{"id":225648,"date":"2026-03-18T18:57:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T18:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/225648\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T18:57:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T18:57:09","slug":"fresno-councilmember-wants-cesar-chavez-name-removed-from-boulevard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/225648\/","title":{"rendered":"Fresno Councilmember Wants Cesar Chavez Name Removed from Boulevard"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fresno City Councilman Miguel Arias said Wednesday he plans to propose returning Cesar Chavez Boulevard to its original name.<\/p>\n

The announcement follows social media posts by Dolores Huerta, former United Farm Workers vice president, stating that labor leader Cesar Chavez raped her.<\/p>\n

Arias said Huerta\u2019s account, which he called \u201cheartbreaking,\u201d was all the testimony he needed to consider the change.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

He said while it comes with a \u201cheavy heart,\u201d he said it is the right thing to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe city will not honor aggressors, it will not reward those who have harmed others,\u201d Arias said.<\/p>\n

\u2018When the Abuelita Sits You Down at the Dinner Table, You Listen\u2019: Arias<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, following publication of a New York Times investigation into Chavez<\/a>, Huerta said that \u201cfor the last 60 years, (I) have kept a secret because I believed that exposing the truth would hurt the farmworker movement I have spent my entire life fighting for.\u201d<\/p>\n

She accused Chavez of using his position to pressure her into having sex followed by a second encounter where she was forced into having sex. She said she had two pregnancies resulting from those encounters.<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the years, I have been fortunate to develop a deep relationship with these children, who are now close to my other children, their siblings. But even then, no one knew the full truth about how they were conceived until just a few weeks ago,\u201d Huerta said on social media.<\/p>\n

Huerta\u2019s story follows those of two other women who say that, when they were children, Chavez sexually assaulted them.<\/p>\n

Arias, calling Huerta a \u201cmatriarch\u201d of the Latino community, said once her story came out<\/a>, that was enough for him. As a former farmworker, he said Chavez\u2019s reforms led to many protections other farmworkers did not have before, including bathrooms, shade, and water.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the abuelita sits you down at the dinner table and tells you the truth about what happened back in the days, we have a responsibility to listen and to act,\u201d Arias said.<\/p>\n

Fresno Streets Renamed for Chavez<\/p>\n

In 2023, the Fresno City Council voted to change California Avenue, and Ventura and Kings Canyon boulevards to Cesar Chavez Boulevard.\u00a0 After a court battle by opponents who cited the costs to businesses and the heritage of the existing street names, the change was made.<\/p>\n

Arias, then-councilmember Luis Chavez, and councilmember Nelson Esparza led the renaming effort in which the city allocated $1 million to change signage and help businesses adapt to the new name.<\/p>\n

The group 1 Community Compact waged the legal fight against renaming the streets to honor Chavez.<\/p>\n

In a statement Wednesday, the group said, \u201cThe Fresno City Council should take this off-ramp and put an end to the waste of public funds. City Councilmembers Miguel Arias, Nelson Esparza, Mike Karbassi, Annalisa Perea, Tyler Maxwell, Brandon Vang, and Nick Richardson should unite and respect the will of the people. End the problematic changes, avoid the legal risks, and restore Fresno\u2019s historic street names.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Los Angeles, advocacy group California Rising called on city leaders to rename Cesar Chavez Avenue there to Dolores Huerta Avenue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fresno City Councilman Miguel Arias said Wednesday he plans to propose returning Cesar Chavez Boulevard to its original…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225649,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":["post-225648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225648\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}