Randy Leonard for Pope!

Finally someone in city hall talking sense and doing the right thing! Nicely done, Randy.

Thank you for reporting this. The O will write it up that Randy is racist for questioning the process or some shit like that. Now let us all wait for Matt's retort to your story.

Great job covering this.

Commissioners Sten, Adams and Leonard,
Thank you for this!

"My immediate thought is that there will be pushback from the Chávez committee, which has understandably dug in its heels and has explicitly said they refuse to compromise on Interstate."
fuck them. life is about compromise. if they are unwilling maybe they should not hold themselves and their egos so dearly.
although I like the idea of naming a street after him, I would imagine that Chavez wouldnt even care if the street wore his name, maybe "Avenue of the Worker"?

Finally, a voice of reason.

Thank God!!! Interstate Avenue is saved and it's historical significance as that one road that went to the bridge that crossed over to Vancouver will be known FOREVER!!!!

This will make it much easier for aliens to complete their anthropological studies after humanity is gone.

No matter how noble the original intentions, the seductions of power can turn any movement from one seeking equal rights to one that would deny them to others.

Power that comes from silencing opposition is tyranny not democracy.

The Mayor can say we agree to dissagree when he holds all the cards.

Sincerely,
Julie Ann Rogers
Overlook citizen

No matter how noble the original intentions, the seductions of power can turn any movement from one seeking equal rights to one that would deny them to others.

Power that comes from silencing opposition is tyranny not democracy.

The Mayor can say we agree to dissagree when he holds all the cards.

Sincerely,
Julie Ann Rogers
Overlook citizen

Dan--

This doesn't mean Interstate is off the table. The table just has far more options on it now.

Awesome. I can't wait to hear the other neighborhoods' arguments about their comittment to honoring Chavez, "Just not here".

I will hope this is settled before tuesdays meeting, but will not get too comfortable until i see interstate off the chopping block for certain.
Kudos to some in city hall for seeing this issue is much broader and deeper than the chavez supporters, the o, and "news reporter" (ha) matt would have everyone believe. How sad there are people who think this issue is summed up in such a one dimensional, simplistic way, and assume the rest of us north portlanders do as well.thanks to leonard for seeing we are not to be defined as a community full of racists but rather a community which seeks to retain its own hard fought identity.

As I have stated before, change 82nd ave to Chavez Blvd. The only historic thing about 82nd Ave is that it is located between 81st and 83rd streets

Phil - I could be wrong about this, but I think 82nd is also considered a state highway which could mean that the city can't change it.

Just because the state owns the road, doesn't mean a city cannot name it whatever it wants. As long as the street is flagged as a state highway, that is all the state cares about. For example as US 99 heads south, it has different names in different towns. Lombard is also owned by the State of Oregon.

82nd is already dual-named the Avenue of Roses.

This intervention of leadership by Leonard is admirable and will help him win my vote, but it does not put me at ease.

I still think the issue at hand is that renaming streets is no way to honor someone's lifetime achievements. However, it's a mighty good way to piss off a neighborhood, create division and preoccupy the city council when they could be focusing on any number of more important things.

-An Interstate Business Owner

I think they should rename Broadway. They should pick a street that runs through a wide variety of neighborhoods, reaching people of all demographics.

82nd AV is indeed State Highway 213, and, the stretch in SE PDX at least, should be renamed in honor of just about anybody that drives a Firebird and still has "Shout at the Devil" on cassette.

Renaming streets is dumb.

Chuck E. Cheese Avenue is coming.

George W. Bush Street is coming.

Bon Jovi In Tight Pants Boulevard.

They're all coming. I hope you fall down the stairs and crack your head on Vera Katz's wig, Mayor Potter.

I wish the Cambridge entrance examiners had called me "intellectually disingenuous" when they rejected me, instead of just saying "his written work is nothing special." There's probably more truth to it.

Good work Randy.

82nd Avenue is not dual-named -- the "Avenue of the Roses" thing is a designation. Portland City Council Resolution 36351, on November 23, 2005, provided for "recognition of that portion of 82nd Avenue within the City boundaries as the 'Avenue of the Roses'", and then they put up sign caps.

On this Christopher Columbus Day, the most archaic and controversial holiday that the United States celebrates, a day that enshrines and honors a man who killed Native Americans, a man who was a slave trader, and a man who is responsible for opening the flood gates that would lead to the Anglo’s genocide over the native peoples of the northern Americas, I’m struck by a double-irony.

Here in Portland the local news has been covering and emotions have been flaring over a embroilment about changing street names to honor a couple minority heroes. Rosa Parks & Cesar Chavez. In my mind, it has been shown here without a doubt that the lingering racist views in this country, and in this supposedly “hip” city are more than simply a residue, but is more like the tar that these same streets are paved with.

For those outside the area, or unfamiliar with the story, there was some outcry when the city changed the name of Portland Blvd. to Rosa Parks Way, in her esteem. Some citizens, citing breaks in previous procedure that were done to quicken the change following her passing, showed their true color(s)....white!
A similar proposition to now change the name of Interstate Ave. To Cesar E. Chavez Blvd. is now garnering heated debate and contention. I do remember a certain amount of protest some years ago when Union Ave. was changed to Martin Luther King Blvd.(with no one dying as a direct result).

And although I do support the changes of these street names to honor these champions and role models whose actions, deeds and beliefs are those of which we could stand to emulate (no matter what color their source), here in Oregon we have a much more serious issue regarding the names given to some place(s) in our locale already affixed.

When I came to Oregon for the first time in 1970, I spent two weeks on a farm in Sheridan Oregon. Then in 1971 my mother and step-father moved me to McMinnville Oregon, about 25 miles east of Sheridan, towards Portland. Whenever we’d go visit or past Sheridan there’s a couple big wooden signs on either end of the city limits on the highway that runs adjacent to the city that say “Welcome to Sheridan: Home of Phil Sheridan Days..”. Like many small towns in Oregon and elsewhere the city picks a weekend or so to throw an organized party, with events, rides, concessions and the like. Sheridan’s party, like the town itself, is named after General Phil Sheridan.

It was years later, when I was in high school, that something clicked in my head when going over the brief synopsis of Phil Sheridan’s “accomplishments” in American History class. He had greatly “helped” pave the way for the settlement of this area of Oregon and the West. In other words, what General Sheridan was so “good’ at, why he is honored with the name of a town and other markers in these parts is that he was very adept at killing lots of “Indians”.
We have a town, streets and more named after a guy who was a bigger contributor to genocide than 99.9% of anyone else who ever lived! General Phil Sheridan-Oregon was responsible for the deaths of hundred of thousands of Native Americans. This IS the man who coined the phrase “The only good Indian is a dead Indian!” (What he actually said to a Comanche Chief was “The only good Indians I ever saw were dead”, but history has altered the statement slightly). He condoned the pillaging, raping and torture of these people if they refused to give up their lands voluntarily. In addition he conceived of the strategy of fighting the Native Americans by nearly wiping out the buffalo herds, robbing them of an essential component of their lives, as well as adding animal genocide to his long list of unforgivable crimes.
Every day we here in Oregon step on and over ground that is rich in the blood, bones and bodies of the dead that this man supervised.

I realize that in the times that these geographic names were assigned, the mind-set of our so-called “civilized” society and the truths, and un-truths, of these times were different to the extent that it would not be reasonable for us to think that those previous populations should have acted with more sensitivity. But we are not the Oregon Pioneers, the first families who followed the Lewis & Clark trail to bring development and “progress” to a wild and untamed pristine paradise. But let us be real pioneers, in today’s world. Using the knowledge and wisdom that a hindsight onto history has afforded us. Let us instead of honoring a murderer, cut-throat and a racist, let us honor his victims. Change the name of Sheridan Oregon!! Change the name Sheridan where-ever its root lies in Phil. Cheyenne Oregon, Cherokee Oregon, or Kiowa Oregon would all suffice. Let us restore dignity to our state and its people.

Now we would never name a street Charles Manson Blvd., or Gary Ridgway Ave. (after the Green River killer). But we have a town, street and more named after a guy whose killing spree dwarfs both those guys murders combined, times a factor of thousands and thousands!

There was a recent uproar about Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, being a holocaust denier. And although I don’t support going to war with Iran, or continuing to let Israel act with carte blanche in their systematic and brutal destruction of the Palastinian race, it raised such a furor because anybody taking a objective look at the historical facts and evidence can clearly see that the Holocaust was all too real. But if we can classify the actions of the Nazi German regime of the 1930's and 40's in such a manner, why is it we have so many deniers in this country of the United States perpetrated holocaust of the Native Americans? Because if we don’t change the name of Sheridan Oregon, because it would make some folks with a warped set of historical priorities and closeted racist ideals mad, maybe we should change the name of the town that borders McMinnville in the other direction (Lafayette) to Hitler, Oregon. It was (or maybe still is) the state seat of the Klu Klux Klan, and at least we’d be showing some consistency in our naming criteria.

For Drinking From Puddles, I’m Brandon. Thanks for listening.

The mere act of erasing history does not alter it. It just makes it more difficult to learn from it. Even racism has a place in history in order to instruct and educate people on how close to savages human beings have and can become. The Lord of the Flies isn't just some pithy tale, civilization is a learned behavior.

By honoring recent national heroes, we have an opportunity to create a new future that will leave a history of its own. The past here in Oregon has been racist but that should not automatically condemn the future to be that way as well.

Most of the "white" people here want to be a part of a new future we hope to create together with all minorities we share this city and state with. Hurling insults and holding people responsible and accountable for social barbarism practiced by others, whether in the past or right now, is not going to engender the atmosphere of trust and compromise that the future will require. The future will need all of us to put the issue of race behind us and realize how small the world really is. We will also learn that there are friends and allies wherever we choose to look. If we do not get past racism, we cannot move forward, we only tread water until we all drown.