The smoke has evidently cleared after a battle erupted over the annual Veterans Day Parade in Cortez.
The first shots were fired last November when several veterans opted to boycott the parade on Montezuma Avenue. They held, and still do, that veterans should be honored with a parade on Main Street, about a quarter click to the south.
In April, a core group of six military veterans filed a notice of intent with city officials to conduct the 2015 Veterans Day Parade along Main Street. According to alternate parade route sponsor and Vietnam and Desert Storm veteran Dale Akin, the veterans group had received all the necessary permits and insurance coverage.
“Veterans should be given the same respect that the county’s rodeo queens, homecoming football team and Santa Claus receive on Main Street,” Akin told The Cortez Journal this week.
In an Aug. 1 letter to Ute Mountain Ute American Legion Post No. 75 officials, the parade sponsor, Akin and the other veterans sent notice that they would take command of the 2015 parade route.
The American Legion fired back with a contentious letter from Commander Marvin Hermanns on Aug. 19, stating in an opening paragraph that Akin and his colleagues had filed a “curt and presumptuous” grievance. Hermanns concluded, that active and participating American Legion members unanimously voted to keep the parade route on Montezuma Avenue.
“An ad hoc group of six friends who stir each other up over a supposed injustice are unlikely to have the staying power or name recognition to do this,” Hermanns wrote.
To reach a treaty, Cortez Police Chief Roy Lane summoned the factions to City Hall the following day. According to Jim Cooper, a lifetime member of VFW Post No. 5231 and partner with Akin, American Legion officials claimed that a rogue group of veterans were trying to divide Montezuma County. To calm the debate, Cooper said he countered by offering to present a petition from citizens calling to relocate the parade. The idea was rejected.
The peace accord? City police will serve as an escort down Main Street for the disenfranchised veterans group to lay wreaths at the veterans memorial wall in the Cortez Cemetery, the George Greer Memorial and the Four Corners Veterans Memorial prior to the official parade on Montezuma Avenue.
“I welcome anyone to join us on Main and Montezuma to show how unified Montezuma County is in supporting its veterans,” Jim Cooper wrote in a letter to the Journal.
As a result of the tumult, Akin said he is no longer affiliated with the American Legion, but he agreed with Cooper.
“We’re not trying to separate the community,” Akin said. “We want to bring it together.”
Veterans Day is officially commemorated annually at 11 a.m. on Nov. 11.
