:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-schools-pass-resolutions-permanently-reinstating-pride-blm-flags\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:42:53","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:42:53","slug":"durango-schools-pass-resolutions-permanently-reinstating-pride-blm-flags","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-schools-pass-resolutions-permanently-reinstating-pride-blm-flags\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango schools pass resolutions permanently reinstating pride, BLM flags"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Supporters
Supporters hug after Durango School District 9-R board members passed resolutions on Tuesday allowing two political flags to be displayed in schools after the banning of those flags prompted backlash in October. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

With the unanimous support of directors, the Durango School District 9-R Board of Education affirmed that the Black Lives Matter flag and an iteration of the LGBTQ pride flag, known as the progress pride flag, are consistent with the district\u2019s policies, curriculum and values Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

The vote concludes a monthslong saga that began in October when the district told teachers<\/a> to remove the flags from classrooms in response to a parental complaint.<\/p>\n

But with ambiguous threats against board<\/h3>\n

<\/strong>members made on social media and a concrete threat from the Colorado Republican Party <\/a>to bankrupt the district, the packed Impact Career Innovation Center was tense in advance of the vote on two controversial resolutions.<\/p>\n

The 140 attendees allowed inside \u2013 a reduced capacity cap in response to security concerns \u2013 fell quiet before the board president could hush them and call the room to order; school resource officers circulated in the crowd and neon vest-clad observers stood watch around the room.<\/p>\n

\"Liza
Liza Williams addresses Durango School District 9-R board members on Tuesday during public comment on resolutions allowing two political flags to be displayed in schools after the banning of those flags prompted backlash in October. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Darcy Shoening, the Colorado Republican Party\u2019s director of special initiatives who is running for party chair, showed up unannounced. The El Paso County resident had tagged Durango School District 9-R in a Facebook post about the board members earlier in the week saying, \u201cI\u2019d love to cause harm to each of you and your livelihoods for the harm you are doing to children.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the calls to rally in opposition of the resolutions made by Shoening and other conservative leaders from outside the district had little effect. Just a handful of people showed up in protest, their opposition group dwarfed by a phalanx of rainbow-wrapped supporters. None of those opposed to the resolutions were early enough to claim one of the 10 public comment spots.<\/p>\n

The juxtaposition wasn\u2019t lost on the crowd.<\/p>\n

\"Supporters
Supporters rally outside Durango High School before the Durango School District 9-R board meeting on Tuesday as they discuss resolutions allowing two political flags to be displayed in schools after the banning of those flags prompted backlash in October. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cIf we continue to allow a few, loud, hateful individuals to determine the course of our community and our nation, then we risk repeating history,\u201d said Teri Kopack, a 9-R teacher, in a public comment that warned of the horrors of Nazi Germany.<\/p>\n

The flag debate has pitted the district\u2019s inclusion efforts against a small, but vocal group of detractors who argue the flags are a tool of political indoctrination. Although a few 9-R parents have spoken previously <\/a>against the presence of the BLM and pride progress flags in schools, the loudest objections have come from those who neither live in the district nor have children who attended Durango schools.<\/p>\n

\"Supporters
Supporters rally outside Durango High School before the Durango School District 9-R board meeting on Tuesday as they discuss resolutions allowing two political flags to be displayed in schools after the banning of those flags prompted backlash in October. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Liam
Liam Morris addresses the Durango School District 9-R board members on Tuesday during public comment on resolutions allowing two political flags to be displayed in schools after the banning of those flags prompted backlash in October. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

During public comment Tuesday, several parents and students spoke directly to that group\u2019s claims, as well as the efficacy of the flags themselves.<\/p>\n

A Durango High School student, who identified himself only as Parker, described the fear he felt coming out as transgender to a teacher.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe immediately accepted me and told me her classroom was a safe space for me. To this day, it still is,\u201d he said. \u201cSeeing the pride pins on her lanyard made me feel I was safe and my education would not be in jeopardy because of my gender identity.\u201d<\/p>\n

The presence of flags that represented him in the classroom saves lives, Parker said, including his own, noting that \u201cRepresentation is not indoctrination.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement before the vote, board Vice President Erika Brown sought to quiet some of the misconceptions around the district\u2019s intentions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of rhetoric that\u2019s being thrown around about what this is about. But it\u2019s not political \u2013 it\u2019s not a lot of things that have been said,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s really about making sure our kids are safe in our schools. That\u2019s all it\u2019s about.\u201d<\/p>\n

9-R pursued the resolutions as part of a legal loophole that allows the district to voice its own speech without making schools a limited public forum open to all political speech. The tactic withstood a lawsuit<\/a> in Denver late last year. And although the GOP has threatened to sue 9-R over the resolutions, none of the parties making the threats so far would likely have any standing in court.<\/p>\n

\"Just
Just a handful of people showed up in protest, their opposition group dwarfed by a phalanx of rainbow-wrapped supporters. None of those opposed to the resolutions were early enough to claim one of the 10 public comment spots. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The district received a deluge of public comment on the matter via email, another board member said. Over three quarters of it supported the resolutions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt means the world to our community and to our youth who have been stressing about this since October,\u201d said Xander Hughes, executive director of the Four Corners Rainbow Youth Center in an interview after the vote. \u201cAnd it\u2019s nice that they can have a space now where they, at least for now, are safe and validated and are affirmed, because that\u2019s ultimately what we\u2019re all trying to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

rschafir@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unanimous vote settles a monthslong saga <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23804,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[2619,1086,28,1765,2618],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-23803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-black-lives-matter","tag-durango-school-district-9-r","tag-headlines","tag-lgbt","tag-pride"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23803"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23803\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78268,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23803\/revisions\/78268"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23803"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=23803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}