Barrington Town Manager Jim Cunha went on the record late last week to say that the town will not be relocating the veterans memorial.

The statement came in response to a request from the Barrington United Veterans Council, which wants the memorial moved away from the flagpole outside Barrington Town Hall. The flagpole has been carrying partisan or political flags, Barrington UVC members have stated, and they do not want the memorial associated with those messages.

Nearly a year ago, members of the Barrington United Veterans Council publicly opposed the council’s decision to fly the Pride flag on the town hall flagpole. The group has also asked the council to remove the Black Lives Matter flag from the pole after the town manager raised that flag in August 2020. Both times, the council rejected the UVC’s requests.

More recently, the veterans group asked that the council raise a different flag on the pole, one that carries the message “Respect the Flag, Keep Politics off the Pole.” Not a single member of the town council supported the flying of that flag.

With few options remaining, members of the Barrington United Veterans Council requested the town’s assistance in relocating the veterans memorial to a different space away from the flagpole.

Initially, the town manager would not comment on the request, but late last week he sent an email to the Barrington Times stating “the Veterans Memorial is Town property and will not be relocated.”

In prior reporting, the veterans group has stated that the memorial was originally constructed using money obtained and raised through the local Veterans of Foreign War post. The group members said a similar approach was planned to raise money to cover the memorial’s relocation.

“The Barrington UVC believes that the men and women of this community, who have sacrificed so much for this nation, deserve a dedicated and respectful home for their memorial devoid of the specter of potential future desecration,” Barrington UVC members stated.

Barrington UVC member Paul Dulchinos said previously that the new location of the veterans memorial will need to be protected and controlled by the town veterans “to prevent the site from being turned into a virtue signaling partisan political billboard.”

The Barrington UVC was only seeking site authorization for the relocation, not funding from the town.