Tamir Rice’s family wants gazebo to be civil rights symbol: attorney
The Cleveland gazebo where Tamir Rice was shot and killed will be disassembled but not destroyed — potentially to become a symbol of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Chicago-based civil rights attorney Billy Joe Mills, who is co-counsel for the Rice family, said ownership of the gazebo will be transferred to the Tamir Rice Foundation, a nonprofit in Ohio founded by his mother, Samaria Rice.
From there, he continued, it will probably head to the Stony Island Arts Bank in Chicago, an exhibition venue run by installation artist Theaster Gates.
“Nothing has been officially decided upon at this point. We’re still figuring out the details of it,” Mills said in an interview with Yahoo News. “Obviously, there are a lot of logistical details to figure out when moving something like that. We are still in discussion, and nothing is official at this point.”
It’s conceivable, he said, that the gazebo will be transported to several institutions over the next few years, but this has not been officially confirmed yet.
On Nov. 22, 2014, a police officer shot and killed 12-year-old Rice, who was holding a toy gun (an Airsoft replica) at the Cudell Recreation Center. A surveillance video of the shooting sparked widespread outrage and reignited an ongoing debate about policing in African-American communities throughout the United States.
In the shooting’s aftermath, the gazebo became a makeshift memorial, with people placing prayer candles and stuffed animals beneath it.
“I think it’s a unique symbol,” Mills said of the gazebo.
According to Mills, the recent change in consciousness surrounding police violence likely did not come about because of a spike in cop-involved shootings but rather because of the proliferation of cameras that have captured these incidents. This footage has created a “unique era of civil rights awareness,” he said.
“There aren’t many physical symbols of what has happened, of the turmoil that the country has endured over the last few years now,” he continued. “I think that because of Tamir’s innocence, as a 12-year-old boy, that his spirit has the ability and the power to imbue the gazebo with what I hope and what I think the family hopes is a healing power.”
Mills said he would like to see the gazebo become a house for mediation and reconciliation between groups that are at odds with each other, whether they be “communities that don’t feel totally safe around police officers or between warring factions of young men on the South Side of Chicago.”
The gazebo had been slated for demolition in May, but the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture successfully urged Cleveland to hold off because of its importance in black history. At the time, the museum was talking with Black Lives Matter about their options for preserving the structure.
Local media, such as Cleveland Scene and NBC affiliate WKYC, reported that the city council passed an emergency measure Wednesday to have the gazebo taken apart and moved to a nearby storage site. Councilman Matt Zone, who previously wanted the structure removed by the end of July, now reportedly hopes the project will be completed by the start of the school year.
When reached by Yahoo News for comment, Stony Island Arts Bank spokeswoman Amy Schachman said, “We’re having conversations about the gazebo, but at this point, no decisions have been confirmed.”
