Sixth Avenue in Zephyrhills is a quiet street in a generally quiet town. My town.
Owning a house on Sixth Avenue didn't used to mean anything special. It was Sixth Avenue, one block north of Fifth.
In October, the City Council changed that. Members changed the name of Sixth Avenue to Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue. Last week, a new council member led the charge to reverse that, and emotions boiled over.
Some homeowners along Sixth Avenue were unhappy when the Martin Luther King Jr. signs went up last year. They face criticism for their perception that the name change will devalue their property.
It's a touchy subject, awkward to bring up.
Comedian Chris Rock, who is black, put a voice to this perception. Rock was quoted in the Times and other publications talking about streets named for King, joking that a white friend called him for directions. The man said he was calling from King Street.
"Run!" Rock replied. "I don't care where you live in America, if you're on Martin Luther King Boulevard, there's some violence going on."
If Chris Rock can talk about a perception of MLK streets, is it unreasonable others might feel the same way? Rock's joke is no good if no one knows what he's talking about.
Chris Rock gets a lot of laughs. A lot of people know exactly what he is talking about.
Is it racist for some guy on Sixth Avenue to know what Rock is talking about, that Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue carries the image of being in a bad neighborhood?
Gee. That's a pretty big thing to lay on a simple homeowner on Sixth Avenue.
I know the goal is to honor a slain civil rights leader who fought for justice. I do believe that King helped change the United States for the better. I stood in the balcony of the old Pasco Twin Theater in Dade City before it was torn down, and I listened as people told me the balcony was where black people had to sit. Not 200 years ago; less than 40. That sounds ridiculous now. Changes have been made. America has made positive steps.
King, the leader, deserves recognition.
But King, the street, has gotten a bad reputation.
The television trucks and newspaper reporters came to cover a protest in Zephyrhills last week. People waved signs, angry that the City Council was backing away from renaming Sixth Avenue in King's honor.
I haven't seen television trucks at Zephyrhills City Hall since I don't know when, unless it had to do with Dr. Martin Luther King.
The whole thing is probably going to get uglier. And the people who own homes along Sixth Avenue are at ground zero.
City Manager Steve Spina warned council members last week before they changed King back to Sixth. "There are places and people in this country whose name alone evokes memories of racial strife," he said, mentioning Selma, Ala., and Rodney King. "I'm asking you tonight not to put us on that list."
I live on Fifth Avenue. One block off Sixth. It isn't a big house, but it's mine. My wife and I put more money into that house than we have ever put into anything else. Someday we may want to sell it. We'd like potential buyers to think of our neighborhood as a safe neighborhood. I wouldn't want it to be perceived as a "bad neighborhood."
If I understand what Chris Rock is talking about when he says Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard is in a bad neighborhood, am I a racist? Is he?
A lot of people who live on Sixth Avenue didn't ask to put their homes up in a fight for anything, no matter how worthy the cause.
Some proponents of King Avenue have argued that by taking a stand, by fighting the stereotype, by naming a nice street for King, the city can lead the way. Someday, if enough cities did the same thing, MLK wouldn't create any perception, any more than Jefferson Street, or Washington Court, or Lincoln Drive. Someday, people wouldn't get Rock's joke.
That would be a bold, new world.
But it's not fair to take that risk, to wage that fight with someone else's property without their consent. It's not fair to a homeowner on Sixth Avenue in Zephyrhills who never asked to change the world.
