If you walked past the U.S. Post Office at 179 E. Franklin St. you may have noticed an orange flag whipping in the breeze just below Old Glory herself.
Unless you're a town official or a mother with a vested interest, you probably have no idea why that banner is there, or what it stands for.
The flag was raised on June 2 as a symbol for National Gun Violence Awareness Day and a reminder and tribute to victims of gun violence.
Jeanne Brown, mayoral aide to Chapel Hill Mayor Pam Hemminger, said in light of recent events, it has not been decided when the flag will be taken down.
"It was originally scheduled to stay up for just a few weeks, but then the massacre happened in Orlando and so it went ahead and stayed up in solidarity with them," Brown said. "And then more recently, I think that when it came back around to pulling it down, it was left up to support Charlotte."
The shooting in Orlando was the worst mass shooting in U.S. history, claiming 49 lives and injuring 53. Keith Scott, an African-American man, was shot Sept. 20 by a Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officer in Charlotte. During the protests that occurred in the city following Scott's death, 26-year-old Justin Carr was shot and killed by another civilian.
The initiative to raise the flag came from the office of the mayor in sponsorship with Moms Demand Action, the grassroots branch of Everytown for Gun Safety, an organization that advocates for sensible gun laws and reform.
"What we’re really trying to do is not make guns go away but to make us coexist with them in a smart, safe manner," said Emily Brewer, organizer for Moms Demand Action in Orange County.
"Numerous times every week now I get word that another child has found an unsecured, loaded weapon in his or her mother’s purse, or in the house and shoots unintentionally himself, or another child or someone else," she said. "That should be a criminal offense because that child should never have been able to access a loaded, unsecured weapon."
