DECATUR, Alabama — Last week Decatur Mayor Tab Bowling issued a statement reinforcing an existing law by stating that anyone wishing to protest or demonstrate must get a permit from the city.
Community members made their voices heard at the first Decatur City Council meeting of 2024. Public comment starts about 1:37:21 in this video.
FOX54 spoke with Councilman Hunter Pepper and Councilman Billy Jackson on the matter before the meeting.
Decatur Mayor Tab Bowling's recent statement reinforcing an existing law that anyone wishing to protest or demonstrate must obtain a permit from the city of Decatur per existing city code is causing a bit of concern in the river city. Decatur Council Member Hunter Pepper said there is some concern with a possible First Amendment Right violation. "I'm curious to know the legality behind it, on how we're going to be able to enforce it, and if it is enforceable. To my understanding, it is enforceable. If that is the case, then obviously we do not need to be enforcing such a thing because we don't want to violate anybody's rights."
Council member Billy Jackson agrees, and believes the ordinance was too inclusive when it was originally written. "We have the right of free speech. We had the right to demonstrate, we have the right to protest, and you know, many of our, um, many of the changes that have come within our society have come because of protest. So I don't ever want to be in a situation where we are taking the ability of our citizens or people in general to be able to take away their ability to protest."
Jackson also believes the ordinance is outdated. "If they want to gather for a prayer vigil or if they want to gather for an outdoor church, um, church activities, all of those have to be because it's an assembly and that's an assembly. So I would think that all of those now, based on this interpretation, would have to go and file a permit. So, I think that it's really as I said, is or stretching and it's too broad for us to actually say that this is something that we should keep in our laws."
Pepper adds that this law has been in effect for a very long time. "So it's obviously we want people to be able to grieve correct. So we want people to take time and and get to get to grieve properly how they want to agree. We want them to be able to mourn the loss of their loved one. And unfortunately, it's now time to move on. It's time to move on."
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