On Monday morning, the City of Gainesville and the Martin Luther King Jr. Commission of Florida gathered at City Hall Plaza to celebrate the late reverend and unveil the redesigned memorial garden in his honor.
More than 200 people braved 40-degree temperatures to embrace and remember King’s values.
At 11 a.m., Mayor Harvey Ward and Rodney J. Long, president and founder of the MLK Commission of Florida, used gold scissors to cut the ribbon, ushering in a new chapter for the space.
Several elected officials and commission leaders spoke during the ceremony, including Ward and Long, who reflected on the decades-long partnership between the city and the commission.
Long said the relationship has been alive since 1984, when the commission first approached the Gainesville City Commission to request a partner for MLK celebration events and a space for a permanent memorial.
According to Long, the city provided the land at City Hall Plaza and promised to maintain the memorial in perpetuity, while the commission raised funds for the original monument, built in 1985.
“City commission did not hesitate in giving us that space,” Long said. “And I want to say, to the city of Gainesville, you have lived up to the promise.”
The mayor echoed the city’s deep-rooted history and emphasized its continued mission to support the memorial and the principles it stands for.
“When Dr. King talked about the arc of the moral universe bending toward justice, it only bends because we bend it,” Ward said.
This partnership was further recognized when the city received the President’s Award at the MLK Commission of Florida’s 42nd Annual Hall of Fame Gala on Jan. 10, an achievement that was highlighted again during Monday’s event. Although the honor is typically given to an individual, it was granted to an entity for the first time in the commission’s history.
The MLK Memorial Garden is part of a larger renovation of Gainesville’s City Hall Plaza, a space originally built in the 1960s. The plaza reconstruction was approved in 2023 to address maintenance issues with the ponds and to add green space, seating, landscaping and lighting to accommodate up to 2,400 people, according to the city’s website.
The $1.8 million redesign is funded by a 2019 city-issued revenue note to fund public projects and the Wild Spaces and Public Places surtax approved by voters in November 2022. The MLK Memorial Garden is the first phase of the project to be completed. The project broke ground on Oct. 14 and is scheduled for completion in April 2026.
Essence Davis, an Eastside High School student, was recognized as the 2026 Edna M. Hart Keeper of the Dream Scholarship Award recipient, and Diyonne L. McGraw, an education and community activist, was inducted into the MLK Hall of Fame. McGraw delivered the first remarks, addressing the crowd before the ceremony concluded.
For Gainesville residents, the MLK Memorial Garden is not only a symbol of hope and peace, but also a place designed to bring people together.
Jacquelyn Collins and Christina Overstreet attended the ceremony together, reflecting the unity the memorial represents.
Overstreet said she is grateful to Collins for helping her understand the significance of King’s legacy.
“I am very happy because I was fairly ignorant about Martin Luther King and everything, being raised in Germany,” Overstreet said. “And then it was good for me just to find a friend who is willing to spend the time to educate me and bring me along.”
Having attended MLK celebrations in Gainesville for the past three years, the two said the redesigned memorial feels more beautiful, accessible and inviting than before.
“It’s so much bigger, we were just crowded into this little space, and it was dark, and it felt so isolated,” Collins said. “But now this is open and welcoming, so people will notice it now because most people didn’t even know where it was.”
For Collins, a Gainesville native, the garden reflects an ongoing effort to strive for the freedom King envisioned.
“Martin was about bringing people together: Love was his mission,” Collins said.
For Overstreet, the memorial offers her hope. In what she described as current tensions in society, she believes this shows that unity is still possible.
Shariel Jones, a student at Santa Fe College, said the ceremony made her feel connected to something that will last over time and like “it will always be a part of [her] no matter what.”
Telisha Martin, a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, the oldest Black American women’s sorority in the country, said the memorial shows Gainesville’s commitment to nonviolence.
“I think it’s just important for our town, our county, to recognize the work that Martin Luther King does, and you do that best by investing in what the community is able to see,” Martin said.