A Grand Rapids restaurant owner says he will not take down flags and a sign honoring police officers and military personnel killed in the line of duty, even if it is a zoning violation.<\/p>\n
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. \u2013 Grand Rapids restaurant owner Johnny Brann says he will not take down flags and a sign honoring police officers and military personnel killed in the line of duty.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe flags and the names of the fallen heroes on the building are not coming down,\u201d he told us.<\/p>\n
City leaders say the display on the Leonard St. restaurant is a violation of zoning ordinances. It has nothing to do with the content they say, but the quantity.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think I exceed the allotted amount for signage,\u201d says Brann.<\/p>\n
But the restaurant owner says he is displaying the sign and flags as a tribute to law enforcement and military personnel. He says he will apply for a zoning variance, but even if its denied he won\u2019t remove the memorial.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m going to go through the process, but regardless of the result I\u2019m not taking the flags down,\u201d he says. \u201cThese people gave their lives for us and they deserve to be honored and remembered. I\u2019m going to continue to make sure they are.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brann did remove a pair of banners after complaints the message was political and offensive to some.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were apparently some people who didn\u2019t like it and out of respect I took it down,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m not taking the flags down.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the City of Grand Rapids web site, applicants hoping to get a sign variance must first pay a $1,349 fee. After a public hearing. the Zoning Appeals Board makes a recommendation to the City Commission where the ultimate decision is made.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully it can be worked out to where I get an exception,\u201d says Brann.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A Grand Rapids restaurant owner says he will not take down flags and a sign honoring police officers and military personnel killed in the line of duty, even if it is a zoning violation. GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. \u2013 Grand Rapids restaurant owner Johnny Brann says he will not take down flags and a sign honoring […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2995,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2994","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-daily-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2994"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2994"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4636,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2994\/revisions\/4636"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsintime.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}