After years of debate, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser joined the growing number of voices calling for the renaming of Woodrow Wilson High School in Northwest. News4’s Mark Segraves reports Bowser is launching a task force to see if there are other buildings that also need to be renamed.
After years of calls for the name of D.C.’s Woodrow Wilson High School to be changed, Mayor Muriel Bowser said for the first time Tuesday that she supports its removal.
In remarks Tuesday morning, Bowser said she stands with a growing number of people who say the name must go. She cited the former president’s “legacy of segregationist policies”
“We know the legacy of President Wilson. I think it has been appropriately disavowed,” Bowser said.
The debate on the name of the Northwest D.C. school has spanned years. Recently, current students have become the driving force behind the effort to change it.
Wilson grads Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady, of the bands Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna, came out in support of the name change too, as well as singer-songwriter Citizen Cope.
The mayor said she will engage the community in a discussion on Wilson High’s name. Also, she will form a task force to look at statues, street names and building names across the District.
