Recent events have confirmed my suspicions: Muncie is divided like a Pizza King pizza, but it's harder to swallow. (I get the corner pieces.)
Residents of Muncie's Whiteley area and their supporters have been pushing for Broadway Avenue to be renamed to honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., according to The Star Press of Muncie (http://www.thestarpress.com).
Since the issue has gone public, long dormant (read: unspoken, ignored, forgotten -- take your pick) racial tension has resurfaced in the Muncie area.
With a train overpass named for King, many Muncie residents think that's enough -- but to others, it's no honor. Downtown alleys get more attention.
Well, depending on your definition of "attention." Vandals recently renamed the overpass "Martin Luther Koon Blvd.," using strategically placed decals on the sign.
That act alone should justify renaming Broadway.
It's not all racial, though. Local business owners are concerned about possible address changes. Janice Wagner, who owns an insurance business off Broadway, expressed concerns about getting her mail.
"It is very serious to me," Wagner was quoted as saying in The Star Press. "It is not a race thing."
Maybe not to Wagner, but let's see what some local government employees and politicians think.
During a Muncie City Council meeting, Bonnie Adams, a county engineer's office employee, used a racial epithet to describe African-Americans.
Adams told a Star Press reporter that she said, "Those people are acting like [insert slur here]." She has since been disciplined.
During a hearing on the Broadway renaming proposal, Muncie City Council member Mary Jo Barton was chastised for repeated use of the phrase "you people" when addressing local blacks.
Phyllis Bartleson, director of the Muncie Human Rights Commission, had to ask Barton to stop.
"I don't mean to say it," Barton said in The Star Press.
Tax dollars sure go to some strange places around here.
To be fair, not everyone has sensitivity problems with blacks. Take local Republican Mike Dague, for example.
Dague, a candidate for a city council at-large seat, recently described his south-side Democratic opponents as "hillbillies."
No fooling, folks. This is all in the local paper.
Area Democrat Dan Taylor responded.
"It has been my general experience that this is the general feeling of north side Republicans who think south Muncie is a bunch of rednecks," Taylor said in The Star Press. He added a remark about Muncie's longtime division between north and south.
North and south, black and white, Bearcat and Rebel, Democrat and Republican -- funny how those opposites perpetuate. Sadly, local thinking has evolved little in the 35 years since King's murder.
A long-awaited step toward racial harmony is worth an address change. People gave their lives just so blacks could eat with whites. Cough up the money for some new stationery.
Community harmony is worth requiring all local government employees to complete sensitivity training. Muncie isn't Montgomery, Ala., nor should it appear so. Taxpayers and voters deserve better.
Maybe someday Muncie residents will talk professionally and maturely, without emotions and deep-seeded resentment getting in the way.
Maybe someday color, school, party, railroad tracks and a filthy river won't divide Muncie.
With a city council mostly opposed to progress, that kind of idealism just doesn't appear viable.
That's the trouble with dreams. Reality is a big, powerful opponent.
But it can be overcome.
Write to John at kingseyeland@bsu.edu
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