Anti-Mormon protesters don't plan to back off during their traditional street preaching outside the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' annual conference next weekend.
The city is planning buffer zones to help keep the preachers away from church members attending the annual conference.But the preachers have asked a federal judge to issue a temporary restraining order against the zoning.
"We're prepared to go to jail if we have to," street preacher Lonnie Pursifull said. "We're not going to be put into a box."
The city plans to create free-speech zones across the street from the LDS Conference Center where preachers must stand when holding signs. The preachers would be allowed to cross the street but would have to stay moving and not block pedestrian traffic.
Since most LDS Church members are generally peaceful, McRae said, the city's real motivation is not to protect the street preachers from assaults but to shield LDS Church members from their message.
"You got some people up there in the City Council favoring one religion over another, and we aren't going to have a hard time proving that," Street Preachers' Fellowship director Ron McRae said.
An LDS Church attorney asked the city to create "buffer" areas to shield attendees from the preachers. City Attorney Ed Rutan and Mayor Rocky Anderson declined to include buffer zones when reviewing the city's free-speech laws. But last week, the city announced it would create the zones.
Last October, two street preachers were assaulted by conference attendees at the semiannual event.