DENVER -- Greeley's mayor apologized Thursday saying he made a mistake when he showed school children a fake $3 bill depicting President-elect Barack Obama wearing a Middle Eastern headdress.

The Greeley Tribune reported Mayor Ed Clark said a girl at University School's middle school asked him if he had an extra dollar for lunch. Clark took out his wallet and didn't have a dollar, but showed the girl the fake bill.

Clark, who works as head of security at the school, said the girl let other children around a lunch table see the bill before he took it back and put it away.

A parent complained to school officials, prompting the apology.

“It wasn’t meant to be hurtful,” Clark said.

He said he never told the kids Obama is a Muslim and that he knows Obama is a Christian. The bill doesn’t depict Obama in a turban, Clark said, but instead in a “prince’s hat” in the Middle Eastern style.

The parent, who did not want to be identified because of fear of retribution to his children, said his child and others at the school told him that Clark had shown them the fake money with Obama on it.

The parent said he wasn’t upset that Clark had the bill, just that he shared it with children in his capacity as security director at the school.

Clark said the bill was simply satirical.

“I called the family and I apologized,” Clark said. “I was clearly wrong.”