SUN SENTINEL EDITORIAL Erasing rainbow crosswalks reveals darker motives

Delray Beach has one. So do Fort Lauderdale, Orlando, Key West, Jacksonville, St. Petersburg and many other places — from Huntington, W. Va., to Ames, Iowa, to San Diego.

They all painted crosswalks in bright rainbow hues to celebrate America’s diversity as part of Pride Month.

But in Florida, it’s now against the law.

That’s because diversity is a dirty word in Washington and Tallahassee.

Cities embracing diversity face retribution from the feds, the state or both, including possible loss of highway funds, for allowing painted crosswalks that the nation’s highway chief considers dangerous to the smooth flow of traffic.

“Roads are for safety, not political messages or artwork,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy wrote to all 50 U.S. governors, part of a Trump administration’s hurtful, evidence-bare attack on artistic asphalt.

‘No place’ on public roads

Typically for this White House, Duffy couldn’t stay on script on social media.

“Taxpayers expect their dollars to fund safe streets, not rainbow crosswalks,” he posted. “Political banners have no place on public roads. I’m reminding recipients of @USDOT roadway funding that it’s limited to features advancing safety, and nothing else. It’s that simple.”

It’s a blow that hits particularly hard in Orlando, where a permanent rainbow crosswalk is outside the site of the former Pulse nightclub where 49 people died in a gun massacre in 2016.

As if on cue, Gov. Ron DeSantis’s transportation chief Jason Perdue issued a similar edict. Perdue said Florida now defines a painted sidewalk as a “traffic control device,” which is prohibited under an FDOT design manual.

In a June 30 memo, the agency also cited a provision in a new law (SB 1662) that gives the state power to order rainbow crosswalks to be removed immediately, with threats of denial of state money for those that don’t comply.

The law says a city can’t create a new rainbow crosswalk for five years without state approval. The provision was buried in an 87-page bill that received overwhelming bipartisan support (yes, most Democrats voted for it, too).

A crosswalk in Orlando

The rainbow crosswalk in Orlando, a tribute to a diverse city’s broken heart, especially needs defending.

It marks a place where young people once walked with one thing on their minds — to dance and have fun at a nightclub that welcomed an LGBTQ-friendly and ethnically diverse crowd.

That crosswalk, near where dozens died on June 12, 2016, is part of a tribute to the nightclub shootings that shattered and remade Greater Orlando. It is meant to be a part of a planned permanent memorial there.

Whitewashing that rainbow crosswalk would be like ripping a bandage off a still-bleeding wound.

The Pulse massacre rewrote Orlando’s emotional DNA: From that day, city officials worked with business and civic leaders to make clear that it was a place where everyone was welcome, where hate would not flourish unchecked.

For that reason alone, state and city officials should fight this foolish federal urgency.

No threat, no evidence

Here’s another: There’s no compelling evidence that street paintings make intersections more dangerous.

In fact, a good body of experience and data suggests just the opposite, that street art grabs the attention of bored or distracted drivers.

They see the paintings, then see people walking across them, or cars entering the intersection. A study by Bloomberg Philanthropies tied road art to a 50% decrease in crashes involving pedestrians or cyclists, a 37% decrease in crashes leading to injuries, and a 17% drop in the overall total of accidents.

Bloomberg helped fund the road-art study, but the foundation concluded that its money was well-spent.

Another expert voice is the Federal Highway Administration’s Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, which says this about road art: “The FHWA’s position has always been, and continues to be, that subdued-colored aesthetic treatments between the legally marked transverse crosswalk lines are permissible, provided that they are devoid of retroreflective properties and that they do not diminish the effectiveness of the legally required white transverse pavement markings used to establish the crosswalk.”

Hate-filled and homophobic vandals defaced the crosswalks in many places, including Delray Beach and Fort Lauderdale. These attacks by government are more subtle, but with similar desired results: to marginalize and ostracize LGBTQ people.

Nobody seriously believes that paint on pavement constitutes a legitimate driving hazard.

Strip away that pretense and the real purpose comes clear: The government wants to erase cities’ signs of pride and tolerance. Defiance is the only legitimate response.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writers Pat Beall and Martin Dyckman, and Executive Editor Gretchen Day-Bryant. To contact us, send an email to letters @sun-sentinel.com.