ABOVE: Sticker found attached to the LGBT+ Center Orlando building promoting the white nationalist hate group Patriot Front. (Photo courtesy George Wallace)
ORLANDO | The LGBT+ Center in Orlando experienced several acts of vandalism during the week of May 11-14 including cut internet lines, graffiti and white supremacist stickers on the side of the building.
“I don’t know if the three incidents are tied together,” says George Wallace, The Center’s Executive Director, “but with them occurring so close together I wouldn’t be surprised if they were.”
The first incident occurred with graffiti on the building over the weekend. The Center staff noticed it when they came in on May 11.
“It was on the side of the building in the alley, where it always is. That is nothing new,” Wallace says.
A second incident occurred May 12 when The Center’s internet and phones went down. A technician was sent out and found that the internet lines had been cut on the outside of the building.
“Our phones at The Center are connected through our internet lines so we were without phones and internet here for two days while they repaired the fiber optic lines,” Wallace says.
A Facebook post from The Center May 13 notified the community of the incident.
“Our phone line has been down since yesterday in Orlando due to vandalism. We apologize for any inconvenience. We are still here to serve our community,” the organization wrote.
Wallace says The Center was alerted to the third incident by a Facebook message received May 14.
“We got this message that said ‘Hey, I was taking a picture of the mural and noticed this sticker so I pulled it down and threw it in the trash can. When I got home I Googled the website and realized it was a white supremacist sticker so I wanted to bring it to your attention,'” Wallace says.
The messenger posted the photo on the website Reddit on the r/orlando page. User pauliebleeker wrote that while eating tacos, they wanted to take a photo of the Pulse memorial painted on the side of The Center and noticed something covering the Pulse logo.
“I walked up and it was a sticker of a man with a gun and an American flag type background. Under it gave a website for the group Patriot Front. I was upset someone would vandalize the mural, ripped it down and threw it away, didn’t think to take a photo of the sticker,” they wrote.
White Supremacist group vandalizes Pulse mural from r/orlando
Patriot Front is listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center as “a white nationalist hate group that broke off from Vanguard America in the aftermath of the deadly ‘Unite the Right’ rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, of August 12, 2017.”
“When I read the message I thought I should walk around and make sure there’s no cracked windows or anything around the building,” Wallace says. “When I walked to the side of the building where the graffiti tag was, I noticed on the electric meter that there was another white supremacist sticker. So there were two on our building.”
Orlando police came out, collected the sticker as evidence and took photos of the graffiti. Cameras at The Center have footage from the front entrance and lobby of the organization but The Center’s parking lot camera was not working at the time of the incident due to prior water damage. Another camera located at the rear of the building does not cover the alley way where the second sticker and graffiti was found.
Wallace says that prior to these incidents, The Center had applied for a federal security grant which would go toward updating the organization’s security systems as well as increasing outdoor lighting around the building. He hopes to hear about the security grant by July 1.
“I also reached out directly to other LGBTQ organizations immediately to let them all know about the vandalism,” Wallace says. “When things happen like this I want the other organizations to know so they can be vigilant and keep an extra eye out because this was obviously targeted toward the community.”
Along with messaging members of the One Orlando Alliance, Wallace personally reached out to the Zebra Coalition since they are in the same neighborhood and Pulse since it was their mural that had one of the stickers attached.
Heather Wilkie, the Zebra Coalition’s Executive Director, says that no stickers or vandalism have been found on or around the LGBTQ youth organization’s building.
onePULSE Foundation CEO & Executive Director and Pulse owner, Barbara Poma says that no stickers were found at the site of the Pulse memorial. Some concern was raised about a small, confined space of liquid at the site but the substance could not be identified.
“We notified security and while we don’t have any immediate concerns we are keeping a heightened sense of awareness because of what occurred,” Poma says.
So far it seems like the vandalism has been limited to The Center.
“We are very visible,” Wallace says. “We have rainbow flags up and when you Google ‘LGBT’ and ‘Orlando’ we come up. We don’t hide, we are proud to be the LGBTQ community’s center, and we’ve been the target in the past. We’ve had swastikas tagged on our building, windows broken, unfortunately we’re an easy target for these kinds of people.”
Since the incidents, The Center has seen an increase in messages of support and donations. For more information on how you can donate or help The Center, visit TheCenterOrlando.org. If you have any information about the vandalism incidents, please contact the Orlando Police Department’s Crimeline at 800-423-TIPS.
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