Dallas

Dallas Task Force on Confederate Monuments to Take Closer Look at Streets Named for Confederate Figures

Gaston, Ervay, and Lemmon are well-known street names in the city of Dallas. They are also some of the streets in the city named after Confederate figures.

Now, the Dallas mayor's task force on Confederate monuments is set to discuss whether to recommend changing the names of city streets that are named after Confederate figures.

"There is not really anywhere you can go that doesn't have some layer of difficult history about it in Dallas," said Chris Dowdy, who lives on Junius Street, another street named after a Confederate solider. "We have street names for a reason. Because we have values and we tell stories and we become certain kinds of people based on how we do that work."

Dowdy believes the name of his street and others like it should be changed.

"It's the least we owe each other to talk through what these spaces, what these names mean," he said.

"I did not know that Junius was Confederate," said Lorenzo Brown. "We've been living here going on 20 years, and it's always been Junius, so I prefer it to stay Junius."

A Dallas city staff report estimates the cost of changing names on some of the streets in question. For Lemmon Avenue, the cost would top $364,000. For Gaston Avenue, the cost would be nearly $44,000. For Lee Parkway, the cost is estimated at about $1,430.

"I don't think changing the name will accomplish what people want to accomplish," said Rachel Reininger. "I believe in education rather than just changing history, because history is there, whether or not we like it."

The Mayor's Task Force on Confederate Monuments meets at Dallas City Hall at 6 p.m. Tuesday.

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