Volunteers come together to clean up property damage following SLC protests

By Sona Schmidt-Harris | [email protected]

Salt Lake City was shocked to find itself handling a protest that grew violent on Saturday, May 30.

The protest began peacefully to call for change after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis while he was in police custody. 

Images of burning cars, bottles and objects flying at police, and glass breaking will be burned into the memories of Salt Lakers and those in surrounding communities. Some protesters left traces of their anger in graffiti near the Salt Lake City Public Library, the Public Safety Building, the Capitol and on streets and businesses. 

The streets of Salt Lake City were quiet the following day. It was like a hangover after a bad night of drinking, and only a few of the sober were out and about the business of life and clean up.

On 300 East, an unmarked police car sat abandoned. A rock, a little larger than a fist, still remained in the back windowsill with shattered glass all about. The passenger-side window had several glass spiderwebs emanating from blows. There was another glass spiderweb on the front windshield and shattered glass lying on the front of the car.

At the Public Safety Building, officers spoke quietly to one another. They barely looked worse for the wear, grateful for the peaceful morning.

Remnants of the former day’s activities were apparent on the building’s double-paned, glass facade. The requisite, “F*** the Police” was scrawled about along with images of the middle finger. More poignant graffiti shouted, “We can’t breathe,” and “No justice. No Peace!!!” “STOP KILLING” in pink capital letters seemed to be an urgent, feminine plea.

On 200 East between 400 and 500 South, a worker was busy scrubbing the sidewalk of “Kill your MASTER.” “The only good cop is a dead cop” scrawled not too far away, had disturbing echoes of the saying attributed to Philip Sheridan: “The only good Indian is a dead Indian.” Across the street in Washington Square, Allan Houser’s statue, "May We Have Peace" (a Native American holding a peace pipe) stood serenely after standing over the night’s events.

A small presence of law enforcement from SWAT, the Unified Police Department and a sheriff stayed mainly on the corner of 200 East and 400 South. On 400 South, bits of broken glass, melted into the asphalt, remained from the day before where a car had been overturned and burned. Broken, sticky eggs were on the sidewalk.

On 200 East, some businesses had broken windows and graffiti. Most poignant and disturbing was the Salt Lake City Courts Building. A crew of workers was repairing broken glass and trying to remove graffiti. A worker stood breaking a window, bringing it down to shards because the damage was irreparable. The sound of glass breaking cut into the morning, jagged as the pieces of shards left behind.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” a middle-aged worker said as he put out his cigarette.

There were many workers at the Capitol cleaning in the mid-morning sun. They worked earnestly and ranged in age from 10 to 60 years old. A message on the sidewalk leading to the steep Capitol steps read: “You can’t burn down the master’s house w/the master’s tools.” 

A group of Utah Highway Patrol troopers stood at the top of the Capitol stairs like sentinels. Slowly, they began to come down and disperse. 

Captain Jason Ricks had been at the Capitol on May 30 from 10 a.m. to 2 a.m. and returned on May 31.

“Most protestors behaved in a civil manner, keeping within the law,” Ricks said.

When discussing his motivation to be there during the protest he said, “This was the people’s house. We needed to protect it.”

The First Amendment to the Constitution protects “the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”       

Peaceable and non-peaceable, May 30, 2020 made history in Salt Lake City.