Pinckney considers changes to village protocol after legal pride display was removed

The Village of Pinckney said city officials shouldn't have washed away a legal pride display earlier this month.  

Village Trustee Jo Self said on Monday that the village president has apologized to the resident who painted the ride display on the sidewalk with washable paint. The village is also looking to improve the procedure for handling situations like this going forward.  

"I think one of the challenges is understanding when something like that happens, what is the right protocol? And so, what we've really looked at as a council is we need to do better education," Self said.  

The Village of Pickney is currently in a contentious debate over the proposed budget, but they plan to make official changes to their protocol once the budget is finalized in July.  

"We're not going to make kids stop drawing on the sidewalks with chalk, that's not defacement, it's never going to be defacement as long as we know it's possible to erase or it's going to go away with the rain or anything, then there really shouldn't be any problems," she said.  

Self said that the police department called public works to have the pride display removed. But because the display is protected under the First Amendment, PPD should have contacted the village president first.  

"The protocol should have been to go through the village president to understand what needed to be done," she said.  

There are costs associated with removing the pride display, including the water and equipment used to wash it and the worker's salary. Self said it's currently unclear who will pay the bill for the resources used during the removal.  

"I know that we want to do what's most fair and reasonable considering what happened," Self said.  

CBS News Detroit has reached out to Pinckney's police chief repeatedly for comment, but hasn't received a response.