French city replaces JFK with Chirac in name of major street

PARIS (AP) — Farewell, JFK. Hello, Jacques Chirac.

A French town is changing the name of a major avenue, scrapping the name of late U.S. President John Fitzgerald Kennedy to honor a French president instead.

The city council in Brive-la-Gaillarde, a town in Chirac’s former fiefdom in central France, voted late Thursday to rename the street “Jacques and Bernadette Chirac,” after the president who served 1995-2007 and his wife.

Mayor Frederic Soulier said the city preferred to honor a couple who did a lot for the region rather than a foreign leader.

Bernadette Chirac said in a letter published by radio network France Bleu that the initiative “moves us a lot” and called it a “great honor.”

Chirac’s name is associated with a Paris museum but it’s the first street named after him.