Vets for Peace get OK to join parade

Bill Scanlon, Rocky Mountain News

Published November 10, 2007 at midnight

Text size

More Local News

Veterans for Peace will be allowed in Denver's Veteran's Day Parade today, after the city brokered an agreement between veterans groups with sharply different views on how to recognize the holiday.

"We came to an agreement — we'll be able to march in the parade," Frank Bessinger, chief of the local chapter of Veterans for Peace, said Friday, moments after the agreement was reached.

"We'll carry our banners. I'm sure some folks will have signs saying 'Stop the War Now,'" Bessinger said. "We never had any desire to disrupt the parade. We just wanted to express our views on war and peace. And now we can." His group has about two dozen members.

Jery Hageman, president of the Denver United Veterans Council, said an amicable agreement was reached between Veterans for Peace, his group and the city of Denver, which is co-sponsoring the parade with the Veterans Council.

"Veterans for Peace and their affiliated organizatons are invited to participate in the parade," Hageman said. "They've all agreed to abide by the guidelines and rules, and to allow the focus of the event to return to the veterans and their families who are being honored."

Veterans for Peace was allowed in the parade last year, but parade organizers had said this year that they only want marchers who are there to honor veterans.

Until the 11th-hour agreement, Veterans for Peace were planning to march alongside the parade, on the sidewalk, distributing brochures protesting their exclusion from the official parade.

The parade begins at 10 a.m. in front of the City and County Building on Bannock Street in downtown Denver.

Tim Drago, with the Colorado Veterans Monument Group, said, "People should realize that Veterans Day is not about war or peace. It's about honoring the men and women who serve and sacrifice in our nation's armed forces. That's the thing people need to grab hold of."

Veterans events today

At 9 a.m., 284 American flags will be placed around the Colorado Veterans Monument, near the State Capitol, between Broadway and Lincoln. The flags represent the men and women from Denver and Fort Carson who were killed in Afghanistan and Iraq.

At 10 a.m., the annual Veterans Day Parade will start in front of the City and County Building at Colfax and Bannock. The parade will included an estimated 3,000 marchers, 260 vehicles, 10 floats and three bands.

At 11:30 a.m., the names of the 284 Afghanistan and Iraq war dead from Denver and Fort Carson will be read to honor their sacrifice. The reading will take place at the Colorado Veterans Monument. Keynote speakers are Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and Colorado Secretary of State Mike Coffman.

Subscribe to the Rocky Mountain News