Ask and ye shall receive, goes the saw, only this time it came in spades. 
-The world famous Dicks Street sign at the West Hollywood/Beverly Hills border. Photo by Ryan Gierach. |
By way of asking the City council to reverse itself to allow Dicks Street residents to change the street name so many of them find troublesome, Michael Fisk urged respect for democracy. He didn’t expect the amount of respect his urgings would receive, however.
“I appeal to you to respect the democratic process, in particular to honor wishes of the majority of Dicks Street residents who are in favor of improving our street name,” he said at the February 21, 2006 Council meeting. “[My neighbors elected me] to express the importance to [you] on our daily lives the hassles, embarrassments, harassment and frustrations of living on our street.”
-The world famous Dicks Street sign at the West Hollywood/Beverly Hills border. Photo by Ryan Gierach. |
The issue came before council in early November 2005 (see City Council Lashes Out At Leashes) but was roundly dismissed as a dangerous precedent, too expensive and too troublesome. Council member John Duran disliked the idea of setting a precedent for changing street names. “What if someone wanted to change their street’s name for publicity purposes?”
Jeff Prang cited the expense and the trouble such an undertaking would entail as reasons for his opposition. “It’s a hugely expensive process involving changes to every map,” he said. “every legal document for every household on the street, and every municipal and governmental agency. If we do this I hope we make it as onerous a process as we can make it.”
Mr. Fisk is no stranger to fighting against major interests to improve his neighborhood’s appearance and “feel.” He led the battle to tamp down the industrial-strength lighting at the end of Dicks Street at Doheny (see Illuminating WeHo Code Enforcement)
Knowing that the most commonly made argument against using Dicks Street as a jumping off point for setting the precedent for changing street names - “People knew what the name of the street was when they moved there” –Mr. Fisk came back three months later with a refined, and to council at least, compelling, argument for that.
He also came prepared to refute all the other arguments against allowing a street name change in WeHo, and did so one by one, beginning with the “knowledge that they knew what they were getting into” argument.
“Yes, we are aware of the street’s name when we buy the houses,” he said, “but no one can possibly imagine, before they experience it, how grinding it is to hear snide, rude remarks made daily by package deliverers or shop clerks or [nearly anyone we deal with who require an address]. It wears you down.”
-The world famous Dicks Street sign at the West Hollywood/Beverly Hills border. Photo by Ryan Gierach. |
Mayor Pro Tem John Heilman responded by admitting that he had been of precisely that mindset. “I’ve been one of those people whose thinking has been, ‘didn’t they know the name of the street when they moved in?’, but hearing [what has been said here] tonight,” Mr. Heilman said, “I can understand people moving in to a street and…realizing [after the fact] the affects is has on them with the kinds of remarks they might get.”
Another of the arguments cited in November’s down vote was the complexity and expense of changing a street name in a major urban city. His refutation came in the form of correspondence with a set of residents in Connecticut, the former hamlet of Hooker, now proudly known as Stonebrook, CT.
Mr. Fisk had sent the community a survey. “In [the] survey we sent them they said there were virtually no city and resident costs. The hassles outweighed the benefits of changing the street name.” He said that they noted there was little of the “confusion” predicted by opponents here after their street’s name was changed.
And facing the precedent issue head on, Mr. Fisk said, “Another argument is that pandemonium will ensue if citizens are allowed to change street names because [people and corporations] will be requesting the city change names on streets left and right.”
-The world famous Dicks Street sign at the West Hollywood/Beverly Hills border. Photo by Ryan Gierach. |
He pointed out that the City of Los Angeles, among many others, already have processes in place that allow residents to successfully petition for street name change. “We have found no such resulting chaos,” Mr. Fisk said.
He began the campaign to change his home’s street name last year, and this time came supported by another neighbor who weighed in on the difficulty of living with a Dicks Street address.
“A long time ago my wife divorced me and moved away,” John Dullaghan, a Dicks Street resident for 23 years declared.
“I think maybe she didn’t like the name of the street,” he opined. “Anyway, my son has been bothering me to do something about the name of the street for years. ‘Come on, Dad, do something; Dicks Street, come on,’ he says to me,” Mr. Delehan told the public.
Council member John Duran spoke at length about Mr. Fisk’s request, as he’d met earlier in the week with him and had heard even more detail from him then. He said he understood the frustrations and irritations of the residents, but was cognizant of the fact that, as he said, “In my experience…we’ll get a dozen people who want change and we’ll try to do something…and then we get twelve people from the other side who are opposed to [it].
-The world famous Dicks Street sign at the West Hollywood/Beverly Hills border. Photo by Ryan Gierach. |
“I think the streets in the Norma Triangle: Dicks, Cynthia, Lloyd, Norma, were all named after silent screen stars of the 1920s. That’s part of the history of the area, as opposed to being about male genitalia. The name goes way back to the town of Sherman, and has been in place for a very long time. [The name] may actually be something you’d be quite proud of.”
Mr. Heilman helped give Mr. Fisk his wish when he too supported the idea of investigating opening up a process by which a street name could be changed, but he also gave Mr. Fisk another of his wishes, and in spades, when he suggested that a first step in that process be a city-wide survey on the name change, not just a mere polling of Dicks Street residents. “We need to send out a survey to all residents so that we get a sense of the [citizens’ wishes], like when we do permit parking in a neighborhood.”
Mayor Land brought the short but important discussion to a close by saying, “We can give staff direction to develop such a [survey] process, but along with that we should also analyze the [potential] historical significance of the name of the street.”
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