Chavez street name scrapped
Portland Business Journal
Portland city leaders have, for now, abandoned plans to rename a downtown street after Cesar E. Chavez.
The Portland City Council on Wednesday voted unanimously against the plan to rename Fourth Avenue, the street on which Portland's City Hall sits, after the Mexican-American labor leader. The council had floated the idea after North Portland neighbors had protested a previous proposal to rename North Interstate Avenue after Chavez.
In a separate vote, the council also rejected Mayor Tom Potter's Interstate name-change proposal. Potter and Commissioner Erik Sten backed the notion; commissioners Sam Adams, Randy Leonard and Dan Saltzman opposed it.
The argument first pitted Portland's Latino community, which had sought the Interstate name change, against neighbors who protested changing the street's name whatsoever. The council has contentiously discussed the matter. Potter walked out of a recent work session after stating that the other commissioners weren't taking his opinion seriously.
The council reemerged with the Southwest and Northwest Fourth Avenue proposal. The street runs through Portland's Chinatown section. Asian leaders and business owners along the stretch vehemently opposed the idea.
The television station KGW, a Business Journal news partner, reported that Portland's Latino community could reconvene its renaming committee in a few weeks. The committee could try to rename another street for Chavez.
http://www.bizjournals.com/portland/...ml?jst=b_ln_hl
If there are people determined to have a street named in honor of Mr. Chavez I suggest, again,
82nd Avenue...