AGENDA #11a(2)

MEMORANDUM

TO:                 Mayor and Town Council

FROM:            Edith Wiggins, Mayor Pro Tempore

SUBJECT:       Petition to rename Airport Road or a comparable thoroughfare in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

DATE:             January 12, 2004

Next Monday will mark the seventy-fifth birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the eighteenth annual year of the National Holiday in his honor and the twentieth year that the Town of Chapel Hill has recognized this day as a town holiday.

The King Holiday honors the life and contributions of America’s greatest champion of racial justice and equality, the leader who not only dreamed of a color-blind society, but who also led a movement that achieved historic reforms to help make it a reality.

Chapel Hill is a town which prides itself as being a champion of justice and equality and a leader for reform in those areas.  To that end, I propose that the Town of Chapel Hill rename Airport Road or a comparable thoroughfare in his honor.  This proposal has the support of the local NAACP and other residents who would like Chapel Hill to formally recognize Dr. King, as some of our neighboring communities have done already.