Philip Staffelli-Suel shares his thoughts before a packed house of Boro Pride Supporters at the Murfreesboro City Council Open Forum held on Thursday, January 5, 2023.
by Selena J. Haynes
There were eight people who spoke at the Murfreesboro city council open forum from 5:30-6:00 p.m before a packed house of Boro Pride supporters, Mayor Shane Mcfarland (or as I like to call him SHAME McFarland), city manager Craig Tindall, city attorney Adam Tucker and the city council.
Tonight, to say the least, really showed us or shall I say, we heard, exactly what Shane McFarland and his council intend on doing about rescinding the letter that bans Tennessee Equality Project (TEP) from ever holding any event on Murfreesboro city property ever again. They aren’t.
Now, if there are any council members that have differing opinions on the subject, then they might want to express those to McFarland and the others. I don’t know of any council member who has expressed support of TEP during this fiasco.
It’s important to note that city manager, Tindall, didn’t make eye contact with anyone. He pretended to be busy on his little laptop the entire time. As a matter-of-fact, Allie Sultan, an MTSU professor, LGBTQ+ community member, and speaker tonight said immediately upon approaching the podium, “I would appreciate it if the city manager would put his email away during this talk,” of which he did not. As a citizen of these United States and of the great state of Tennessee and of course, Murfreesboro, I say how dare you be so disrespectful of people. I can’t say that I’m surprised though. From what I understand, McFarland did the same thing at a prior city council open forum. You are elected to represent the people of Murfreesboro, well, except for Tindall who is the former Murfreesboro city attorney.
Now follow this. Tindall was the city attorney when the city manager at the time, Rob Lyons decided to resign. This was only after negotiations for a severance package and the new city manager salary were discussed behind closed doors with Tindall, who was, as mentioned, the city attorney. Funny thing, after all was said and done, Tindall ended up being the city manager. According to an article in the Daily News Journal, “The pay offer is more than the $173,813 salary that Lyons earned. The council agreed to give the former city manager half of his salary for six months as a severance to end his contract.”
Not only was Tindall offered the job, he was not even an applicant among the “35 applicants for the city manager job through a $28,000 national search.” His total compensation was negotiated to be $220,000 including a pension.
I digress. Let’s dive deeper into tonight. Those who spoke gave us raw, unadulterated, passionate speeches about how much Boro Pride means to them. There were students and professors from MTSU who spoke along with other Murfreesboro citizens. Every chair in the meeting room was filled and filled with love, except for maybe that one guy that was hating on the unhoused. That’s a whole other battle in Murfreesboro.
Shae Crowell, a parent of two LGBTQ+ kids, a teacher to thousands of Rutherford County youth, a former REA president, the founder of three LGBTQ youth organizations, a TEP volunteer since 2007, and on the board of Rainbow Rutherford also spoke. “Creating visible communities of belonging generates new community investors and deepens community capital resources.”
She goes on to say, “I am so disappointed that this council has not yet rescinded the action of its city manager with regards to the letter banning TEPs future use of public space and Boro Pride. The city manager’s letter seemed a bigoted and obvious attempt to use his position and privilege to shame, to stigmatize and to erase Murfreesboro’s visibly growing and often violently targeted community of people in Murfreesboro. The council’s lack of decisive action speaks volumes. The council’s lack of decisive action will create a ripple going forward not only affecting the stability of today’s LGBTQ community and its allies, but also limiting the future growth of community investment in Murfreesboro.”
Rebecca Walter addressed the council with her concerns of feeling threatened and at risk every day. “I am dressed in all men’s clothing right now and I have been dressed in all men’s clothing ever since someone at church was offended that my belly button was showing. I feel at risk every day. I feel threatened.”
In the end, McFarland had to have the last word though. He expressed that the city attorney had met with TEP and had come to a compromise. “We suggested that the event either be a ticketed event; it be age appropriate, 18 and up,” said McFarland. The city attorney, Tucker, quickly retorted “that was never suggested at that meeting. What was suggested is that they present materials that address specifically the concerns that had been expressed by council members.”
After a brief back and forth between McFarland and Tucker, of which they clearly weren’t on the same page, McFarland said, “Folks, I think we’ve listened to you. Council members have gotten emails and responded. I think there needs to be a discussion maybe that y’all have with the Tennessee Equality Project to figure out how that they can work on some of the concerns that not only the council had but the community had and find a way to compromise. And there’s not a council member up here that’s saying that we want any event in Murfreesboro that meets the guidelines. They should be able to have that. But there has to be some accommodation and there has to be some accountability.”
With that, the open forum was closed. My questions though, what will they do when we keep showing up every month? Are they not going to allow us to speak? Will McFarland treat us like we aren’t citizens like he does the unhoused?
And to Mayor McFarland I say, Do your job! It’s not up to us to work with TEP to fix this issue. It’s up to the city. The first thing I suggest is to rescind that letter. You know it’s wrong. We know it’s wrong and soon the world is going to know it’s wrong!
You can find the live streamed video on the Connect Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/weconnect.lgbt
Broden, Scott. “Craig Tindall Agrees to $180K Salary to Be Murfreesboro City Manager.” Daily News Journal. May 24, 2018. https://www.dnj.com/story/news/2018/05/24/craig-tindall-agrees-180-k-salary-murfreesboro-city-manager/642464002/.
