On Martin Luther King Day 2023, Monday, January 16, Tracie and I will be protesting the newly built Neo-Confederate memorial in Orange, Texas, where she grew up and where much of her family still lives.

We began organizing our events at the site in 2018 after the Sons of Confederate Veterans first began raising Confederate battle flags at the site — a conspicuous Greek-style atrium that sits at the intersection of Martin Luther King Dr. and Interstate 10. Yes, those pieces of shit built their eyesore on MLK Dr., one of the city’s major arteries, just a stone’s throw from an elementary school (!!!).

We will be there from 1-3 p.m. Please join us to show solidarity for the Black community there. Here are the Google coordinates.

Please feel free to contact me at jparzen@gmail.com if you have questions.

Some may remember that our campaign to repurpose the memorial was featured in a video on the news site NowThis. It will give you a taste of what we are up against (contains graphic language).

You can also read about the site and its impact on the community at our blog, RepurposeMemorial.com.

If you can’t join us on MLK Day, please help us keep our MLK billboard active through Black History Month. Every year since our campaign began, we have raised an MLK billboard across from the site featuring the image and words of Dr. King. The billboard is already active and we just need $200 more to reach our goal of $2,000. That will keep the billboard up through the month of February.

Please donate to our GoFundMe here. And if you can’t donate or attend, please share the info with your networks. Every share, every click counts.

Thank you for your support and solidarity. Hoping to see you on MLK Day! Celebrate the life and writings of Dr. King by standing up for what’s right. As Dr. King famously said, “the time is always right to do what is right.”