PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — A Pinellas business owner who said he only wanted to honor veterans in an annual Veterans Day boat parade recently received a municipal fine for his efforts.
- Digital "Thank You Veterans" floating sign seen in area waterways
- City of Treasure Island voted to not allow sign into parade
- More Pinellas County stories
David Duvernay, who owns Florida Beach Advertising, said he only wanted to honor veterans with his floating “Thank You Veterans” digital sign. However, he had a problem.
“There’s a sign ordinance in Treasure Island that we’ve tried to get around, but we weren’t able to get around and they said we can’t have the thank the veterans sign in Treasure Island,” Duvernay said. “We didn’t want to jump out of the parade halfway through it, and so we decided to stay in the parade and that’s what we did and the consequences was an ordinance violation.”
Duvernay was fined $118 for the violation.
In the days leading up to the parade, Duvernay posted online about the city voting not to allow his sign in the parade. It’s something Treasure Island City Commissioner Tyler Payne said caused major backlash and threats against city leaders.
“To say that we’re un-American or anti veteran couldn’t be further from the truth,” Payne said. “People just took that small piece of information and there were attacks made against individual city commissioners, against the mayor, against our city manager saying that we were un-American because we weren’t allowing this boat to be in the parade when it really didn’t have anything to do with the parade — it was just very systematically that it doesn’t comply with the city ordinances.”
Payne said people don’t know the full story.
“Before anything even came up with the Veteran’s Day Parade he had actually been warned several times and cited by our police department for going through Treasure Island waterways with his sign on, so he was well aware of these ordinances beforehand,” said Payne.
Duvernay said an exception should’ve been made in this instance to honor those who fought for our country. But if it costs him $118 to honor them again next year, he’ll fork over the cash.
“They’re shutting down roads and doing all kinds of military exercises all over the country this time of year for Veterans Day and I can’t imagine why we can’t display a 'Thank You Veterans' sign in the city regardless of the code," Duvernay said. "I think it should be wiped out, at least for this one time event."