* Warning: This is an unofficial, introductory copy of the bill.
The official copy considered by the City Council is the first reader copy.
Introductory*
City of Baltimore
Council Bill
Introduced by: Councilmember Costello
A Bill Entitled
An Ordinance concerning
title
City Property - Renaming Riverside Park Pool to the Congressman Elijah E. Cummings Community Pool
For the purpose of changing the name of Riverside Park Pool, located at 1800 Covington Street (Block 1940, Lot 001), to the Congressman Elijah E. Cummings Community Pool.
body
By authority of
Article 5 - Finance, Property, and Procurement
Section 20-2
Baltimore City Code
(Edition 2000)
Recitals
Elijah E. Cummings, the longtime United States Representative for much of Baltimore City, grew up in Sharp-Leadenhall in South Baltimore. As a child, Cummings would join other youths playing in the wading pool at the Sharp Street Community Center. The small pool was not sufficient for the community it was serving. One day in 1962 the center’s recreation leader, Jim Smith, gathered up some two dozen Black youth including Cummings and walked down to Riverside Park Pool.
In the wake of 1954's Brown v. Board of Education, both Maryland Governor Theodore McKeldin and Baltimore City Mayor Tommy D’Alesandro issued executive orders integrating public facilities, but in practice, the Riverside Park Pool was whites only. As the Sharp Street swimmers used Riverside Park’s pool over several days, as many as 1,000 white protestors flooded the area, hurling insults, rocks, and bottles. One of those bottles hit the young Elijah, resulting in a scar he would carry with him for the rest o...
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