XPost: alt.politics.conservative, alt.politics.democrats, dc.politics   
   XPost: soc.culture.african.american   
   From: rkoch@banmlkday.com   
      
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   A historic 10-mile road in Kansas City, Mo., will no longer be   
   known as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., after having nearly   
   100 signs erected with his name stand for only nine months.   
      
   The proposal to remove the celebrated civil rights leader’s name   
   received overwhelming support from voters, with 70 percent   
   casting ballots Tuesday in favor of restoring the boulevard back   
   to its original name, The Paseo, according to unofficial results   
   reported in the Kansas City Star.   
      
   Renaming the roadway sparked a tense battle among residents,   
   local leaders and national politicians in a major city that will   
   go back to having no streets named after the civil rights icon.   
      
   A majority of city council members voted in January to rename   
   the boulevard, which runs through Kansas City’s predominantly   
   black East Side, to honor King.   
      
   Save The Paseo, a grass-roots movement, formed in response to   
   the city council’s waiver of a requirement that 75 percent of   
   residents approve changing a street’s name. Objections centered   
   largely on whether residents and businesses along The Paseo were   
   given enough notice or didn’t want the street renamed, the   
   Associated Press reported.   
      
   Organizers and supporters argued that the old street name held   
   historical significance for Kansas City and that there were   
   other ways to honor King’s legacy, they said.   
      
   The hotly debated boulevard is part of the city’s original plan,   
   and the north side of the street is under the National Register   
   of Historic Places, according to the Associated Press. The   
   Paseo’s namesake derives from a street in Mexico City that   
   loosely translates to “Reformation Walk,” the Kansas City Star   
   reported.   
      
   The Paseo was the third option to honor King.   
      
   The Kansas City Parks and Recreation Board refused a suggestion   
   to replace The Paseo signs with King’s name in 2018, according   
   to KCUR, noting that streets were to be named after people who   
   had made significant contributions to the city and that the 42-   
   acre Martin Luther King Jr. Park has honored the civil rights   
   leader since 1978.   
      
   In response, ministers of the Southern Christian Leadership   
   Conference, which King once led, started collecting signatures   
   to place the question on August or November 2018 ballots, but it   
   didn’t get enough votes, according to the Associated Press.   
      
   Then-Mayor Sylvester “Sly” James (D) formed a commission that   
   allowed citizens to give their recommendations for King sites,   
   and the group favored giving his name to a new terminal in the   
   Kansas City International Airport. Airport officials weren’t in   
   favor of the suggestion, either, according to the Associated   
   Press.   
      
   Renaming 63rd Street, which cuts through very wealthy and very   
   impoverished neighborhoods, was also an option, according to the   
   Kansas City Star.   
      
   On Sunday, Save The Paseo staged a silent protest at a black   
   church that was holding a rally for the street to remain named   
   after King after allegations of racism from pro-King streets   
   surfaced, according to the Associated Press.   
      
   Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II (D-Mo.), who has been trying to get the   
   street renamed in honor of King for years and who first proposed   
   in 1976 that the park have King’s name, asked Save The Paseo   
   protesters to sit down and to consider if their actions were   
   appropriate for church, according to the Associated Press.   
      
   It was a chance for black church leaders to call Save The Paseo   
   group members racist to their faces, one of its organizers told   
   the Associated Press. Members in gray shirts with the green and   
   white “Save The Paseo” logo that looks like street signs,   
   appeared to be of different ethnic and racial backgrounds,   
   though King Street supporters allege that the group is majority   
   white, according to the Associated Press.   
      
   Kansas City is nearly 60 percent white and 29 percent black,   
   according to census data.   
      
   There are more than 900 streets named after King in the United   
   States with most of them being concentrated in Southern states.   
   Living on a street with King’s name means one is more likely to   
   be black, poor or both, researchers have found.   
      
   Street-naming shows where the country stands on issues of race   
   relations because street names connect visual facts with   
   emotions, according to researchers at the University of   
   Tennessee who studied Martin Luther King Jr. street naming and   
   the politics of belonging.   
      
      
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