Former Councilman Offers to Pay for Banner Removal

The controversial prayer banner at remains covered and has yet to be removed.

Former Cranston City Councilman Jeffrey P. Barone has written Superintendent Peter Nero with an offer to pay for the banner's removal so it can be donated to the class of 1963, the schools first graduating class, which gave the banner to the school as its class gift.

"I am again requesting that I absorb the cost of the removal of the banner and in return, I am allowed to take possession of the banner. Upon my possession, I will then donate it back to the class that originally donated it to [the school]," Barone wrote.

Barone said that he believes the banner's fate isn't up to the School Committee to decide. clearly ordered the banner to be removed, he said, "and it is not theirs to do as they wish."

"The court order has determined the banner be removed and there is no reason to wait," Barone said.

Nero said today that the banner has not been taken down yet. The district is waiting for word from its lawyers, who have been discussing the matter with the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the suit last year and proved victorious.

The School Committee has already received a number of offers to house the banner once it comes down including , a business owner in Pawtuxet Village and the .

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