NewsJune 16, 2020
Cape city council hears public comments regarding race, Confederate monuments, crosswalks
For more than an hour Monday night, members of Cape Girardeau City Council heard input from residents and discussed issues of racial discrimination, local Confederate monuments and the crosswalks on Broadway. Ward 6 Councilwoman Stacy Kinder was the first to raise discussions about two issues she noted as heavily-discussed among citizens — the Confederate monument in Ivers Square and the yield signs along the centerline of Broadway...
For more than an hour Monday night, members of Cape Girardeau City Council heard input from residents and discussed issues of racial discrimination, local Confederate monuments and the crosswalks on Broadway.
Ward 6 Councilwoman Stacy Kinder was the first to raise discussions about two issues she noted as heavily-discussed among citizens — the Confederate monument in Ivers Square and the yield signs along the centerline of Broadway.
According to previous Southeast Missourian reporting, the 14 1/2-foot-tall monument was first erected in the city in 1931 by the United Daughters of the Confederacy to commemorate the one Confederate unit gathered from Cape Girardeau during the Civil War. The hand-carved monument, which weighs 12 1/2 tons, was moved from its original spot on Morgan Oak Street to the courthouse grounds in 1995 by the Civil War Roundtable.
A petition calling for the removal of the monument was recently published online by Cape Girardeau resident Sofia Voss, who sat in attendance at the meeting. As of Monday night, the petition has 955 supporters.
Discussions amongst the City Council members went on for more than 20 minutes. One option proposed by Mayor Bob Fox was to remove all of the statues and monuments in Ivers Square during the ongoing renovations to the Common Pleas Courthouse and reassess how the monuments would be placed at a later point in the construction process.
Deputy city manager Molly Mehner entered the council chambers and advised the council that although monuments deemed not to be “historically significant” to the property can be relocated, under the current construction plan, the Confederate monument was not planned to be removed and any adjustments would require necessary authorizations from the State Historic Preservation Office.
Chuck Voss, father to Sofia Voss, only needed about a minute of the public comment period to express his support of the petition. He acknowledged the city has no legal obligation to take action on the issue, but said the issue would not go away and action should be taken now.
“I believe the monument needs to go, and this is as good of a time as any,” Chuck Voss said.
Ultimately, the council decided to allow city staff time to gather further information about what possible options may be pursued, at which point the item would be taken up for future discussion.
Racial discussions
During his time for public communications, Fox read a letter reiterating a message shared by Cape Girardeau police chief Wes Blair on June 1 and stressed the local police force’s “constantly updated” training in areas of harassment, anti-discrimination and proper use of force.
“We are One Cape. Our City continues to choose unity, to reject hatred, racism and violence against all members of our community. We respect the rights of our citizens to protest, to express their opinions, to contact their Council member or to come to their meetings,” Fox read. “Regardless of race, religion or neighborhood, everyone should be safe and feel safe where they live. We want the City of Cape Girardeau to be a City of opportunity for everyone and we believe that working together, better days are ahead.”
Almost all of the other speakers during the period for public comments spoke about racial discrimination and how to confront racism at the local level.
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Cape Girardeau native Bishop Calvin Bird spoke about the importance of treating conversations about racial issues with care and attention.
“Let’s give them some attention,” Bird said. “It might be frustrating. It might take you an extra hour in a meeting. But you know what? It’s worth it. ... I’m worth it. Our voice matters”
The bishop’s brother, the Rev. William Bird Jr. of Greater Dimensions Ministries, said he was “a little upset” to see how the council responded to concerns raised by Chatez Robinson at the June 1 meeting.
Cape Girardeau resident Brianna Clark said Robinson’s words at the last City Council meeting inspired her to attend Monday’s meeting. Clark noted seeing an absence of Black History Month education during her experience in the local public school system, and said the first time she ever demonstrated publicly was to protest the firing of former Cape Girardeau Middle School principal Frank Ellis.
Ward 4 Councilman Robbie Guard issued an apology to Robinson, who sat in the front row during the meeting but chose not to speak, for a June 1 statement involving long-term local change that could take 10 years to accomplish.
“Obviously, I did not mean that in that way whatsoever,” Guard said, before pointing to his history of supporting the local Purpose Built Community initiative.
“[Those initiatives] don’t do nothing, Robbie. It’s up to the City Council and the city to come together and get some things done,” the Rev. William Bird Jr. said as the timer for public comments expired. “Quit passing the ball.”
Guard attempted to continue the conversation, however, the Rev. William Bird Jr. acknowledged his time at expired and told the council he would return to speak further at a future meeting.
Guard briefly stepped away from his seat on the council and the two men continued the discussion outside of the City Council chambers.
Pedestrian yield signs
Under the advice of Mayor Fox, discussions regarding the pedestrian yield signs were left to be raised during the public comment period by David Goncher, who lives on Broadway and cited an email he had previously sent to the City Council.
Goncher cited various reasons he believed the signs to be improper, but city attorney Eric Cunningham cited city ordinance Sec. 26-133, which designates the city traffic engineer to designate crosswalks and establish safety zones.
Although he had stepped away from the podium, Goncher returned to the podium once during the City Council’s rebuttal to his statements and continued to express his disagreement with the yield signs. After the designated period for public comments had been closed, City Council members held a follow-up discussion on the topic, during which Goncher began waving at the council members from his seat. After ultimately stepping to the podium unrecognized and continuing to voice his opinions out of turn, city staff noted ongoing conversations amongst members of Old Town Cape and the downtown Community Improvement District regarding the signs and ended their discussion of the topic.
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