San Antonio’s César E. Chávez Boulevard will soon revert to Durango Boulevard after City Council approved a measure to remove the disgraced civil rights leader from city street signs. The Thursday, August 20 decision was unanimous.
The vote came after an explosive March New York Times exposé alleged the late organizer abused and raped multiple girls and women, including his United Farmworkers (UFW) cofounder Dolores Huerta. The multi-year investigation caused an immediate quake in civil rights circles with UFW pulling out of César Chávez Day events.
Councilmembers Teri Castillo (D5) and Jalen McKee-Rodriguez (D2) quickly called for the boulevard to be renamed, which prompted community input efforts, including a public survey and two listening sessions. Of 18,029 responses to the survey, 64 percent favored reverting to Durango, a figure that increased to 79 percent among residents actually living on the corridor.
According to the city, 295 addresses — changed to César E. Chávez in 2011 — will need to be changed on the stretch from Southwest 36th Street to South Hackberry Street. Installation will cost around $ 374,700, largely for installation of city and state roadway signs. Castillo had previously proposed redirecting the 2026 César Chávez March’s $200,000 budget toward covering resident costs.
Updated signs will include 58 pole signs, 15 highway signs, 31 overhead signs, and a frontage sign. City signage is expected to revert back to Durango within two months; Texas Department of Transportation signs have a slower expected timeframe of a year.
San Antonio is not the only major Texas city grappling with the fallout from the abuse allegations. On May 27, Houston City Council unanimously approved the renaming of its César Chávez Boulevard in honor of MSG Joe E. Ramirez. Dallas and Austin are still reckoning with the issue, with the Capitol City currently in the public input stage. However, two artworks depicting Chávez, a mural and a University of Texas statue, have been removed.
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