Santa Maria Residents Push Back Against Renaming Cesar Chavez Drive
SANTA MARIA, Calif. (KEYT) - Residents of Santa Maria who live on Cesar E. Chavez Drive are pushing back against the City Council’s decision to rename the street.
The surveyed residents are unanimous that they don’t want the street to be renamed.
This all started in march with reports of Chavez having been involved in sexual misconduct during his life.
Both Santa Barbara and Santa Maria decided to change their street names.
Similar name changes are happening all over the country.
At June 16th’s meeting, mayor Alica Patino spoke in strong support of changing the street’s name.
“I am in total support of this,” the mayor said. “And I think we need to stand here in the city of Santa Maria and say we want that culture changed.”
In Santa Maria, Cesar E. Chavez drive is alongside Tommie Kunst Junior High School and on the north side of the city.
“The council has taken a pretty clear action that the street is going to be renamed and thus, choose a name,” says Brett Fulgoni, City Of Santa Maria’s Public Works Director.
It is the address for no more than 60 homes, and some of those neighbors have questioned the rapid decision, as the neighborhood has strongly opposed the change.
“I went door to door and started talking and meeting with my neighbors, And when I asked if they wanted to have the name change, every single one person that I spoke with said no, not because of politics, but because of the financial strain it's going to take on everybody,” says Stella Felix-Villarreal, who lives on Cesar E. Chavez Drive.
Others think the 26 thousand dollars estimated to cover the name change could be better spent enhancing safety measures near the school.
“We have a safety issue on the street,” says Felix-Villarreal. “We could use more stop signs, more crosswalks. Our children walk these streets in the morning and in the afternoon.”
Public Works officials have more process to go through before the street name undergoes its full change.
“It's a lot like moving, right?” says Fulgoni. “You file the, the address change and, and get everything switched over. So it is a, it is an administrative burden for sure.”
Public input on what the new street name is to be, will be welcome at a traffic committee meeting on July 22nd.
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