Thirty American flags will be raised on Veterans Bridge on Thursday at 10:30 a.m. There will be a ceremony at the Bluff View Art District Sculpture Garden with Mayor Berke and several citizens who donated a flag in honor of their loved ones who served the country.
About thirty American flags fly from May through November each year on Chattanooga’s Veterans Bridge. For the last decade, an anonymous donor supplied all funds each year to replace the American flags hanging on Veterans Bridge – a total of about $40,000. Last year, the Transportation Department was notified that the anonymous donor could no longer continue to provide those funds. In effort to ensure the Veterans Bridge continued to fly American flags, the city announced the Veterans Bridge Flag Initiative.
Through the Veterans Bridge Flag Initiative, any group or individual who wishes to honor a service man or woman can do so by donating the cost of a flag. Each flag is $75 and will fly on a numbered pole on the bridge from May until after Veterans Day in November. Honorees received a proclamation recognizing their service to the country and proclaiming the pole number from which their flag flies. The flags will be offered to the donors at the end of each season.