Torres: County changes locks at Moore Cultural Center keeping board on outside looking in

Sometimes relationships flourish and sometimes they turn sour.

Such is their finicky nature.

But once someone changes the locks on you, then you know things have gone from a once-promising union to pretty much kaput. And you can file that scenario, as well as this story, under “just plain sad.”

As reported by Eric Rogers this week, the county has essentially blocked the Harry T. and Harriette V. Moore Cultural Complex board of directors from the very facility board members worked so hard to build in collaboration with the county back in 2003.

Locked Out:Board locked out after being told to rent space in civil rights museum they helped create

And just so there is no confusion here as to how sour the relationship has become, the county went all-out nuclear and changed the locks to the complex that was once an example of great cooperation, persistence and dedication between the all-volunteer board and the county.

The Memorial Park and Museum was built to honor Harry T. Moore’s tireless efforts toward racial equality. The facility sits on 12-acres at the site where the Moores lived before their home was bombed in 1951 bombing, killing them both.

The relationship between the board (did I mention they are all volunteers?) was tolerable until recently when when the clock ran out on a new contract. Without a contract, the county said the board would have to start paying for meeting space in the very building they worked so hard to see get built.

What? That’s like charging seniors to meet at the senior center or the Catholic Church charging the Knights of Columbus to meet on church grounds.

More: Harry T. Moore helped thousands of blacks register to vote. It led to his assassination on Christmas night

Adding insult to proverbial injury the county recently changed the locks to prevent “unauthorized access to the facility.”

At the risk of sounding repetitive…what?

Board President Bill Gary said he doesn’t know why the relationship with the county has soured and the county is offering very little beyond this boilerplate response: “The County does not have a contract or agreement with the Harry T. and Harriette V. Moore Cultural Complex, Inc.”

Now, in defense of the county, Gary was supposed to submit a list of changes to the negotiated agreement before the clock struck midnight on their contract in January. He failed to do so. By March the fees were in place and now here we are in June and the locks have been changed.

The board and the county haven’t always seen eye to eye and in recent years the relationship could be described as strained at best.

There was the issue of the county taking almost a year to complete security upgrades at the complex and there were complaints that the work was done in a shoddy fashion.

But perhaps more troubling is that the county didn’t allow a few board-sponsored events they didn’t like from taking place at the complex. Wanna know what they were? One was a presentation about hate speech and another was on critical race theory.

The county spokesman, supposedly with a straight face, said Parks and Recreation officials decided the programs weren’t in line with the mission of the Moore Center. I’m sorry but those programs are exactly the reason why this place was built in the first place.

If there is one place in the entire county that should be able to host a presentation on Critical Race Theory it is the Moore Center for crying out loud. The place was built to honor a husband and wife who were murdered trying to attain racial equality. This is exactly the place to hold presentations about the dangers of hate speech and racism.

Wanna hear what kind of event the champions of racial equality at the Parks and Rec department approved? An antique car show. Are you kidding me?

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So, for now, the board moved its meetings to a nearby public library. Here’s the funny part: the library does not charge for use of the meeting space even though it, too, is run by the county. You can’t make this stuff up.

Both sides are supposed to meet again very soon to try and work things out.

Bill Gary should come prepared and make sure he meets deadlines in the future.

And the Parks and Rec people need to put aside whatever it is that caused them to lock out an all-volunteer board of mainly senior citizens from the complex they dreamed of and fought for and get back to working together.

It’s tough to reconcile after the locks have been changed. But an “I’m sorry” goes an awful long way.

Contact Torres at jtorres@floridatoday.com. You can follow him on Twitter @johnalbertorres or on Facebook at facebook.com/FTjohntorres.