Small town fined large amount for refusing to support Pride month or display rainbow flag

A remote Canadian town was fined thousands of dollars after it refused to celebrate Pride Month and didn’t hang up a rainbow flag. 

The municipality of Emo in Ontario was ordered to pay a fine of ,000, with Mayor Harold McQuaker also facing a penalty of ,000 on November 20. This ruling came after a lawsuit filed by a local LGBTQ+ organization against the town of 1,300 for its failure to acknowledge Pride Month.

McQuaker and two town councilors will also be required to complete mandatory human rights training within 30 days, according to The National Post.

They also have show proof of their training to Borderland Pride, which filed the discrimination complaint to the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario.

The discrimination complaint was filed after the mayor said during a recorded meeting in May 2020: ‘There’s no flag being flown for the other side of the coin.’

Councilman Lincoln Dunn questioned the mayor during the meeting discussing if the town should formerly recognize Pride Month and fly a pride flag, asking: ‘Sorry, Harold, what’s the other side of the coin?’ 

McQuaker replied after a long silence: ‘There’s no flags being flown for the straight people,’ according to TB News Watch. 

The mayor said Emo is a good Christian community and that he took in the thoughts of everyone in the area when he made his vote, according to the outlet.  

The mayor and Councilman Harrold Boven and Warren Toles voted no, while Lincoln and Councilwoman Lori Ann Shortreed voted yes to pronouncing June as Pride Month in Emo. 

‘It’s a tough situation. We most certainly in the community have nothing against anybody who lives here or what their thoughts are. Democracy is made up of all different people and the majority rules,’ he said at the time. 

‘Sometimes decisions don’t suit all of the people. Moving forward I personally, and as mayor of Emo, I have nothing against the LGBTQ lifestyles. I’ve always believed in the majority rules in a democracy. 

‘We have three flags. We have our Canadian flag, our provincial flag and our municipal flag. And I’m proud of all three of them.’

Borderland Pride Director Douglas Judson said asking towns to pass such legislation is a formality nowadays. 

Larger areas, like Toronto and Hamilton, symbolic proclamations are standard, according to The Post. 

Judson, who is an attorney, said he will continue to sue organizations and others until people stop attacking the LGBT community. 

‘As a lawyer who does this work that means I’m going to start taking people’s houses and their vehicles and their toys and draining their bank accounts and garnishing their wages because no one is going to stop behaving this way until there are real consequences,’ he told Dougall Media. 

The dispute began in 2020 when Borderland Pride sent a written request to Emo asking them to properly proclaim June as Pride Month to ‘show community support and belonging for LGBTQ2 individuals.’ 

The organization asked the town to ’email us a copy of your proclamation or resolution once adopted and signed.’ 

Emo said it only received four requests – two from Borderland Pride – in a 12-month period asking for a declaration or the flag to be displayed. 

Emo also does not have an official pole to hang a flag outside of the one that holds the Canadian flag in front of the Municipal Office, according to The Post. 

Despite that, the May 2020 meeting took place, where McQuaker made his remarks, which the Tribunal Vice Chair Karen Dawson wrote in her decision: ‘I find this remark was demeaning and disparaging of the LGBTQ2 community of which Borderland Pride is a member and therefore constituted discrimination under the Code.’

London, Ontario, and Hamilton are also towns that were ‘sanctioned for refusing to adopt proclamations in support of their local Pride organizations,’ according to Borderland Pride. 

Former Hamilton  Mayor Bob Morrow was fined $5,000 in 1995 for not acknowledging Gay Pride Week and London was fined $10,000 for not recognizing a Pride Weekend. 

Borderland Pride said it will give one-third of the $15,000 owed to them to the Emo Public Library, but only if the establishment hosted a ‘drag story time event’ on a ‘date of our choosing.’ 

Borderland Pride has also won other discrimination cases, including $35,000 from a small claims court judgement against a Fore Frances man who wrote the organization’s drag show was a ‘pedophile show’ on Facebook in August.