Perth South recently discussed the issue of its flag policy.
The Pride flag was brought up as an issue by Councillor Mark Bell, who tabled the issue after saying he had heard complaints from residents. Mayor Jim Aitcheson said the current flag policy was debated at their June 20 meeting.
"So as it reads right now, we have three flag poles and one is called the Community Pole, and if somebody, like an organization, wants to fly a flag, first they have to ask to fly it, and second they have to provide the flag. We've been asked by the Pride people, and we flew it last year and never heard a word against it," Aitcheson said.
Aitcheson says the issue was only raised this year. He added the current policy, which says a flag can only be flown on the community pole for a week, will stay in place.
"The original wording was for a duration of an event to a maximum of a week. So the only thing that might change, and we are gonna review the policy in 2024 as we have a new CAO starting and we will get that individual involved, is we may change it to allow flags to fly longer. But as of right now, the current policy is staying put," Aitcheson explained.
Under the current policy, Aitcheson noted that he allowed the Pride flag this year to actually fly longer.
"The policy, they make a request to the township and we had two or three requests to fly the Pride flag, so I discussed it with our current CAO and she said 'I think we should be putting it up' and I said that I agreed, so I said put it up June 1. Ultimately it was my decision so ultimately, if someone wants to point the finger at someone, point it at me. I was the one who said put 'er up," declared Aitcheson. "I had to kind of follow the policy, and I kind of breached it a little bit, I actually let it fly for 2 weeks. So it is not currently flying now but the Pride people were happy it went up. Ultimately, we'd like to see it stay up for the whole month. So that may change, but right now, we're just following the policy that's in place right now."
Moving forward, Aitcheson says he would support amending the current policy to allow community flags to fly longer next year, including the Pride flag. He says he believes it's important to include everyone and make everyone feel welcome.
