As reported in the Dec. 7 edition of the DAILY NEWS, the It's Time for a Change committee, with the help of Mayor Dan Canan, will begin its campaign to convince the Muncie City Council to allow Broadway Avenue to be renamed Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. Its aim is to change the minds of the seven council members who voted the idea down last June, and all efforts must be made before the panel's final vote takes place next January.
When asked why he initially voted against the idea, council president Chuck Leonard said that he "voted it down because (he) was concerned about the businesses." If the name of a street is changed, each residence and business on that street will be affected, which for some people can be quite a headache.
But then again, the historical injustice African-Americans experienced to get where they are today was quite a headache, too. In fact, there is no comparison.
In communities that support the diversity and cultural backgrounds of their residents, a street would just be a street. Martin Luther King Jr. was a man who wanted us to live together without prejudice. Due to him and the strong men and women before us who compassionately fought for equality, we live in the racially diverse and wonderful place that we call America. The man deserves it.
These people fought incredible hardships so African-Americans today could exist in the work force. Hundreds of thousands of black students attend universities like Ball State because of the civil rights movement. A hundred years ago, whites and blacks drank from different water fountains, and today some of us pay such little attention to color that we marry interracially. King is an icon for that progress.
Because of this, naming a street after King is much more than a simple dedication; it's symbolic of a community that is tolerant of its residents' immaterial differences. Each person who drives past or on the street should take pride in the amount of growth that has been made over the last 50 years. Any city or metropolitan area with a partly African-American population should and must understand what this street brings to an area. Additionally, it is that city's planners' responsibility to place the street in a location that gives the cause justice.
Muncie understood most of this, as there is already a Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard today just off the south tip of Tillotson Avenue, but its position leaves little to the imagination. The street is on the edge of the city, is very short, and is very unflattering. It is an empty gesture. The last time anyone spent more than 10 minutes on the current Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard was when a pair of white teenagers added the word "koon" to the road's lonely street sign.
The 7-to-2 vote against a Broadway-to-MLK switch didn't surprise anyone. It only ended up suggesting something much deeper and more serious about the people of this city.
If our choice is between properly honoring a truly admirable man or protecting the letterheads of Broadway's businesses, then the black co-workers, classmates and neighbors of the It's Time for a Change committee are fighting for the right decision.
We should join them.
Write to Gregory at gttwiford@bsu.edu
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