Courtesy of WCTV:
By: Emma Wheeler | WCTV Eyewitness News
July 16, 2018
VALDOSTA, Ga. (WCTV) — Streets in Valdosta could be in for some big changes.
An effort to change the name of 3rd Avenue will be up for a vote this week by the Valdosta City Council. The Valdosta Westside Archives is looking to change the stretch of 3rd Avenue running between Magnolia Street and Canal Street to Eathel Way. It’s in honor of Eathel Lee Hall Whitfield, an African American businesswoman who served her communty on that street.
But 3rd Avenue isn’t the only street that could be changing names. Local civil and human rights activist group The People’s Tribunal is trying to change the name of Forrest Street.
“We drive down that street, we live on that street,” said Floyd E. Rose, People’s Tribunal President. “It’s one of our main streets, and Obama was our main man.”
The major Valdosta roadway is currently named after Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Confederate Army general and one of the founders of the Ku Klux Klan. Organizers want to change the name in honor of former president Barack Obama.
“The irrelevant past is never as important as the relevant present and future. We want Forrest Street renamed after Barack Obama,” Rose said.
But it’s not just Forrest Street. People’s Tribunal said most of Valdosta’s streets are named after Ku Klux Klan leaders or prominent slave owners. The organization said Forrest Street could just be the beginning.
“They don’t live on the street now. Most of the people that live on that street are black, we just think that the street that runs through the black community ought to be named after Barack Obama,” Rose. said.
Now the group is planning to go door to door next week in order to raise awareness about the street’s meaning and to gain signatures in support of the change.
“We think by renaming the name after him will send a strong message,” Rose said.
Organizers said 51 percent of Forrest Street residents have to sign a petition supporting the change in order to bring the measure to city council.
We reached out the United Daughters of the Confederacy for comment but did not hear back.
(WCTV)
