LAKE STEVENS — For the past two years, Mayor Brett Gailey signed a proclamation declaring June as Pride Month in Lake Stevens.
Not this year.
Gailey made it known that he is withholding his signature due to personal beliefs. That’s according to City Council member Anji Jorstad, who wrote the city’s first Pride proclamation in 2021.
The move surprised some and disappointed others.
“If Brett actually believed what he signed in the proclamation before, then I don’t understand how those beliefs can change,” Casey Strom, a Lake Stevens Pride board member, said in an interview late last week. “It makes me think either he was lying before or he’s lying now.”
At a May 2021 city council meeting, Gailey even discussed the need for a Community Advisory Council to promote inclusivity.
“I see this council leading our community in celebrating diversity as an important asset in our welcoming city,” Gailey said at the meeting in 2021.
Gailey did not respond to multiple requests for comment to discuss his apparent change of heart.
Pride proclamations are a significant marker of support and safety for the LGBTQ+ community, Strom said.
This year, Gov. Jay Inslee, County Executive Dave Somers, and city officials in Snohomish, Lynnwood, Edmonds, Mill Creek, Mukilteo and Mountlake Terrace have signed Pride proclamations. Many Snohomish County cities, including Monroe and Arlington, have hosted official Pride events or partnered with their community’s nonprofit Pride organizations.
In response to Gailey’s decision, Jorstad sought council support. But when she offered a motion to discuss the proclamation at a June 13 council meeting, only one other council member, Mary Dickinson voted in favor. The other five voted against.
During the public comment portion of the meeting, several community members expressed disappointment.
“(It) is not OK if this is what our city is representing — a lack of visibility and lack of representation,” resident Terry Bockovich said. “You should do better.”
Strom said what he found most disappointing wasn’t that the council majority denied the proclamation, but that they refused to discuss it. He sent an email to Gailey and the council seeking an explanation.
“If I go back to 15-year-old high school Casey in the closet, and I see that my elected officials won’t even talk about this, that’s like hardcore rejection,” Strom said.
As mentioned in the proclamation Gailey originally signed, LGBTQ+ youth are four times as likely to attempt suicide and experience higher rates of violence, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A 2020 UCLA study found that sexual minority adults are twice as likely to experience homelessness.
Council member Kim Daughtry was the only city official to respond to Strom’s email, records obtained by The Herald show. He refused to answer Strom’s questions over email, citing “trust issues.”
“I have found over the years that I have a hard time conveying my thoughts in the written word and then they get used to attack me,” Daughtry wrote.
Daughtry declined comment.
Lake Stevens resident James Harmon also emailed the council, and submitted a letter to the editor published in the Herald on June 20. He said his email went unanswered.
“This is an ongoing trend among the mayor and city council,” Harmon said. “They don’t care or listen to the community, and are more concerned with their own interests … and people who are like them.”
Strom said he and other Lake Stevens Pride organizers received “overwhelming” community support for the family-friendly event held Saturday at Lundeen Park.
Jorstad said the council received at least 20 emails in support of the LGBTQ+ community following last week’s meeting.
“This is a great opportunity to show the community, especially the LGBTQ+ community, that the words and actions of a few aren’t representative of everyone,” she said.
Sydney Jackson: 425-339-3430; sydney.jackson@heraldnet.com; Twitter: @_sydneyajackson.
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