Ten days since sexual abuse allegations were disclosed in a chilling New York Times investigation against farmworkers rights advocate César Chávez, the race to erase his name and likeness from public life is moving at a breakneck pace.

Municipal governments and agencies from the Bay Area to Phoenix, Denver and Texas are removing statues, renaming his holiday (March 31) and cutting mentions from history classes and beyond.

While action has been quick in removing Chávez’s name, there has been plenty of debate on how best to move forward.

A similar process played out a few years back in Burbank, when a student-led investigation propelled the changing of David Starr Jordan Middle School to, coincidentally, farm labor leader Dolores Huerta.

Four years removed, the school’s former principal, Jennifer Meglemre, and a former Burbank Unified Board of Education member, Steve Frintner, have advice for those not sure how to navigate a controversial name change.

Burbank name change background

In early 2018, Jordan student Ixchel Sanchez Jimenez investigated her school’s namesake as part of a class project.

What she found led her and her mother, Laura Jimenez, to push for a name change in May 2018.

Jordan was known for being the founding president of Stanford University and a famed ichthyologist, or fish scientist.

But he was also a believer and supporter of eugenics, a system of controlled breeding and separation of certain people to increase the chances for desirable heritable characteristics. It was a belief espoused by the Nazis.

University of Vermont associate professor and historian Lutz Kaelber estimated that roughly 20,000 people in California deemed undesirable were forcibly sterilized until 1964 due to eugenics policies. Most were sterilized because they were believed to be mentally ill or mentally deficient.

The name-changing process

Burbank Unified set up committees to debate the topic, first to decide whether there should be a name change, and then what the new name should be.

The committees took input from students, teachers, administrators and community members.

Frintner said it was critical not to rush the decision and allow for thorough conversations.

“It’s important to make sure you’re giving people in the community a voice because they want to feel a part of this process,” Frintner said.

After agreeing to drop Jordan, Burbank Unified’s renaming process centered on a few considerations: should the school replace David Starr with another notable Jordan (Texas lawmaker Barbara Jordan), should the school be named after another individual or something less contentious like a tree or a street.

Those decisions mirror the current Chávez debate. Los Angeles is changing César Chávez Day to Farm Worker’s Day, while some advocates, including former farmworkers, are asking that Chávez be replaced with Dolores Huerta, the civil rights leader who fought alongside the man who allegedly raped her.

Resistance to change

Meglemre said resistance to the school name change came from all sides: from those not wanting to drop Jordan and others who did not want the school renamed for a living person.

“The discussions were about how people are flawed and we don’t want to get into a situation where something is named after a person still alive and something terrible ends up happening,” Meglemre said.

After three years of debate, hampered in part by COVID-19, the committee settled on Dolores Huerta. (César Chávez was never a top contender.)

“Almost all the schools in Burbank are named after a person and we wanted to continue that tradition,” Meglemre said.

Frintner said the district committees wanted to choose someone with Southern California ties and was either a minority or a woman.

Last piece of advice

Meglemre said that while there was heated debate and pushback from community members, after a couple of years, most people “moved on with their lives.”

Frintner believes more research is always a positive.

“My advice is make sure you’re doing as much background as possible,” he said. “You do want to honor people but you don’t want to be in a position where you’re having a hard time defending your decisions.”

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Residents in the San Gabriel Valley are contending with a dramatic surge in black flies, a painful little pest known for biting around the eyes and necks of people and pets.

The San Gabriel Valley Mosquito and Vector Control District issued a warning this week advising residents of a spike in black fly activity in foothill communities including Altadena, Azusa, Bradbury, Duarte, Glendora, Monrovia, San Dimas and Sierra Madre. The flies develop quickly in flowing waters, where females will lay 200 to 500 fertilized eggs at a time.

“Black flies are currently very active in the San Gabriel Valley, and many residents are feeling overwhelmed,” the district said in a statement. “Right now, populations are increasing due to favorable conditions, and black flies can travel up to five miles from where they emerge, which is why they’re being seen throughout the community.”

The district is treating river breeding sites to reduce populations, but warns this might take several weeks to take effect.

In the meantime, residents are advised to take protective measures such as wearing long pants and long sleeves and using protective netting over one’s face. People should also consider using DEET-containing repellent on exposed skin and turning off personal water features such as decorative fountains for 24 hours once a week, according to the district.

The bugs, measuring two to three millimeters, are so small they can be hard to see. Still, their bite can pack a painful punch.

Azusa resident Constance Yu described the persistent bugs as “like little demons but tiny,” while she swatted away the critters during an interview with CBS News this week.

Though the flies cause discomfort, they are not known to transmit diseases in L.A. County, according to the vector control district.

Spikes in black fly activity are often caused by scheduled water releases from upstream dams, which are necessary for the region’s water management but also create ideal breeding conditions for the pests.

The district monitors and sprays pesticides at breeding sites — including local rivers, streams and locations such as Morris Dam — and sets traps in foothill communities to track the population size and minimize the effects on residents.

This time last year, surveillance traps had single-digit counts of black flies. Now they are capturing more than 500 flies at a time, district spokesperson Anais Medina Diaz told LAist.

Diaz also said it is usual to see such so much fly activity this time of year, noting that the uptick is probably connected to the recent record-setting heat wave. Southern California is experiencing the hottest March on record, leading to a surge in snow runoff from the mountains.

“We are experiencing them now because of the warmer temperatures we’ve been having,” Diaz said. “And of course, all the water that’s going down through the river, we have a high flow of water that is not typical for this time of year.”

The black flies are not the only troublesome creature acting up during the unseasonably warm weather.

The Southland has also seen more rattlesnakes, with two recent human fatalities, as the early heat draws more serpents onto hiking trails. Toasty ocean temperatures have been linked to a great white shark sighting in Newport Beach that prompted a temporary beach closure Thursday.