Utah's capital already has named streets after two other civil-rights icons - Martin Luther King Jr. (600 South) and Cesar Chavez (500 South) - and even after basketball hero John Stockton (300 West).

Soon, you might be able to take Stockton (Drive) to Malone (Drive). With the Utah Jazz about to retire the basketball superstar's jersey, Mayor Rocky Anderson wants the city to add Karl Malone Drive to 100 South between 300 West and 400 West.

So who else might deserve their name plastered on a boulevard, avenue, parkway, street, road, drive or alley?

Lee Martinez, the former Salt Lake City councilman who led the charge to name a segment of 500 South after labor legend Chavez in 2002, has two suggestions: Francisco Dominguez and Silvestre Escalante, the famed Franciscan friars who in 1776 became the first Europeans to explore Utah.

Michael Styles, director of black affairs in the Utah Governor's Office of Culture, is thinking of someone closer to home for the honor as he reaches for a phone book to look up the new address of Salt Lake City's Calvary Baptist Church, where the Rev. France Davis has preached for the past three decades.

"He's a bridge builder in our community," Styles says.

"I'd also have to say that a portion of 12th North should be named after Alberta Henry. She's the Rosa Parks of our community."

Henry, a schoolteacher who died last year, came to Utah in 1949 and ended up being the longest-tenured leader of the Salt Lake chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Other possibilities are Terry Williams, Utah's first black state senator, and the late Pete Suazo, a Latino community leader who became a powerful and articulate voice in Utah's Legislature.

"Suazo is a slam dunk," Styles says.

Edith Mitko, director of Asian affairs for the state, has a list of nearly a dozen Utah Asian-Americans who might qualify, including former 3rd District Judge Raymond Uno.

"There are many people locally who are deserving of such an honor. It would be difficult to choose," she says. "However, the other people that come to mind like Gandhi or the Dalai Lama, it seems, are too revered that it would almost be disrespectful to name a street after them."

Salt Lake City Councilman Carlton Christensen anticipates more street-name changes to surface but agrees that selecting locals could prove troublesome.

"If their stories didn't play out on national TV, it might be difficult to agree," he said.

The process itself isn't all that hard.

"You raise the money to pay for the street signs and get the approval of the Planning Commission and the City Council," Martinez says, "and you can name a street after anyone you want."

The name changes are honorary. Neither the post office nor the telephone directory acknowledges the new street designations, allaying fears that Brigham Young's renowned numbered street grid for Salt Lake City would fall by the wayside.

For the record, West Valley City and West Jordan also are naming streets after Rosa Parks, whose refusal to yield her seat to a white person on an Alabama bus in 1955 galvanized the civil-rights movement.

"What she did," Christensen says, "was an act of courage that can be felt in Salt Lake City and every other city in America."

lorib@sltrib.com

Parks is in, Malone still up in air

* Rosa Parks Boulevard: The Salt Lake City Council and YouthCity Government will mark the naming of Rosa Parks Boulevard (on 200 East from South Temple to 600 South) in a celebration Wednesday at 4 p.m. in the Urban Room of the Main Library, 200 E. 400 South.

l Karl Malone Drive: Salt Lake City will stage an open house Monday to discuss adding Karl Malone Drive to 100 South between 300 West and 400 West. The gathering will be in Room 118 at City Hall, 451 S. State, from 4:30 to 6 p.m.

l Cast your vote: Who else deserves roads named in their honor? Send your ideas to streetnames@sltrib.com.