Editor, Gazette-Journal:

On Tuesday, Dec. 19, there was a board of supervisors’ meeting in Mathews, and the Gazette-Journal had an article about the meeting and left out the other side’s version of the war memorial.

Here is what I said in front of the BOS:

“I am here to speak for myself … and I will use my First Amendment rights. I want to take time to thank you all for the service you gave. It’s not easy. Not everybody can serve. A lot of people don’t realize what it takes to serve on a board. You got people who will like you, and then you got the others that will dislike you. You’re not going to make everybody happy. I can testify to that.

“Now my issue with the incoming board, we will be entering into a new territory. With the monument, I would like to call it the war memorial. It will now be open to be removed.

“I see green paper again tonight; saw it last year in November. The little green badge they wore said the following ‘Protect & Preserved’ and had a full sheet of green color paper also to wave with.

“The same group before the war memorial used red paper when they got rid of the school’s name, Lee-Jackson. And then the NAACP, that’s right, they moved on to the war memorial to have it removed. But it was left up to the citizens and not a board. Eighty percent of the people voted to keep it and 20 percent to get rid of it. This didn’t work for them this time. However, this was a non-binding resolution, which means any board in the future could have the war memorial removed.

“Now freshly from losing a battle, they rethink their course of action to take, as the opponents decide to have the monument turn over to them with the ground under it. Goes on for a while and then a decision is made in November 2022, and they come to do battle. Now they have decided to back the war memorial to save it, protect and preserve, this way they can get people to go with this so at a later date they can come back and try to have it removed. So, as you can see, this was a big lie so they could win more people to their side. So, with the new board coming in, they can get ready to go after it to have it removed.

“That’s why Tuesday night they were there with the green once again. Mr. Bowen got up after me and offered they would make a law that would make the election that was held binding. The only problem with that, state law overrides local laws We had a state law to protect monuments and war memorials, but the former governor struck it down and the statues started to fall, one by one. Today, approximately 96 have been taken down. Mr. Bowen, you know this. Are you just trying to win people over?

“Time will tell. We could have saved the war memorial for sure. Should have had it when we had a shot at it.”

Bobby Dobson
Cobbs Creek, Va.