Petition filed to drop an 'R' from Forrest Avenue
MEMPHIS, TN (WMC) - A Memphis neighborhood has filed a petition to change a street name back to its original, which was changed nearly 100 years ago.
Arnezz Stewart has lived on Forrest Avenue for five years.
He often takes a few minutes on a nice day to clean up the area around his neighborhood.
"This is a very caring neighborhood, and we try to cultivate a very caring atmosphere," Stewart said.
Other residents say the name of their street doesn't represent that atmosphere.
"If it's correlated to a KKK person, yeah I think it should be changed. We don't want to represent anything of that nature," Stewart said.
An online petition is asking for support to change the name of the street from Forrest Avenue with two Rs to Forest Avenue with one R. The street was changed from “Forest” to “Forrest” in the 1920s.
Although there’s no documentation of the reason behind the name change, many believe there’s an assumption it’s named after the Confederate Army General and the Ku Klux Klan’s first Grand Wizard Nathan Bedford Forrest.
According to the Memphis and Shelby County Office of Planning and Development, an application must be filed with the office to change a street name.
The board will either accept or reject the application and appeals can then be made to the City Council.
If approved, the applicant pays for the new street signs.
The office confirmed it does have an application for the Forrest Avenue name change request.
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