More Fresnans unhappy that Kings Canyon Road is getting renamed | Opinion

Renaming Kings Canyon big mistake

Shame on the Fresno City Council for pushing a political agenda to benefit themselves at the expense of many. I am a 40 year resident of the Fresno Sunnyside area directly affected by any decision to rename Kings Canyon Road. No street in Fresno should be “renamed,” especially an already historically named street such as Kings Canyon. Kings Canyon Road has 100 years of history in Fresno, and its memory would be erased forever because of this foolishness. Businesses are still struggling to come back after COVID and this decision would cause them unjustifiable time and money.

There is no benefit to renaming Kings Canyon Road other than to satisfy a selfish political agenda. New developments around Fresno offer plenty of alternatives to name a new street after Mr. Chavez at absolutely no expense.

This is foolish and frivolous spending of taxpayer money and its affects would be departmental to all the struggling business along it route. Taxpayer monies should be used for more important things that our city so desperately needs:

1. Fix our enormous amount of deteriorating streets and potholes.

2. Safe neighborhoods should be the top priority.

3. Clean up our homeless trash and graffiti that is everywhere.

Road renaming dishonors history

I oppose the decision to rename California Ave., Ventura Blvd, and Kings Canyon Road to Cesar Chavez Blvd. Granted, Chavez is a hero for Hispanic farm workers without whom we would not be rich with agricultural production. His name should be and has been honored in many ways.

But renaming California and Ventura Avenues ignores the history of neighborhoods, generations of Blacks, Armenians, Asians, Italians, Portuguese, and Hispanics. Ventura housed and nurtured Armenian community life for years because we were prohibited from buying houses beyond downtown.

The Ventura neighborhood belonged to the Armenian community: Holy Trinity Armenian Apostolic Church, Ganimian’s Bakery, Valley Lavosh Bakery, Arax Market, Kazanjian Grocery, Maroot’s Signs, Kazanjian Shoe Repair, the Asbarez Newspaper, the Asbarez Cardroom and lunchroom, and now the Saroyan Theater.

The history of Ventura and California avenues have nothing to do with Caesar Chavez. As for Kings Canyon, the road leads to Kings Canyon National Park. Ignoring Fresno’s history does not sit well with those of us who grew up with this avenue being the center of our cultural heritage.

Does the City Council not value Fresno’s history?

Editing needed on signs about water

Question: Will the farmers who have perpetual signs on Highway 41 south of Fresno, which accuse Newsom, Pelosi, and Costa of causing the drought, will they change the word 'drought' to “flood”?

Curious minds want to know.

GOP must back gun laws for kids’ sake

Another mass shooting with three elementary schoolchildren. My own daughter went to a private religious kindergarten because her birthday did not allow her to start kindergarten in public school. Then she went to public school kindergarten through grade 12. I remember the three lockdowns for gun-carrying men during her tenure and the terror they brought families.

I urge my elected officials to call out the GOP. We need an assault weapons ban, background checks, magazines limited, age restrictions and red flag laws. The part of the Biden executive order must be used to expand the definition of guns in order to expand background checks for things such as ghost guns.

I am so furious at the Republicans that care more for guns than the lives of our children. We will not rest until lawmakers do the task they were sent to do — pass laws to protect our children from gun violence.

Pregnancy decisions are a woman’s alone

I’m a teen concerned about the worrying rise in abortion bans in the United States. It is my belief that any decision about the body, especially a woman’s body, is a relationship that should remain strictly with the patient and health-care provider.

The government intervention on bodily autonomy is horrendous and is an obvious overreach.

I fell that this rise is attributed to the lack of adequate sex ed. My parents are both medical provider,s so I have insight others may not. This ignorance is correlated and must be addressed. The amount of vulgar and disgusting comments I hear at school, especially from the boys, is a dangerous thing to witness, and I believe it isn’t getting the attention it needs.

Quotes so relevant to our times

“Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms.” — Aristotle.

“It’s not tyranny we desire; it’s a just, limited federal government.” — Alexander Hamilton.

“Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered.” — Thomas Paine.

“When plunder becomes a way of life, men create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.” — Fredric Bastiat.

“Excessive wealth in the hands of the few means extreme poverty, ignorance, vice and wretchedness as the lot of the many.” — President Rutherford B Hayes.

“A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both.” — President Dwight Eisenhower.

“When misguided public opinion honors what is despicable and despises what is honorable, punishes virtue and rewards vice, encourages what is harmful and discourages what is useful, applauds falsehood and smothers truth under indifference or insult, a nation turns its back on progress and can be restored only by the terrible lessons of catastrophe.” — Frederic Bastiat.

These are great quotes to remember!

This story was originally published April 16, 2023 at 5:30 AM with the headline "More Fresnans unhappy that Kings Canyon Road is getting renamed | Opinion."