Talk about strange bedfellows.
The city’s plan to install rainbow sidewalks in the heart of its queer nightlife district is on hold after Pride San Antonio, organizer of the Pride Bigger Than Texas Parade, and the Texas Conservative Liberty Forum (TCLF), a group known for supporting anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, sued over the project’s funding.
In a lawsuit filed Thursday in Bexar County District Court, the two groups accuse the city unlawfully allocating $170,000 in taxpayer money to remove the crosswalks and paint the sidewalks in the city’s Pride Cultural Heritage District. Pride San Antonio had raised the funds to install the rainbow crosswalk seven years ago.
The suit asserts that city officials have deprived the plaintiffs and residents to have the plans “deliberated in a public forum, have their elected representatives take a public vote on same, and hold them accountable (or at least know where they stand. Instead, the City has hatched a cockamamie plan to summarily circumvent the entire legislative process and unilaterally expended large sums of taxpayers’ money.”
The city is removing the rainbow crosswalk after Republican Gov. Greg Abbott threatened to withhold transportation funding from any Texas city that placed “markings conveying social, political, or ideological messages” on its roadways.
San Antonio officials filed for exemption from the order, arguing that the rainbow crosswalk at Main Avenue and Evergreen Street hadn’t impeded public safety. However, the state rejected the request, giving the city until Jan. 15 to comply with the governor’s order.
In a Thursday memo obtained and written about by the Express-News, City Manager Erik Walsh told Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones and City Council that he had paused the painting of the sidewalks “until we have the opportunity to brief the Council in an Executive Session and to continue working with the LGBTQ+ Advisory Board and the community on implementation.”
The LGBTQ+ Advisory Board collaborated with the city’s Public Works department on the design for the sidewalks, which will wrap around the corners of the same intersection as the crosswalk. In addition to the rainbow hues, the sidewalk is to include overlaid triangles in pale pink, blue and white stripes, representing the Transgender Pride flag.
In the memo cited by the daily, Walsh also attributes the pause to concerns council members have raised about the plan.
In a joint statement earlier this week, conservatives Marc Whyte (D 10) and Misty Spears (D 9) expressed their disapproval of the city’s allocation of $170,000 from the Public Works budget for rainbow sidewalks, saying tax money shouldn’t be used to promote “individual viewpoints.”
In a statement posted to Facebook around 3 a.m. Friday, Pride San Antonio sought to clarify it’s involvement in the suit, saying its original claim and a separate one by TCLF “found their way to the same attorney,” who advised the groups to file together since they both want to force council to have open deliberations on the project.
“It is false narrative to state that Pride San Antonio supports the missions and ideologies of TCLF or that TCLF supports the missions and ideologies of Pride San Antonio,” the statement continues. “Pride San Antonio did not ‘partner up’ or otherwise enter into an agreement or relationship with TCLF.”
Rather, it insisted, both groups called for a transparent, deliberative process. “San Antonio City Council has a history of handling deals and actions in so-called backroom deliberations,” the statement added.
Some commenters on the Facebook post appeared unconvinced, however, telling Pride San Antonio that it could have used other avenues beyond a lawsuit to force a more transparent discussion.
“A lawsuit isn’t a neutral tool,” commenter Coby Dalton said. “When you file together, you’re linked — legally and publicly. Even if no partnership was intended, it looked like one, and that alone caused real damage and confusion in the community.”
Commenters also complained that the attorney who filed the suit, Justin P. Nichols, is a Republican precinct chair — something the Current confirmed. They argued that hiring Nichols is tantamount to giving money to those who oppose LGBTQ+ rights.
“That means community funds (those gay dollars) helped pay for a lawyer who is an active Republican precinct chair,” commenter Daniel Pacheco remarked. “The Republican party platform explicitly opposes LGBTQ+ equality, protections and representation. This is not about party labels for sport. It is about materially supporting a political system that works against our community, while claiming to represent it.”
TCLF has supported various anti-LGBTQ+ causes, including legislation such as Texas House Bill 1686, which sought to prohibit gender transition procedures involving minors.
“If no rainbows come from this, it will be on ya’ll,” Tyler Colton Bigler added in a comment directed at Pride San Antonio.
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