DALLAS — While cities across the country fly rainbow flags in honor of Pride Month, Dallas city leaders claim their flag is one of a kind.
For the second year, Dallas is the only city in America to fly its own Pride flag.
“I know other cities fly the Pride flag underneath their city flag, but we have our own so we don’t need to do that,” said Mayor Pro Tem Adam Medrano.
In June 2020, Medrano and City Council members passed a resolution during a special meeting allowing a Pride flag to be flown outside city hall during Pride Month each year. The flag features the city’s seal over the six rainbow colors to symbolize LGBTQ pride.
"The City Council believes it is important to communicate its support for diversity, inclusivity, equality and respect in our city during Pride Month," members said in a June 2020 written statement.
In May 2021, Medrano and council members voted unanimously to amend the 2020 resolution allowing City Hall and all other city-operated facilities to fly the flag during the month of June, if they choose to.
This June in celebration of Pride Month, the Dallas Pride flag will be on display at City Hall Plaza, Dallas Love Field Airport and the Dallas Police Department headquarters.
“What these flags say is that we are a welcoming community, and we are not afraid to embrace everybody,” said the founding member of the Dallas LGBTQ Task Force, Pam Gerber.
Gerber was honored with the job of raising the Dallas Pride flag at the airport for her service as a member of the task force which works to implement a safe and inclusive working environment for queer city employees.
Another person proudly choosing to wave the flag for the first time during Pride Month is Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia.
“I support our LGBTQ community and our officers, as we have members in our department of that community and the rest of us as allies,” said Garcia at a flag raising ceremony held June 1.
Officer Megan Thomas with DPD’s Office of Community Affairs was one of the dozens of DPD employees who attended the event. As a proud lesbian she believes it’s important to feel comfortable being openly LGBTQ+ in the workplace. She said Garcia’s choice to proudly display the Dallas Pride flag is a huge step in the right direction.
“Honesty is actually the sole part of being a police officer, so to be honest with your coworkers, to be honest with the city of Dallas, and say, ‘I’m out, I’m proud. This is my community.’ That’s the best place to start, and I don’t think we had that in our history,” said Thomas.
Gerber said she feels proud to live in a city that is working to be more inclusive. She hopes to see the Dallas Pride flag flying at other city operated facilities like libraries, and police substations in the years to come.
“There’s no turning back! Look at where we are, we’re not going to take two steps backwards, we just going to keep moving forward,” said Gerber with a big smile on her face.
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