The seats honoring Parks stand out with a yellow seat covering that reads "Dedicated to the Memory of Rosa Parks." The seats will debut on some local buses, including the Metro Park & Ride, METRORapid, METRORail and METROLift. 

METRO CHANGES: COVID, security concerns have Metro eyeing glass partitions to divide bus drivers, riders

"The national day of action recognizes her act of defiance, strength, and dignity while promoting access to and investment in public transportation as a civil right and strategy to combat climate change," Metro officials said in the release.

The announcement has received mixed reviews on social media, however, with some calling the commemorative seats "disrespectful and disturbing." 

"This is no tribute it’s ignorance and a slap (in the) face towards Rosa Parks and African Americans," one Twitter user commented. "To simply reduce her fight to a yellow seat. CRT is obviously needed in Texas." 

One person's tweet criticizing the seats for not being adequate enough to honor the sacrifices African Americans made went viral, earning more than 150,000 likes in less than a day. 

Jeanne Theoharis, a political science professor at Brooklyn College whose biography "The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks" won a 2014 NAACP Image Award, says the gesture by Metro Houston may have been well-intentioned, but ultimately felt toothless. 

"I think things like seat covers and statues are comfortable ways of honoring Rosa Parks because they don't ask anything of us in the present.  Rosa Parks to the end of her life in 2005 was insistent that the struggle for racial justice wasn't over and there was much more work to be done," Theoharis said.

"What would have been a more fitting honor would be for Houston's public transit authority to have used the seat cover money to inaugurate a program in her honor for free public transportation cards for poor people — or joined a public campaign to let Texas' Senators Cruz and Cornyn know that they were defacing Rosa Parks' memory when they helped block the voting rights bill last month, since she also fought for decades for voting rights," she said. 

Metro Houston provided the Chronicle with the following statement: 

"METRO embarked on this initiative after one of our customers saw a similar tribute to Rosa Parks on a San Antonio VIA bus and asked if we would consider doing something similar. Tributes to Parks can also be found on transit vehicles and properties across the country.  We honor her act of defiance and demand to be treated with dignity which changed the course of history in the fight for civil rights.  The commemorative seat being installed at the front of our vehicles is symbolic… It’s a symbol of courage, equity, and justice.  We respect the fact that this gesture has sparked an important conversation on social media about social and economic opportunities for all. At METRO, every day is Transit Equity Day which is why we offer discounted fares for students, seniors and those living with a disability, free fares for older seniors and veterans, and free rides to the courthouse for jurors or to the polls during elections."