A Summerland, B.C., business owner is looking for an apology from the mayor after a tense confrontation on Saturday.
Your Dollar Store and More’s owner Allan Carter is upset after Summerland Mayor Toni Boot came into his store and confronted him about the sale of Confederate flag bandanas.
“She wanted to know why we sold the rebel flag (Confederate flag) or bandana,” Carter told Global News.
Also known as the “Stars and Bars”, it was the flag of the South during the American Civil War and for many it represents slavery and racism.
As for why Carter was selling the flag in his store in the first place, he told Mayor Boot, “There was a demand for it.”
Carter says Boot asked to buy the rest of the bandanas to remove them from the shelves.
He gave them to her for free, as he had already removed them.
Boot then left and destroyed the bandanas in front of the dollar store.
“I have gotten to the point where enough is enough,” Mayor Boot told Global News.
Carter says he asked Boot to not destroy the flags in front of his store and that’s when he said she replied with, “I am the mayor, I can do whatever I want.”
Boot refuses the claim that she said that: “My recollection is I said no such thing.”
“This was a loud and clear message,” said Boot.
“I don’t want this in my town.”
As a Black woman, Boot says she has experienced racism her whole life.
When asked what the Confederate flag was a sign of to her, Boot’s only reply was simple, “Hate”.
“I just think it’s terrible behaviour on her part, I think extremely unprofessional,” said Carter in regards to the destroying of the bandanas.
As for the apology from the mayor: “He wants an apology from me? He’s not getting one.”
The confrontation stems from an incident where a man waved a Confederate bandana out of a truck window at a parade.
The parade was in support of the Lehkis, a Summerland family who was recently the target of a hate crime.
The man has since apologized.
Anti-Black racism protests are ongoing around the world, after George Floyd was killed by police in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020.