A chain-link fence was erected around the 9-11 Memorial on Wesley Bolin Plaza as a prelude to workers replacing inscriptions that some saw as inappropriate.

If the state’s 9/11 memorial doesn’t receive the overhaul proposed in a Fountain Hills Republican’s bill, a former New York City firefighter told a House committee the state doesn’t deserve to keep the piece of twisted steel taken from the World Trade Center that was incorporated into the design.
“I’ll take that steel back if I have to do it at three in the morning,” retired FDNY Capt. John Ferry told the House Government Committee Feb. 19. “And you can put me in jail for it.”
Ferry, who lives in Scottsdale after a 25-year career as a New York firefighter, said he and other FDNY retirees who helped secure the wreckage for the memorial are angry that the memorial injects political speech and personal agendas into what should be a fact-based tribute to those who died that day.
“When I go there, I have no peace, I have no sense of serenity,” he said.
That there is barbed-wire-topped chain link fencing currently in place around the memorial, seems fitting, given Ferry’s comments. The fence, however, is not there to prevent theft; rather, it was installed in advance of construction to alter the structure.
Just a few days after the fence was erected, the House committee approved legislation aimed at overriding those changes, which were agreed to by a pair of volunteer commissions that oversaw the memorial.
The memorial, unveiled on the fifth anniversary of the attacks, came under fire almost immediately for being unpatriotic and lacking historical context.
At a Dec. 21 meeting, the Legislative Governmental Mall Commission approved alterations already adopted by the volunteer commission that oversaw the design and construction of the memorial.
The changes include deleting two of the 54 inscriptions on the memorial and adding seven new ones, along with a pair of new panels explaining the memorial and the events surrounding the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Among the new inscriptions are “United We Stand,” “God Bless America” and “Let’s Roll.”
One of the inscriptions that will be removed contains a reference to an “erroneous” U.S. airstrike that killed civilians attending a wedding in Afghanistan.
Rep. John Kavanagh, R-8, is pushing to remove all of the inscribed metal panels and replace them with what he calls “a simple timeline” of the events of Sept. 11, 2001.
His bill, H2700, was approved by the House Government Committee by a 4-3 vote and forwarded to the entire House for floor debate. Kavanagh said the controversy over the memorial disrespects the victims of the attacks – many of whom he served with as a member of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey — and is an “embarrassment to Arizona.”
The changes, he said, aren’t aimed at the artistic qualities of the memorial, which uses sunlight and shadows to display inscriptions etched in steel panels. Rather, he said he merely wants to change the content of those inscriptions.
“I very specifically and intentionally avoided any artistic tampering, because I wanted this to be a surgical, non-controversial correction,” Kavanagh said.
But Gov. Janet Napolitano, who appointed the 9/11 Memorial Commission, said that group has done what was asked of it and approved changes that arose from the initial public outcry.
“There was a good, transparent, healthy process in response to the public reaction to the memorial,” she said. “I think that that has been a good and healthy process so it’s going to take a lot of convincing to get me to believe that the Legislature could do a better job.”
Napolitano later said she would likely veto the bill if it is approved by both the House and Senate.
In the committee meeting, Billy Shields, who led the 9/11 Memorial Commission that designed the monument, said the debate that has dogged the memorial is largely political in nature.
“I think the controversy is in this room,” he said. “I think the citizens are moving on, living with 9/11 in their own way.”
But Rep. Ray Barnes, a northeast Phoenix Republican, said the Legislature needed to act because the changes already approved are not adequate.
“It looked to me like (the 9/11 Memorial Commission) said, ‘Screw you. We’re not changing for you,’” he said.