‘We don’t honor those folks.’ Charlotte renaming 9 streets linked to racist figures.
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Name changes in Charlotte
Righting past wrongs and honoring civil rights heroes: Increasingly, local leaders are examining the history of Charlotte and choosing to rename some streets and buildings, including schools.
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Nine Charlotte streets that honor white supremacists or Confederate leaders will be renamed, the city council unanimously voted Monday night.
A legacy commission formed in June by Mayor Vi Lyles — following protests for racial justice in the wake of George Floyd’s death at the hands of police and subsequent nationwide civil unrest — was tasked with reviewing street names and monuments in the city.
The 15-person group, composed of local historians and community members, initially reviewed a list of over 70 streets — all with names “in honor of slavery, slave owners, Confederate veterans, and supporters of white supremacy or romanticized notions of the antebellum South,” according to the commission’s report.
They discovered that nearly every eponymous street in Charlotte named before the late 1800s honors a family that enslaved people. In response, they prioritized renaming streets named after Confederate leaders and those who led a statewide white supremacy campaign that started in 1898, the Observer reported in December.
“It doesn’t mean we erase that history. It doesn’t mean we don’t teach that history,” Councilman Larken Egleston said Monday. “It means we don’t honor those folks in the way they’ve been honored up until now.”
Egleston addressed concerns from residents and business owners who work or live on those nine streets about the changes they’ll have to make and assured them they’d have support from the city. Grants may be available to offset costs associated with renaming and the impact on individual addresses.
The streets being renamed are:
- Jefferson Davis Street
- West Hill Street
- Stonewall Street
- Jackson Avenue
- Phifer Avenue
- Aycock Lane
- Barringer Drive
- Morrison Boulevard
- Zebulon Avenue
A decision has not yet been made on what those streets will be renamed.
Confederate monuments
The commission also reviewed Confederate monuments, but did not recommend moving or taking them down, and recommended the city educate its residents about Charlotte’s history of segregation and white supremacy.
“It was determined that there are no Confederate monuments currently in public spaces controlled by the City of Charlotte, beyond those located in Elmwood Cemetery,” according to the Legacy Commission’s findings.
Their report suggested the city consider naming streets after Black, Latinx, indigenous and female Charlotteans that had historically been overlooked, an idea that some local activists approved of.
But Councilman Tariq Bokhari, who supported the changes Monday, pushed back on continuing to name streets after people.
“It’s impossible for us to understand with today’s lens, or a future lens, what is happening today and anticipate that,” he said. Bokhari recommended the council “strip that out of our playbook altogether.”
This story was originally published February 9, 2021 at 10:47 AM.
