Question: What is covered by the $60,000 in the budget related to street renamings? Did the City provide any financial support to businesses or residents impacted by the renaming of what is now Richmond Highway? (Councilman McPike)

Response: 

The City Manager’s plan currently is to utilize the requested funding to rename three streets per year, two smaller streets and one larger street.  The $60,000 will cover the costs to manufacture the new signage. 

Transportation & Environmental Services (T&ES) has calculated $164,000 in signage manufacturing costs for 41 streets (no labor), or approximately $4,000 per segment. However, this cost is heavily weighted by three street segments with significant amounts of signage: Beauregard (21 signs), Van Dorn (30 signs), and Pickett (16 signs). The cost of these three streets is also higher due to the number of illuminated signs associated with these segments. T&ES estimates these three larger segments could have signage manufacturing costs ranging from $16,000 -$44,000 each. The $60,000 requested should cover one of these large streets and two smaller streets per year. The labor required for the installation of the new signs will be absorbed by T&ES as part of their workload.

This past year, an additional 27 streets were identified in the City that may have been named after Confederate generals, soldiers, or political figures.   Additional research needs to be done to determine the origin of each name, so these are not included in the total costs currently.  Staff will update the costs as needed, depending on the findings.

There is additional work required to successfully complete the street name changes that occurs in the Planning and Zoning (P&Z) and Information Technology Services (ITS) departments.  These opportunity costs will be absorbed in the departments’ normal workloads and are not included in the $60,000 request.

There is no record of any financial support provided to businesses or residents impacted by the renaming of what is now Richmond Highway. The June 6, 2018, City docket item explaining the process for changing the name of Jefferson Davis Highway to Richmond Highway included the following statement: “A change in street name will primarily impact residents and businesses on Jefferson Davis Highway, who will likely need to replace stationery and marketing materials, update vendors with new contact information, and in some cases, replace signage. Staff has confirmed with the Clerk of Circuit Court that because deeds use legal descriptions to identify properties, it is not necessary for owners to update their deeds when street addresses change. Most physical address signage includes only the street number, which the recommendation does not suggest changing.”

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