US city votes to rename street as ‘Dalai Lama Avenue’

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Richmond, a city in western Contra Costa County of the US state of California, has decided to rename a part of its Huntington Avenue as ‘Dalai Lama Avenue’. (Photo courtesy: TANC)

(TibetanReview.net, Oct04’19) – Richmond, a city in western Contra Costa County of the US state of California, has decided to rename a part of its Huntington Avenue as ‘Dalai Lama Avenue’. The decision was taken by unanimous vote on Oct 1 by the Richmond City Council. On July 16, the Richmond council had declared July 6 as ‘Dalai Lama Day’ to honour the exile Tibetan spiritual leader on his 84th birthday, reported richmondstandard.com Oct 2.

The renamed section roughly covers one-block stretch of Huntington between Columbia Avenue and San Joaquin Street (just west of Interstate Highway 80), the report said.

A sign for the new name will be installed in the next few weeks, prior to a day of recognition for the Dalai Lama, the report said.

The report said the Tibetan Association of Northern California (TANC), which operates a cultural centre on the block that, in part, is used for classes teaching children Tibetan language and culture, had requested the street name change. It added that TANC also had a temple on Barrett Avenue.

The name change is expected to make finding the TANC centre easier.

Leaders from the TANC were stated to have expressed gratitude to the council, mayor, the Recreation and Parks Commission and neighbors for supporting the street renaming.

Besides, Councilmember Eduardo Martinez was quoted as saying, following a door-knocking effort in the neighborhood to fetch input from residents, “Only one or two had no opinion, and everyone else was very strongly in favour of the name change.”

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