Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
MEGAN SCOTTCity commissioners would not name a street, but approved other plans to honor the civil rights leader.
DUNEDIN - The city will take a few steps to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., but renaming a street won't be one of them.
City commissioners on Monday approved making Jan. 19, 2004, Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Dunedin and using that week to celebrate and promote diversity.
The city staff is expected to present a plan to commissioners Dec. 4. They also planned to honor King in the Pinellas Trail and to sponsor a celebration of his legacy.
In its final report, a nine-member committee made five recommendations to the commission. The first two were to rename a street Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and add the name of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to the Dunedin Community Center.
Both ideas were rejected, for now, by the commission Monday, leaving Dunedin as one of the largest cities in Pinellas County without a street or building bearing King's name.
While the committee had suggested renaming Patricia Avenue or County Road 1 after King, business owners on Patricia expressed opposition to the idea Monday. Many cited the economic impact that changing the street name would have on their businesses.
"I want to talk about public perception," said Dr. James Long, who has an office on Patricia. "Public perception believes Martin Luther King Boulevard is always in a bad neighborhood. Whether it's true, whether it's not is immaterial."
Matt Stevenson, owner of Dunedin Lanes, also on Patricia, said construction work on the avenue has already decreased traffic. "The smoking ban has cut my revenues by 30 percent. I can't take a third blow to my business," Stevenson said. "I ask commissioners to consider other venues."
County Road 1, meanwhile, was ruled out because the street is not a city street, and it shares the name Keene Road.
Inclusion member James Brown protested the decision by getting up and walking out. In an interview late Monday, he called the comments made from the business owners racist.
"None of these people know anything about Martin Luther King," Brown said. "The street is out. They're only going to filibuster to keep our hopes up. The mayor has the chance to make history, and he doesn't have the courage to do it."
At least one commissioner still wants the city to think about renaming a street.
"The scale of the impact of naming a street has to be taken into consideration," said Bob Hackworth, who first suggested the idea. "However, I think the fact that there is controversy and struggle in virtually every community this has been proposed in is a good thing. And so I will continue to suggest that discussion go on in this city."
In Pasco County, the Zephyrhills City Council recently voted to rename Sixth Avenue for King, prompting an outcry from opponents, who circulated a petition to block the name change. The council reconsidered the matter but decided to stand by its original vote.
Dunedin City Manager John Lawrence said the city staff will work hard to honor King in other ways. However, he said, the city will not close Jan. 19, as the federal government does.
"I would like to make Jan. 19, though, a real special day in Dunedin," Lawrence said. "My employees and myself will have to roll up our sleeves and make this an important day."
The recommendations were outlined in a report from the Dunedin Inclusion Task Force, which was formed earlier this year to study naming a street after King.
The mission of the committee changed, however, when members agreed to come up with other ways to help the city reflect King's views of inclusiveness. Only 2 percent of Dunedin's 35,000 residents are black, according to the 2000 census.
"I'm an advocate for making Dr. Martin Luther King a dream for all of us, not just to the African-American community," said Richard Gehring, former mayor and chair of the task force. "We've been trying to have people appreciate the big picture."
Another recommendation that was accepted was the last listed in the report: to use the Pinellas Trail to commemorate Americans who contributed to inclusion. A Martin Luther King Jr. crossing would be done first.
"To me, what calls to my heart is the Pinellas Trail," Commissioner Deborah Kynes said. "To have a place where you can actually take children to. It's difficult to take children to a busy thoroughfare. This is what I feel speaks to what we are here in Dunedin."
Commissioners also decided to sponsor an event called "An American Celebration: Diversity in Dunedin." It will be folded into an already planned April 2005 program sponsored by the Dunedin Library.
Inclusion committee member Clem Bell said getting three recommendations approved is better than nothing. Before now, Dunedin had done nothing significant to honor Martin Luther King, said Bell, pastor of Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church and vice chair of the committee.
"This is not the end," he said. "This is the beginning."
But he professed dismay at the decision against naming a street.
"I realize the economic impact," Bell said. "I do know all over America when someone has done something great, one of things we do for them is name a street. The street name isn't going to go away. We want to do that."