Local activists are pushing to rename the city’s Cesar Chavez Avenue in the wake of new abuse accusations surrounding the late civil rights activist.
Chavez allegedly sexually abused several young girls and engaged in broader sexual misconduct throughout his activism career, according to a March report by The New York Times. The publication reported it had uncovered “extensive evidence” to back up its findings.
Chavez’s name is found in several locations throughout Grand Rapids, including a downtown street and an elementary school. The renaming of Grandville Avenue in honor of Chavez came during a 2022 push to recognize activists, which also saw Franklin Street dedicated in honor of Martin Luther King Jr.
Synia Gant-Jordan, president of the Southwest Business Association, told The Grand Rapids Herald her organization is renewing its efforts to remove Chavez’s influence from the city in the wake of the abuse accusations against him.
“Naming [Grandville] after Cesar Chavez, with the actions that have recently taken place, every conversation that I’ve encountered has been ‘we want our name back, Grandville Avenue,’” Gant-Jordan said via phone. “We never wanted it changed in the first place. This is not history.”
The Southwest Business Association is one among several groups calling on the city to rename Cesar Chavez Avenue. The Roosevelt Park Neighborhood Association posted a petition calling on the city to revert the street back to Grandville Avenue.
“This request reflects community interest in preserving the historical identity and continuity of the neighborhood,” the petition reads. “We value community voice and ask that this request be reviewed through the City’s established process for street renaming.”
City Media Relations Manager Steve Guitar told The Herald that Grand Rapids is aware of resident concerns but has not received any formal requests on the matter.
Gant-Jordan said she viewed the original move to rename Grandville Avenue in honor of Chavez as an erasure of Black history in the city. The area surrounding the street, she added, is far more diverse than its current name would suggest.
Many Black residents were historically forced into segregated housing in the area, she said. Gant-Jordan argued that the street should therefore bear a name reflective of Black culture and other ethnicities in the area.
“Grandville Avenue, for me, is where Black people were redlined to,” she said. “I’ve been there all my life. Although they want to say it’s this community or that community, we are a very diverse community. It’s been Dutch, it’s been Black, it’s been Latinos and Native Americans who are there, and they’ve never once been recognized.”
Businesses located along Cesar Chavez Avenue also struggle at times to market themselves to customers who still know the street as Grandville Avenue, Gant-Jordan said.
State Senate candidate Ivan Diaz, a member of the city’s Latino community, told The Herald he too is in favor of the move.
“At this point I’m in favor of changing the name, and I don’t have a specific preference for what we change it to,” he wrote via text message. “My family and I have lived in the area now for over a decade, and it seems the name most people are attached to is ‘Grandville Ave’ but again, I don’t have a preference.”
Diaz also said he would personally speak with Grand Rapids Public Schools board members about changing the name of Cesar E. Chavez Elementary School.
“I know a majority of the GRPS board members on a first name basis and I will advocate to have the school renamed to honor farmworkers somehow but I have yet to see an official action from the board on the matter,” he said.
The city’s renaming policy directs the City Commission to undertake a lengthy review process of any street name changes. That process requires speaking with local law enforcement, editing internal records, and a provision that “the proposed name shall be widely recognized nationally or throughout the greater community as meriting remembrance, so as to override memory of the former name to the greatest extent possible.”
Write to jackson@grherald.com.