Downtown street could be renamed to honor Ben Frazier

A street in Downtown Jacksonville soon could be renamed to honor the late Ben Frazier, founder of the Northside Coalition of Jacksonville.

City Council will consider a bill that would rename Confederate Street as Frazier Place, a recognition of Frazier’s tenacious efforts to eliminate Confederate monuments.

Council Member Jimmy Peluso introduced the bill July 23. In a post on X, he thanked the Northside Coalition and current leader Kelly Frazier “for allowing me to carry this bill to immortalize the name of Ben Frazier in our city.”

“He stood up for the little guy, fighting injustice and leading a community to stand up and demand more. Let’s do this,” Peluso wrote.

The 73-year-old Frazier died of cancer 13 months ago.

Kelly Frazier, his daughter, said she will be one of the voices heard when the bill faces committee review on Tuesday, then a public hearing Aug. 13 before the full council. She joined the coalition and the Springfield community in asking for the name change, and Peluso sponsored it, she said.

“It is a great thing that we are renaming Confederate Street to Frazier Place, because of the things my father did to fight against what Confederacy stood for,” Kelly Frazier said. “This is beyond an honor to rename the street from something that was so negative, that he fought so hard to bring that positivity, to say almost a thank you to him. It is phenomenal to me.”

The bill would rename Confederate Street between Hubbard Street and Liberty Street. The street ends at the eastern side of what used to be called Confederate Park at the Downtown/Springfield border. The park itself was renamed to Springfield Park in recent years.

In late December, Mayor Donna Deegan had the divisive “Tribute to the Women of the Southern Confederacy” statue removed from Springfield Park .

Ben Frazier was the first African American news anchor at WJXT-TV in 1979. The Raines High School graduate and Jacksonville native founded the Northside Coalition of Jacksonville to combat social, racial and economic injustice. His civil rights actions led to his receiving the NAACP’s Rutledge H. Pearson Civil Rights Award, and he spoke at the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in Switzerland.

Frazier also became a frequent critic at government meetings and spoke out loudly for removal of the 108-year-old statue in Springfield Park, to the point of being arrested in late 2022 after he refused to stop speaking during a City Council meeting.

Frazier also was briefly arrested in early 2022 when he tried to attend a news conference by Gov. Ron DeSantis at the state Department of Health facility in Jacksonville, where he decried DeSantis’ stance on COVID-19 measures.

Frazier died June 24, 2023, a day after he had turned 73. A few days later, more than 150 people remembered him at an emotional vigil at James Weldon Johnson Park . His daughter and many members of the Northside Coalition were among an audience in the same park where Frazier would stand and protest Confederate monuments.

Kelly Frazier said she will support the renaming bill at the same podium where her father spoke many times.

“It is always tough when I stand in the places that my father has stood, but it will be a task that I will take on happily, as everything else that I have in his absence,” Kelly Frazier said. “I will be happy to go to the podium and to express the need and why this should be changed to Frazier Place.”

The bill to change the street name was reviewed and recommended in advance by the city’s 911 Emergency Addressing Advisory Committee on March 6. The Historic Preservation Commission endorsed it March 27, saying that it would be consistent and compatible with the city’s Ordinance Code.

The bill waives part of the Ordinance Code, which requires that the honoree of a street renaming be deceased at least five years.

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