Bill imposing fines for flying Pride flag heads to House

BOISE — A new bill targeting what flags can be flown by local governments passed out of the House State Affairs Committee on Monday, sending to the House floor a bill prohibiting what can be flown on publicly owned property. 

If passed into law, cities and counties would be unable to fly a wide range of flags, including the rainbow Pride flag, the Basque flag and banners recognizing high school graduates.

Rep. Ted Hill, R-Eagle, who presented the legislation, described it as a response to “the local mayor who refused to follow the law” through “reckless and insubordinate” action. Hill’s pointed characterization of the bill arrived after a protracted disagreement between Boise Mayor Lauren McLean, legislative leadership and Attorney General Raúl Labrador over the summer after the Legislature clamped down on flag-flying last session.

"The whole idea of a government sphere, and what we represent, is it embraces everybody," Hill said. "We can't pick one group or another group or another, and that's not what we want to do as a government."

House Bill 561 represents a revised version of House Bill 96, which passed during the previous session and significantly limited the flags that could be flown by state and local governments. A notable exception for "official" city and county flags prompted the city of Boise to take action in the spring of last year to be in compliance with the bill.

A proclamation from McLean, which was supported by Boise City Council in May, denoted the rainbow Pride flag and a flag honoring National Donate Life Month — in recognition of organ and tissue donors in April — as official flags of the city. This change allowed the city’s flying of these flags to legally comply with the law that specified “official” flags of local governments may be flown.

A carve-out in the new bill states official city and county flags can only be flown so long as they were made official before Jan. 1, 2023, a provision that, in addition to invalidating Boise’s official flag proclamation last year, would mean no city or county in Idaho would be able to update their respective flags as a result of the bill. The bill also includes a $2,000-per-day fine for noncompliance, adding an enforcement mechanism that is lacking under current law.

Additional language in the bill specifies these restrictions apply to government-owned land and land maintained by a government entity, including “buildings, adjoining land, parks, roads and boulevards.” In a prior meeting on the bill, Hill acknowledged this language blocks Harrison Boulevard’s annual flying of Pride flags during Pride month as they are flown on city-owned light poles, as was previously reported by Boise Dev.

During a public testimony period on the bill, McLean went before members of the Legislature for the first time in her capacity as mayor. 

In her remarks, she defended the flying of the Pride flag as representative of the city’s inclusive character and emblematic of the broader desires of Boiseans. The city of Boise has been flying the Pride flag for over a decade, she said, and this new bill now punishes the city for doing so at the cost of the rights of all other cities and counties in the state.

“My opposition to this bill is my elected duty,” McLean said. “… I’ll continue to do what I’ve always done, what I’ve been elected to do — stand up for all Boiseans, proudly proclaiming and celebrating our values.”

Lynn Bradescu, who ran for Boise City Council’s District 6 seat in November, testified in favor of the bill Monday. Bradescu said her position was a matter of avoiding First Amendment concerns around viewpoint discrimination. 

“Public spaces should remain places that bring people together, not platforms for political or ideological messaging,” Bradescu said. 

Additional testimony made clear the scope of the bill impacts a range of local government action from Boise’s ability to fly the Basque flag to small Idaho towns being able to recognize community events.

Addressing the former, Gloria Totoricagüena spoke to her own Basque heritage as the daughter of parents who immigrated to Idaho after surviving the Spanish Civil War and the bombing of Guernica. At the time her family fled Spain, the Basque flag was outlawed from being flown.

This was not in the case in Idaho, however, where it has flown for 100 years at city halls, parks and historical buildings in the state — before the same could be done in Basque Country, she said.

“It’s a symbol of community, the same way that a peace sign might be,” Totoricagüena said, “the same way that our American flag is.”

Despite reservations from several committee members, the bill passed handily in a 12-2 vote, sending the bill for debate on the House floor. Boise’s representatives on the committee — Democrats Monica Church and Anne Henderson Haws — both voted against.

    Members of the public gathered outside the House State Affairs Committee on Monday morning to show their opposition or support for a bill seeking to impose fines for local governments flying the rainbow Pride flag and other flags or banners outside of limited exceptions.