After convening in executive session after last week’s meeting of the Petal Board of Aldermen, board members decided against an ordinance that would require permits for parades and other events throughout the city.
Mayor Hal Marx said the decision was made after conferring with City Attorney Rocky Eaton.
“They chose not to pass it, which I agreed with after listening to our attorney,” Marx said. “He had some issues with just the fact that if we pass an ordinance like that, you open it up for a challenge in court ... even though the ordinance I put forward was not just about protesting, but about other types of parades, and anybody who would use the city streets for any kind of event like that.”
About a month ago, Marx presented three ordinances to the board. One of those ordinances would prohibit targeted picketing, which also would put an end to the harassment Marx said he received at his home after making controversial comments on social media after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Although that ordinance was later passed, the other two ordinances – the one dealing with parades and another with charcoal grills in streets – were tabled until a later date.
Since Marx’s social media comments, several protesters have taken to the streets and in front of Petal City Hall to protest the mayor and his comments.
“Because of the timing of (the parade ordinance), the protest groups were likely to see that it was aimed at them, and therefore they would likely challenge it in court, and we would end up trying to defend it,” Marx said. “It’s really not that big of a deal most of the time, because we usually have two parades a year, and we have one or two 5K races.
“And with those, they usually call us ahead of time and plan everything out anyway, so it really wouldn’t apply to them any differently; we were pretty much already on the same page with them. So we just decided to withdraw that for right now. If we start having more groups that want to utilize our city streets for different events – races, parades – we might consider it, but it just wasn’t something we felt we had to do right now.”
Marx said he hopes event organizers will continue to call 72 hours in advance to give the city time to prepare and have extra police officers on the scene to control traffic and for security.
“But we don’t have a permit requirement right now,” he said.
