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City Council President Pushes To Rename LA Street After Obama

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com/AP) -- The president of the Los Angeles City Council hopes to rename a street in his district for former President Barack Obama.

Councilman Herb J. Wesson Jr. on Tuesday introduced a motion to change the name of Rodeo Road to Obama Boulevard.

"Nine years ago I had the honor of introducing then Senator Obama at his first campaign rally held at Rancho Cienega Park on Rodeo Road", Wesson wrote on social media.

If approved, the name change would be applied to a roughly 3.5-mile stretch of Rodeo between Arlington Avenue and Jefferson Boulevard along the Culver City/South L.A. border.

Wesson notes that his district already has boulevards named Washington, Adams and Jefferson, and the new name would recognize the legacy of the nation's 44th president.

As a senator, Obama held his first Los Angeles presidential campaign rally at Rancho Cienega Park on Rodeo Road.

Wesson is the first African-American to hold the position of Los Angeles City Council president.

Rodeo Road - located between Baldwin Hills and Crenshaw - is unrelated to Beverly Hills' famous Rodeo Drive luxury shopping district.

It's not the first plan to honor the former president on a Southern California thoroughfare: last month, the California State Senate backed a plan to rename a stretch of the 134 Freeway in the Eagle Rock area after Obama, who attended Occidental College in Eagle Rock in 1979.

(© Copyright 2017 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

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