COXSACKIE — The sale of Confederate flags by a vendor at a firefighters’ parade this weekend has ignited a furor on social media and led to threats against an event organizer.
Confederate flags have been deemed a hate symbol by the Anti-Defamation League and in December were prohibited from being sold or displayed on state-owned property in New York under legislation signed by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
The flags were being sold by a vendor at McQuade Park in Coxsackie following the Mardi Gras parade last Friday celebrating the 150th anniversary of D.M. Hamilton Steamer Co. No. 2.
McQuade Park is owned by the village.
The issue was raised at Tuesday’s meeting of the Coxsackie Village Board.
Mayor Mark Evans said the fire company asked for permission last year to hold a Mardi Gras parade on Friday and a dress parade on Saturday, with music, vendors and food trucks at McQuade Park after the parades to mark the company’s 150th anniversary.
Resident Carly Lynch brought the issue to the board Tuesday and asked that the village develop guidelines for the park that are in line with the 2020 state legislation.
“I expect the village to move swiftly to create guidelines that align with this state law, making it unlawful to sell or display the Confederate flag or other ‘symbols of hate’ on community property like McQuade Park or at community events,” Lynch told the board.
Lynch said having the Confederate flag at a local park was offensive and distressing.
“I was totally shocked,” Lynch said. “I would have never thought something like that would be for sale in the public domain and it is a village park, so I was very surprised.”
The fire company responded to the problem, she added.
“D.M. Hamilton did address it on Facebook pretty quickly and said all the right things and said they were taking care of it,” Lynch said. “That is important, but it is also important that we prevent it from happening again.”
She would like to see the village take steps to ensure a similar incident doesn’t happen again, she said.
“I am sure it was an unforeseen detail,” she said. “This is not about placing blame, it is about making sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Evans said the fire company asked the vendor to remove the Confederate flags after it was made aware of them.
“I firmly believe there was no malicious intent on the part of the fire company,” Evans said. “I don’t believe they knew this vendor had those items.”
Evans said he came under fire on social media for not seeing to the flags’ removal personally. He said he was at another event in Climax during the day and had a personal emergency to attend to in the evening, but was told by fire officials that the issue was being addressed.
“On my way out, I saw a member of the fire company, who is a fellow firefighter and also an ex-chief, and he assured me that it was handled,” Evans, also a longtime firefighter, said. “Knowing him for 30 years and being a fellow firefighter and an ex-chief, I felt I could put confidence in what he was saying was true, so I left and didn’t hear anything more about it.”
The vendor agreed to take the flags down around 9:30 p.m. Friday, D.M. Hamilton Steamer Co. President T.J. Moore said.
The vendor arrived at McQuade Park late Friday and was still setting up when fire officials headed over to the Mardi Gras parade, so they did not see what he was selling, Moore said. He was told about the flags around 9:30 p.m., he added.
The vendor sold American flags and flags with all kinds of designs and messages, not only confederate flags, Moore said.
Organizers and officials did not identify the vendor.
“We went right over there and said something to the guy very nicely,” Moore said. “The [vendor] was very cordial and he pulled it down. It did not go up the rest of the time the event was going on.”
The Confederate flags were not put back up at the park Saturday during the dress parade, as some have charged on social media, he added.
Courtney Stickle, co-organizer of the fire company’s 150th anniversary celebration, said her committee dealt with the matter when it was brought to their attention.
“There was only a handful of us on the committee who put this together,” she said. “As soon as we arrived back [at the park] we were made aware of the situation and we immediately took action.”
Vendors were required to identify what they planned to sell during the event, but did so in broad strokes — flags, cups, tumblers — and did not provide specifics, she said.
Stickle said she has faced intimidation in the community since the incident.
“This has had a serious effect on me,” she said. “I have had multiple people sending Facebook messages threatening. I understand this is a hate thing and racism, but it breaks my heart because if anyone knows anything about this fire department — we are all about this community, we are all about helping people. I helped open an outreach program here at the church, I would give someone the shirt off my back and I have been threatened.”
There was an incident where she was intimidated Tuesday, she said.
“Today I picked up my child from school and I had people standing in my way and bullying — grown adults,” Stickle said. “I love this community and I understand that people took this to heart — I took this to heart. I was upset by this. If we had known from the get-go that this man was selling these items, his application would not have even been accepted.”
Village Trustee Kaitlyn Irwin said the incident was unfortunate but emphasized the fire department was not to blame.
“I don’t think this was anyone’s fault in this room or in this community,” Irwin said. “I think that even though we are not responsible for the unfortunate event of it taking place, we are responsible for acknowledging it and making sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Voicing outrage on social media is not helpful, she added.
“Ultimately, what we are looking for are healthy solutions and blame is the opposite of a healthy solution,” Irwin said.
Notifying the mayor earlier in the day, when the flags were first seen in the park, would have been more helpful than venting on social media, Evans said.
“I wish instead of going and posting on Facebook, somebody had called me and made me aware of it hours earlier,” the mayor said.
“Give us a chance,” he added. “We can’t do anything unless we know about it and we can’t help unless we are given an opportunity. The whole Facebook thing is condemnation and guilty before you have even had a chance to respond and take care of it.”