Des Plaines may allow police flags on city-owned property
Des Plaines aldermen Monday will consider adding the Des Plaines police and fire department flags, and perhaps the thin blue line flag that pays tribute to fallen police officers, to the list of flags permitted to be flown on city-owned properties.
Rules approved July 5 by the city council allow only the flags of the United States, state of Illinois and city of Des Plaines, and the POW-MIA flag, to be flown over municipal sites. Any other flags require prior approval from the council.
Alderman Jim Brookman, who proposed the original rules, said Friday he'll seek to amend the policy at Monday night's council meeting.
A separate resolution proposed by Brookman will call for the law enforcement tribute flag - a black flag with a thin horizontal blue line in the middle - to be posted on a pole outside city hall through July 31 in honor of the five Dallas officers killed July 7.
The law enforcement flag was hung this week from the Civic Center plaza entryway between city hall and the police station. Police Chief Bill Kushner requested the flag be flown, but because the city council's new policy wouldn't immediately permit it to be on the city hall flagpole, Mayor Matt Bogusz had it placed on the nearby entryway, according to City Manager Mike Bartholomew.
Similarly, the Des Plaines Public Library placed the thin blue line flag in its front lobby.
In a letter sent to aldermen Friday, Library Board President Greg Sarlo criticized the council's new flag rules because it creates a time lag between an event like the Dallas shootings and getting the appropriate flag hoisted.
"For us not to be able to immediately show some response like that, it's wrong," Sarlo said. "People should be able to express their grieving contemporaneously. You shouldn't have to be delayed like that."
Brookman said he, too, wants the city to be able to respond to unfortunate events in a timely manner, but he also wants the council to be involved in the decision-making process.
He originally proposed the flag flying rules after Sarlo, with the approval of Bogusz, had the rainbow flag flown on the library plaza after the June 12 mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando.
Brookman said at the last council meeting that without procedures governing flag flying, there could be no limit to groups that want their flag displayed over a city building.
Brookman added he probably would have voted to fly the rainbow flag, if asked.
The city council meets at 7 p.m. Monday at 1420 Miner St.