Atascadero City Council doesn't make Pride Month proclamation 

The Atascadero City Council is no longer making proclamations for any group—something it made clear during a recent meeting when it opted not to proclaim June as Pride Month.

Thom Waldman, who co-produced the first major Atascadero Pride event on June 16, told the council that he was disappointed in the city. The city "is taking a huge step backwards," he told the council members during their June 11 meeting, after the very same council proclaimed June as Pride Month in 2023.

"Think about the message you are sending to our community," he said.

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• Photo Courtesy Of Gala Pride And Diversity Center
• PRIDE CONTINUES Residents create crafts together at Atascadero's first major Pride event on June 16.

City resident Nadia Levine, who has worked within and has a child in the Atascadero school system, encouraged council members to attend the Pride event and vote on the Pride Month proclamation.

"It's important to the people of the city that we can come together," she said.

Levine added that she's seen "LGBTQ hate" within Atascadero schools, which is very concerning. Her 14-year-old daughter also spoke at the meeting and said she was bullied at school last June for wearing a Pride flag as a cape and was called homophobic slurs.

"Declaring June as Pride Month in this city would make me as a person feel so much safer because I felt like I was in danger all those days," she said.

Mayor Heather Moreno said the city isn't reviewing proclamation requests so it can focus more on government business and services.

Three people spoke against Atascadero Pride Month via Zoom. City Attorney David Fleishman told meeting attendees that the comments were "incredibly uncomfortable" for the council to listen to. He said the commenters were allowed to continue as the content fell under council jurisdiction because the issue of Pride came up during the community forum portion of the meeting.

Of the four remote speakers, three were muted in the recording of the meeting shared via YouTube, while one who spoke on a separate topic was not. Other versions of the recording were unmuted.

One speaker said Pride was "nothing to be proud of," and another said it is an "oxymoron" to include "family and Pride" in the same sentence.

The last speaker transitioned into talking about what Fleishman called white supremacy. During the meeting, Fleishman said he gave the OK to cut the speaker off Zoom since the topic did not fall under council jurisdiction.

Mayor Moreno told New Times via email that what happened over Zoom that night was unfortunate.

"Like many cities across the state, Atascadero experienced hateful and derogatory comments towards members of our community via the Zoom platform," she wrote. "The speech that night was painful and hurtful to the public, council, and staff and does not reflect the values of our community."

Moreno added that while what the speakers said were hurtful, "they have the right to speak."

After the meeting, the Gala Pride and Diversity Center posted an open letter on Instagram.

"We are disappointed by the Atascadero City Council's decision to not recognize June as Pride Month this year, or the existence of the city's first major Pride event," the letter said. "We are furthermore appalled by the failure of the council or city manager to intervene in explicit hate speech and violent rhetoric against BIPOC, LGBTQ-plus people, and a mother and child in the chambers in front of the council."

Gala Director of Programming Serrin Ruggles said they have not received any response from the council about their open letter.

"I'm a big believer that actions speak louder than words," said Ruggles, who uses they/them pronouns. "And unfortunately, both the words and actions of Atascadero City Council have made it very clear that they are not interested in supporting the LGBTQ-plus population up there."

Despite threats of protests, Ruggles said Atascadero's Pride event was successful.

"We had a lot more people turn up over the 12-hour day than we anticipated, which was the absolute best problem that we could possibly have," they said. "We ended up having a wonderful day, and I think the most impactful thing from that day was everyone who was there was aware of the risk, everyone who was there really wanted to be there and to show their support."

Mayor Pro Tem Susan Funk, who requested that Atascadero make a Pride Month proclamation in 2023, attended and spoke at the Pride event on June 16. Funk didn't respond to New Times' request for comment. ∆