School district ejects board members who voted to ban Pride flags
A Progress Pride flag waving in a street.(Getty)
Two people who voted in favour of a ban on Pride flags have lost their seats on a school district board.
Voters in the small Sunol Glen Unified School District in California elected to oust board members Ryan Jergensen and Linda Hurley, both of whom has supported a ban on any flag that wasn’t the star-spangled banner or the state flag.
The board members were accused of “censorship” after approving the policy in September, shortly after the district’s superintendent and principal of K-1 Sunol Glen School, Molleen Barnes, flew a Progress Pride flag on the campus, about 45 miles from San Francisco.
Both board members lost following a recall campaign. Parents removed Jergensen in a vote of 254 to 218, and Hurley by 249 to 223.
Chris Bobertz, a campaigner who fought Hurley for her seat in the past, commended the outcome but disappointed by how tight the vote was. “[It’s] not the definitive outcome we were looking forward to, but we are hopeful,” he said.
“Above all, we’re looking forward to getting past this and moving to a more boring way of life, the way things were before all this.”
Speaking about the original flag decision, parent Matt Sylvester, who led the campaign to remove Jergensen and Hurley, said: “It was sneaky behaviour, and they pushed it through without listening to people. There has been no compromise. This recall is about making a point that we will not stand for this.”
Two replacements will be selected by the Alameda County Board of Education, which oversees the district, once the recall votes are certified.
Sylvester said that an upcoming local election to decide new board members is incredibly important amid the rise in anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric across school boards, but is hopeful that the right candidates will be selected.
“As long as the people who have supported us go out and vote, statistically speaking we should be sound,” he said.
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