This is a screenshot from the City of Stone Mountain’s special called meeting on Tuesday. Credit: City of Stone Mountain
By Zachary Hansen
Councilmembers accused each other of censorship, abdication and grandstanding
An activist group’s exclusion from the City of Stone Mountain’s first Juneteenth event created a rift between city leaders, leading to a chaotic meeting full of accusations.
The Stone Mountain Action Coalition, a grassroots group that advocates for changes to Stone Mountain Park’s Confederate iconography, was denied a vendor table at the city’s planned June 19 celebration, which honors the emancipation of slaves.
A Juneteenth Event Committee, which includes a few councilmembers, approved nearly 30 vendors but the action coalition was not among them. The committee later pointed out the group could participate in the event, but not as a vendor.
During a special called meeting Tuesday, councilmembers on both sides of the debate hurled accusations at one another — from censorship to grandstanding to purposefully missing meetings. The public spat over the group’s participation threatens to overshadow the event itself, which is a monumental first for a city best known for the huge granite Confederate memorial carving and its role in the rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan a century ago.
“The fact that we are having these arguments about Stone Mountain Action Coalition and not speaking to Juneteenth is exactly what we were trying to avoid. But so far, you guys have won,” said Mayor Pro Tem Chakira Johnson, who is also a Juneteenth committee member.
Councilman Clint Monroe, who has advocated for the inclusion of the Stone Mountain Action Coalition since meetings last week, presented a resolution to rescind the earlier denial and give the group a vendor’s table. The motion failed when Mayor Patricia Wheeler broke a tie vote.
Members of the action coalition will be able to still attend the event, scheduled for 6 to 9 p.m. Saturday, and hand out flyers. But they will not be allowed to set up a table or sell goods. In a statement released Tuesday, it wasn’t clear if the group plans to attend.
‘You chose to abdicate. Shame on you.’
The city decided in April it would hold its first Juneteenth celebration and formed a committee to organize the event, envisioned as a block party.
Discussion about the action coalition’s participation began to overtake City Council meetings June 7. During an update on the Juneteenth event, Monroe questioned why the group was denied a vendor table, equating it to censorship.
He, along with councilmembers Gina Stroud Cox and Shawnette Bryant, tried to hold a special called meeting last Friday afternoon to discuss the action coalition’s application, but the mayor and other councilmembers did not attend. Lacking a quorum, the meeting never began.
Monroe said the absences weren’t an accident.
“We could have had this resolution resolved (Friday) with a majority of council by having one more person come and vote,” Monroe said during Tuesday’s meeting. “Instead you chose to abdicate. Shame on you.”
Wheeler, who said she missed the meeting because she was out of town, threatened to mute Monroe’s microphone during the video conference meeting if he didn’t calm down.
Stone Mountain Resolution by Zachary Hansen
Earlier in the meeting, Monroe spoke about how refusing to issue a vendor permit for the group was effectively an affront to freedom, which Juneteenth is meant to represent and celebrate.
“Why the heck are you trying to separate freedom from the rights of citizenship? If you deny that, there is no freedom at all,” Monroe said. “Juneteenth has to be about freedom, but it also has to be about Juneteenth and citizenship…”
He was cut off by Councilwoman Jasmine Little, another member of the Juneteenth committee, who questioned the relevance of his comments. Wheeler agreed, adding that Monroe was out of order and was trying to overtake the meeting.
‘You are out here trying to make controversy’
Little said the Juneteenth committee’s intentions were to unite the city during its inaugural Juneteenth festival. Focusing on Stone Mountain Park’s Confederate carving, a longstanding controversy in the state, was what the committee wanted to avoid, she said.
The small city of roughly 6,300 residents became the scene of a clash last summer when leftist, anti-racist groups and armed, far-right militia members argued and fought over race, politics and the Confederate iconography at the park.
Johnson, who is also on the board of the Stone Mountain Historical Society, said the Juneteenth event is meant to highlight the city’s Black history, namely its historic Black neighborhood of Shermantown. She said she wanted to avoid making the event about politics and the Confederacy. She said the committee aimed to take a “neutral stance” on Stone Mountain Park.
She said Monroe attended a Juneteenth Event Committee meeting previously and didn’t bring up the group’s application. She accused him of trying to make a scene in public.
“You want to do this in a public forum when you can have the most impact and get the most controversy when you are out here trying to make controversy when this city is finally recognizing Juneteenth as a holiday,” Johnson said.
‘Intended to silence’
Darryl Gresham, a resident running for mayor and a Stone Mountain Action Coalition member, said during the public comment portion of the meeting that the group’s denial was politically motivated.
“It is disingenuous to say that no one was being silenced from speaking at the Juneteenth celebration,” Gresham, who announced his candidacy in May, said. “… It is totally absolutely clear that the intentions of the committee, along with the City Council members, purposefully intended to silence oppositions to the mayor, Patricia Wheeler.”
The mayor responded in the meeting by saying she wouldn’t comment.
In a phone call with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Gresham said both his political campaign and the Young Democrats of DeKalb County also applied for vendor tables and also were denied. The committee told him they weren’t approving political groups.
“It’s disingenuous to talk about freedom if you’re going to limit the access for any political organization who might highlight the point of voting,” he said. “You can’t have it both ways.”
The action coalition issued a statement after Tuesday’s council meeting that said it is “disappointed” it will not be a vendor at Stone Mountain’s event, adding that the group will have a table at Decatur’s Juneteenth event on the same day.
“SMAC supports the Stone Mountain community and its celebration on Saturday. Our members will be joining Juneteenth celebrations across the metro area…” the statement said. It’s unclear whether members will still attend the Stone Mountain event in any capacity. Gresham also said he wasn’t sure if he would attend.
Stone Mountain’s event will take place in its downtown village along Main Street. The council unanimously voted to allow for open container alcohol sales during the event. Johnson said anyone is invited to attend.
“We have never said, ‘You are not allowed to attend our event. You are not welcome,’” Johnson said. “… please come. If you want to hand out your information, we cannot and we will not stop it.”
Read the original story on AJC.com.
