KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- In 2021, Amanda Burrows had an answer to a giant Confederate flag that was erected along a popular route to the Lake of the Ozarks: a billboard with the anti-racist message, “EQUALITY BIGGER THAN HATE.”

She raised money through GoFundMe to lease the billboard so visitors would not leave with the impression that the area was stuck in a place of “ignorance, hate, & racism.” She wanted to let visitors know the flag did not speak for everyone in the community.

The goal was to cover expenses for six months.

But when news of the billboard spread, donations rolled in and she secured leases for both sides of the billboard along U.S. 54 highway just south of Eldon, Missouri. She raised just under $50,000 and was able to keep her message there for three years, a fact which fills her with pride.

“You know, outside of my personal life, like my family life, it’s one of the things I’m most proud of,” she said, as she also gave credit to the others who played a role in the campaign.

But now, with the funds exhausted, Burrows said her involvement is now ending, despite the overshelmingly positive feedback she’s gotten for the effort. In fact, she said the support she received over the years outweighed the negative comments nearly five to one.

“The initial campaign for the billboard was unexpectedly successful,” Burrows said. “The fact that we raised as much money as we did, and we were able to keep the space for so long was a true surprise to me.”

Although Burrows is stepping away, the message will carry on from a different voice in a different way.

The Missouri Conference of the United Methodist Church will take over the billboard spaces when the leases run out, one side this month and the other in October, using its Love Unites campaign.

Soon, the billboard will be red and black, the colors of the United Methodist Church, with the words, “HATE DIVIDES LOVE UNITES.”

‘Amazing act of bravery’

The Missouri Conference works with more than 500 United Methodist churches within the state, with a staff that travels extensively around the state.

After one trip, a staffer mentioned someone had placed a billboard under the big Confederate flag at the Lake of the Ozarks with the message about equality being greater than hate.

The next time Kim Jenne, a pastor and director of connectional ministries for the Missouri Conference, was down that way, she saw the billboard and noted it was paid for by the Friends of Amanda Burrows. That piqued Jenne’s interest, and she searched online and a Kansas City Star article popped up. Jenne then went to Burrow’s GoFundMe page and saw she’d raised quite a bit of money.

“I thought, ‘Wow, what an amazing act of bravery for an individual to do, to say not everyone thinks like you do,” Jenne recalled thinking.

Around the same time, Bishop Bob Farr had challenged Jenne’s communications team to come up with an advocacy campaign for love as opposed to hate. They brainstormed ideas, including possibly helping fund Burrows’ billboard, but decided to promote their own message to stand alongside what Burrows had started.

“That’s what birthed our board,” said Jenne, who said their billboard is closer to the Lake of the Ozarks, also on U.S. 54.

The Missouri Conference started developing that message into yard signs and stickers, and then churches started inquiring how they could get their own billboards. Jenne said she worked with her team to try to allocate funds for additional billboards, using the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hate Map of Missouri to prioritize locations where there are known hate groups.

At their annual conference in June, Bishop Farr shared what they were doing and several churches started fundraising. Currently, there are at least six billboards up and at least two more coming, Jenne said.

‘Take a stand’

In early August, Jenne received a voicemail from John Huhman of Columbia, saying they might have a mutual friend — Amanda Burrows.

When Jenne returned the call, Huhman relayed that Burrows was ready to pass the baton, but didn’t want to give up the billboard location to anyone who isn’t going to advocate against hate symbols or hate.

After meeting over a video conference call, Burrows helped coordinate the Missouri Conference’s takeover of the contract for the billboard spaces indefinitely — one side of the billboard in mid-September and the other in mid-October, using the Love Unites campaign.

The Missouri Conference has made a verbal commitment that if it ever decides to pass that off, they’ll work to identify another group that will carry on the advocacy work as long as the Confederate flag remains, Jenne said.

Around 15 million people travel to the Lake of the Ozarks each year, many passing the flag. Jenne said it breaks her heart knowing the harm the flag causes to people of color driving past and the idea that visitors might think it represents the way Missourians think.

“I know that there are a lot of people who in this state who are silent, who haven’t spoken up, but think it’s wrong,” Jenne said. “So on behalf of all those people, we want to take a stand.”

Huhman, who grew up in the area and owns a farm in Miller County with two of his brothers, Sid Huhman of Columbia and Mike Huhman of Mayville, Wisconsin, remembers visiting the Lake of the Ozarks while he was a kid. He said that he was happy to see that the United Methodist Church was taking up the billboard.

“It’s sad that the United Methodist Church has identified my backyard as a place where hate needs to be addressed,” Huhman said.

To Jenne, the move is a necessary one to counteract a symbol that to far too many represents white supremacy and racism.

“It can be dressed up in all sorts of pageantry and nostalgia, but at the end of the day, I know that that symbol causes people harm, and for that reason it should be put to rest,” she said.

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