The City of Rockville Council said Monday it doesn’t want the statue of a Confederate soldier to be moved to city property.
The council, with a 4-1 vote, rejected Montgomery County’s request to move the controversial statue to a spot in the city’s Beall Dawson Historic Park.
It’s the latest setback in the county’s quest to move the statue from outside of the county’s historic Red Brick Courthouse, also in Rockville.
County Executive Ike Leggett first said he wanted the statue removed from the spot last summer, amid a national debate over Confederate symbols following the racially fueled murders in June of nine people in an historic black church in South Carolina.
In July, somebody spray-painted the words “Black Lives Matter” on the base of the statue. The county has since cleaned the statue.
Leggett’s desire to move the life-sized bronze of a Confederate calvary private, which was erected in 1913 by The United Daughters of the Confederacy, touched off a debate on the county’s role in the Civil War and how the government should treat historic memorials.
The statue was created to commemorate the soldiers from the county who served in the Confederacy during the Civil War. Many in the county objected to moving the statue to parks near them. Some suggested it be packed away in storage or donated to historical groups elsewhere.
On Monday, members of the City of Rockville council indicated they were against accepting the statue at the Beall Dawson house because of other factors, including potential costs of security, lighting and cleaning up vandalism and the massive size of the 11,000-pound statue.
David Dise, director of the county’s Department of General Services, said the county would agree to pay all moving and landscaping costs if Rockville were to accept the statue. Any maintenance fees in the future or signage explaining the history of the statue would be the responsibility of the city.
“If a statue of a Confederate soldier does not belong on county property, I’m not sure why it belongs on city property,” said Rockville Mayor Bridget Donnell Newton, who is part of the five-member city council.
While Newton said she doesn’t want to see the statue “warehoused,” she shared concerns about costs and whether the Beall Dawson location was equipped to explain the statue’s historical context. The Beall Dawson House is now home to the Montgomery County Historical Society, but Newton and other council members said the group has been operating there on a year-to-year basis and may not remain for the long term.
Newton also said the city and county “have been put in an untenable position” by Leggett’s decision to move the statue “without having a fuller discussion.”
Council member Julie Palakovich Carr said she agrees with Leggett that the statue should be moved from the Red Brick Courthouse, but indicated it should be put in storage before being moved to city property.
“Providing a site for the statue, I want to be helpful in that regard,” she told Dise. “But to be put on the hook for potentially thousands of dollars a year for cleaning of vandalism of the statue and additional security measures is not something I have an appetite for.”
Council member Beryl Feinberg, who is the deputy director and chief operating officer of the county’s Department of General Services, was the lone council member to vote against rejecting the county’s request. Feinberg said her vote on the matter didn’t represent a conflict of interest.
Dise told Bethesda Beat on Wednesday his department will confer with Leggett on what happens next with the statue’s relocation.
“We are pursuing other possible sites, none identified at this time,” Dise wrote in an email.
