Activists take to Greenwood Avenue to protect street's Black Lives Matter mural

The painting on Black Wall Street, which spans Greenwood Avenue between Archer Street and the Inner Dispersal Loop overpass, was made on the eve of Juneteenth celebrations. But the city decided last week that the mural would be erased upon legal guidance that if it were left, similar street murals would all have to be allowed.

By early Monday morning, cardboard cutouts symbolizing tombstones bearing names that included Terence Crutcher, Joshua Harvey and Joshua Barre blocked the lanes of Greenwood.

Etta Lowe-Barre, whose son Joshua Barre was shot and killed by two Tulsa County sheriff’s deputies and a Tulsa police officer on June 9, 2017, said “words couldn’t describe” how she feels about the city’s decision to remove the mural.

“My last question to you all, Tulsa, is can we have something? Can we have something? You’ve taken everything. Can we have something? You’ve even taken my child.”

The city announced Monday afternoon that it plans to remove the sign.

Mayor G.T. Bynum explained that because the City Council decided last week not to permit the sign, the city’s only option for keeping it in place was to “vacate” the street. If that were to happen, the property owners adjacent to the street would take over ownership of the street and responsibility for maintaining it.

The Greenwood Chamber of Commerce owns the property on both sides of the street where the sign was painted.

“They didn’t want to take on that responsibility and liability; also, they did not want the mural there and, also, the president of the Tenants and Merchants Association told me that they did not want the mural there,” Bynum said.

District 1 City Councilor Vanessa Hall-Harper said Monday morning that she was saddened that the gathering was necessary to protect the mural. She maintained that efforts to remove it more than a month after it was painted are rooted in racism, not a legal question.

“This is just another way in which racism rears its ugly head,” Hall-Harper said. “And the sad part about it is we are using local ordinances and policies in order to do it. That is what systemic racism means.

“There is nothing wrong with this mural. It is art. It is a message. It is speaking to the lives and experiences of Black people in this country.”

The city’s decision to remove the mural came after Bob Jack, chairman of the Tulsa County Republican Party, sent a letter to City Councilor Ben Kimbro and the Mayor’s Office asking for information about applications to paint signs on streets.

Jack wrote some had approached him about painting a “BACK THE BLUE” or “BABY LIVES MATTER” sign similar to the mural on Greenwood, with Fifth Street and Denver Avenue floated as possible locations.

Tiffany Crutcher, Terence Crutcher’s twin sister and founder of the Terence Crutcher Foundation, said she and other community members are “exhausted” but that grandstanding can’t bring the mural’s end.

“We have to do better,” Crutcher said. “We have to wake up, and we cannot let political theatrics or this dangerous rhetoric continue to divide this city.”

In a Facebook post Monday morning, District 4 City Councilor Kara Joy McKee said the city doesn’t need the cost of a protracted legal battle, but she said actions that disrespect the city’s Black community and put the city in a bad light are a “much greater expense.”

“The mural painted on Greenwood Avenue is part of our history now, too,” McKee said in the post. “It represents a moment when community members came together during a time of pandemic, economic suffering and divisive politics to say that we celebrate each other. It represents the imagining of a better world.

“It should not be erased. I urge Mayor G.T. Bynum to stop any orders that there may be to remove the mural.”

Hall-Harper said she was “ashamed of Tulsa” for the situation and said activists were prepared to fight to keep the mural or, in the event it’s erased, replace it with a new one.

“It’s typical that Tulsa is doing this,” Hall-Harper said. “No other city in this state, in this country, is removing murals, but Tulsa is. It is the American way, and Tulsa does it best. Showing racism at every chance they get, and trying to use the laws, the ordinance or the policies to do it.”

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