PHOENIX โ State senators are moving to let residents of homeowner associations display flags honoring first responders regardless of what the governing board says.
On a divided vote, the Senate gave preliminary approval Tuesday to legislation barring homeowner associations from prohibiting residents from displaying a โfirst responder flag.โ House Bill 2030 spells out the colors for each type โ police, fire and paramedics โ along with the words that can be used.
They would join the list of other flags that legislators previously decided cannot be banned by HOAs, including the American flag, flags honoring branches of the military, the POW/MIA flag, the state flag, the flag of any Arizona tribe, and the Gadsden flag. The last is the familiar coiled rattlesnake with the caption โDonโt tread on me.โ
Sen. Juan Mendez, D-Tempe, tried to amend the proposal, saying thereโs no reason to limit the permissible banners to those, especially when now seeking to add more. He said itโs a matter of free speech.
โFlags are not empty,โ Mendez said. โThey are symbols for movements. We canโt just allow one and then totally neglect all the other ones.โ
Sen. Martin Quezada, D-Glendale, agreed, saying if lawmakers are going to decide what HOAs must allow โ and, by extension, what they can ban โ they should realize that flags are a form of speech.
โWhy is a โsupporting law enforcementโ flag OK, but, for example, a โprideโ flag is not OK?โ he asked. Ditto, he said, if someone wanted to display a โBlack Lives Matterโ banner.
โIf we are going to allow flags at all, we should allow for all of that to be available and allow all those flags to be flying,โ Quezada said in support of the change Mendez sought. โIt says that if you want to fly a flag, if you believe in something passionately that you want to hang a flag outside your home, you can do that.โ
But Mendezโs proposal failed because of opposition from Rep. John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills, the sponsor of the original legislation. He said what Mendez wanted would โinject controversy.โ
โI specifically worded this bill so the symbols and the words could only deal with honoring first responders: police, fire, ambulance, EMT,โ Kavanagh said. โI donโt want controversial flags from either the left or the right,โ he said, saying that would doom his bill.
Kavanagh rejected arguments that flags supporting police, given the current political climate, could be considered controversial and representative of only one side of an issue. โI think only among the most extreme partisans would that apply,โ he said.
What his bill would permit is not a political statement, Kavanagh said.
โโPolice lives matterโ would be a political statement,โ he said, as would โBlack Lives Matter.โ Kavanagh said thatโs why his measure is written in a way to limit the pro-police message that could be displayed.
Under HB 2030, such flags would be limited to the colors blue, black and white. The only permissible words would be โlaw enforcement,โ โpolice,โ โofficers,โ โfirst responder,โ โhonor our,โ โsupport ourโ and โdepartment,โ along with the symbol of a generic police shield in crest or star shape.
The bill has similar language for flags honoring firefighters and paramedics and emergency medical technicians.
Kavanagh said he is not entirely unsympathetic to what Mendez is trying to do in terms of freeing residents who own houses in HOAs from restrictive rules.
โI donโt object to letting people fly those flags,โ he said. โAnd I would vote for a separate bill that did that.โ
But Kavanagh said it is up to those who want to fight that battle with HOAs to introduce their own legislation and get it through the process rather than simply try to tack it on to his measure.
The bill now needs a final Senate roll-call vote and, if approved, then goes to the governor.
