The New Orleans Street Renaming Commission is narrowing down potential new names for streets currently named after Confederate leaders, slave owners, and people who supported Jim Crow laws.
The suggested new names include names of former slaves who gained their freedom, to more recent New Orleans notables, including renaming streets after Allen Toussaint, Mack Rebennack (Dr. John), and Henry Roeland Byrd (Professor Longhair).
However, the commission is facing a deadline to make their initial report to the city council, and Commission Chairman Karl Connor says they've had delays.
"We will in all likelihood not be able to complete our public stakeholder engagements and complete our initial report as required by the city council ordinance that created this commission," said Connor. "Public input is crucial to our effort and we must gather as much of that as possible before we make our recommendations to the council."
Connor said they were unable to complete as much work as they would have liked, in part due to the disruption caused by the six named storms that threatened the region at one point our another in the past five months.
