Delray Beach officials will change course and leave a Pride-themed intersection in place despite threats from Florida officials. The move comes weeks after the city and other Florida municipalities initially announced plans to remove the rainbow colors from the roadways.
The Florida municipality’s city manager, Terrence Moore, initially said the road décor would be sandblasted off after the Florida Department of Transportation issued guidance calling such Pride-themed infrastructure a safety concern. The state directive followed U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy publicly asserting rainbow crosswalks were "dangerous."
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But Delray Beach Commissioner Rob Long at the next meeting of the city board said such a removal of a landmark would leave a "legacy of cowardice and capitulation" in its place, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel. The roadway was painted to honor Pulse victims after the 2016 mass shooting just a few hours away.
"When do we stand our ground and when do we surrender without even a conversation?" Long said.
A majority of the City Commission agreed. The intersection, at least for now, will remain.
All this happened weeks after a man was arrested for defacing Delray Beach’s intersection, intentionally doing tire burnouts with his truck at the intersection.
Delray Beach isn’t the only city resisting Florida’s state-level direction.
Key West voted earlier this month to explore all legal avenues to preserve its own rainbow crosswalks at Duval and Petronia streets, according to Axios.
Meanwhile, Fort Lauderdale and Miami Beach officials have so far ignored the state directive. The same goes for Orlando, where a rainbow crosswalk sits near the site of the Pulse shooting.
But in Boynton Beach and West Palm Beach, city officials have followed state direction to remove the road paintings.
This article originally appeared on Advocate: Another Florida city will defy state direction to erase Pride-themed crosswalks
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