All Christmas trees removed from Sea-Tac Airport

http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/updates/story/6275154p-5474799c.html

Six ‘holiday trees’ at Sea-Tac Airport come down

John Gillie, The News Tribune
Published: December 9th, 2006 10:09 PM
It might be the Christmas season, but don’t look for any Christmas trees in the public areas at Sea-Tac Airport.

Graveyard-shift work crews pulled down half a dozen of what the airport called “holiday trees” at the airport early Saturday after a religious leader complained that the trees gave unfair recognition to a Christian holiday.

The trees, all artificial, were located on the canopies over each of the outside ticketing level entries to the airport. Another tree had been on display in the airport’s new Gina Marie Lindsey arrival hall on the south end of the ticketing lobby.

“The trees were all old – perhaps as much as a decade old – and they were showing their age anyway,” said Sea-Tac spokeswoman Deanna Zachrisson. The trees were decorated with nonreligious ornaments and most were unlighted. The airport had displayed the trees for many years without hearing a protest.

The trees became an issue after Rabbi Elazar Bogomilsky, affiliated with the Central Organization for Jewish Education Lubavitch, asked the airport to display an 8-foot tall menorah in the arrival hall beside the holiday tree and to allow a ceremony for the lighting of the menorah. The Jewish outreach organization sponsors humanitarian, educational and social activities. It is one of a network of 2,700 Chabad centers worldwide.

The menorah is a large candelabra whose lighting recalls the victory some 2,200 years ago of the Jewish community over Syrian rule of Israel and over Syrian repression of the Jewish faith.

The Port of Seattle felt that allowing such a clearly religious symbol to be displayed in the airport might violate constitutional prohibitions about mixing church and state, said Terri-Ann Betancourt, the airport’s chief spokesperson. The airport thus turned down Bogomilsky’s request. The rabbi hired a lawyer, who threatened to file a federal civil rights suit over the display of the “holiday trees,” she said.

“We want to be respectful of all religions,” said Betancourt. “We didn’t want to get into litigation with a religious group over this issue. We would rather deal with the issue after the holidays when we can talk with all those who are concerned in an unhurried manner,” she said.

Thus, the airport removed the offending trees. Port of Seattle commissioners were briefed on the issue and didn’t disagree with how it was being handled.

While the holiday decorations are down in the public areas, the airport wasn’t stripped bare of any signs of the Christmas season, said Zachrisson. Airlines, restaurants and vendors who lease space from the airport are free to post whatever holiday decorations they choose, she said. Many have decorated their ticket counters with holiday fare.

Betancourt speculated that since the trees were nearing the end of their lives anyway, when the airport buys new decorations, it won’t be more trees.

“I suspect you’ll be seeing a lot of snowmen and snowflakes,” she said. As head of the Pacific Northwest Friends of Chabad-Lubavitch, Rabbi Bogomilsky last year sponsored the lighting and display of a menorah aboard a naval warship, the USS Ford, at the Naval Station Everett. Sailors also festooned the ship with Christmas decorations.

Attempts to reach Rabbi Bogomilsky were unsuccessful.

John Gillie: 253-597-8663 john.gillie@thenewstribune.com