Reporter
Bill Dries covers city and county government and politics. He is a native Memphian and has been a reporter for almost 50 years covering a wide variety of stories from the 1977 death of Elvis Presley and the 1978 police and fire strikes to numerous political campaigns, every county mayor and every Memphis Mayor starting with Wyeth Chandler.
There are 3973 articles by Bill Dries :
The temporary fix of cart paths on the golf course could wait to get a feel for what a larger makeover similar to that underway on the Overton Park golf course might involve.
Memphis could soon have a daily reminder that we don’t have “time for things with no soul.”
The council also approved a new seven-year lease between the city and the Withers Collection Inc., which has been behind on its rent.
The council approved the larger Crosstown overlay district without the 9-acre mound Tuesday, May 4, in the first of several votes on the blueprint for control of design standards by the Memphis Landmarks Commission.
Cerelyn “C.J.” Davis became the new leader of the Memphis Police Department Tuesday, May 4, in a council vote that was almost unanimous.
On Tuesday, both sides in the pipeline dispute agreed to put their actions on hold until July.
What began as a more general ban of underground pipelines in the city is now a specific ordinance that allows existing underground infrastructure to be grandfathered in. It also allows companies to seek exceptions from the council to the ban.
The Tuesday, May 4, council day includes a possible vote on the nomination of C.J. Davis to be the new police chief. And the council has a proposal to change eviction set-outs 16 years after its last attempt to bring some order to the process.
A budget committee meeting Monday, May 3, drew 12 of the 13 council members together at City Hall for the first time since mid-March of 2020. The in-person meetings continue Tuesday with a full slate of committee meetings before the 3:30 p.m. session of the council.
Douglas Emhoff and Labor Secretary Marty Walsh are among a blitz by the administration to promote President Joe Biden’s $4 trillion “American Jobs Plan.”
The retreat Saturday, May 1, marks the first in-person council meeting in more than a year. It included new details of $16 million in bonuses to city employees in Mayor Jim Strickland’s $716 million budget proposal and a flap over whether team-building exercises and a tour of the Renasant Convention Center were open to reporters.
City Council budget committee Chairman Worth Morgan said that the drop of the city property tax rate below $3 as appraised values have increased could set the stage for a tax rate hike.
Memphis Police Chief nominee Cerelyn “C.J.” Davis met the public on a limited basis Friday, April 30, during a one-hour online Q&A session with screened written questions.
On “Behind The Headlines,” the incoming CEO of the Downtown Memphis Commission says federal pandemic relief funding due the city will likely make up the loss. The drop in sales tax revenue for the TDZ comes as sales tax revenues across the city have exceeded bleak projections at the outset of the pandemic.
Members to meet Downtown for budget retreat.
With much of the plan already outlined well before Wednesday’s speech, reaction from the city’s two congressmen and the state’s two U.S. senators was set along partisan lines. There was a social media blitz by all during President Joe Biden’s remarks.Related story:
The offer to talk came Tuesday, April 27, at a Memphis Rotary forum at which the pipeline companies and the most visible pipeline critic each spoke. Proposals are pending before the council that would require more local approval.
The federal class action lawsuit was filed in 2016, a month after a new computer system was installed by the county to track the movement of pre-trial detainees through the criminal justice system.
The City Council Scorecard focuses on a short-lived plan to give old police motorcycles to Collierville, a first vote on a pipeline measure and qualms about setting a minority business percentage.
The proposal by Assessor Melvin Burgess would have moved the cycle of countywide property reappraisals for taxation purposes from once every four years to every other year.
The commission also approved a $161,250 contract renewal with Global Tel*Link Corp. for maintenance and licensing of the telephone and video communications system at the Shelby County Jail.
Cary Vaughn is the new chairman of the Shelby County Republican Party as Democrats outline a long-term data-driven strategy and the county’s only Republican elected official opens her re-election campaign.
The commission delayed two earlier votes on moving to an every-other-year cycle for property reappraisals from the current four-year cycle.
Memphis has an emergency contract with Team Waste in Area E, probably until the end of 2021. In the interim, officials are considering whether to keep using a private waste company to manage the area or expand city services to cover it. Related stories:
The solid waste route system covering Cordova, Hickory Hill and East Memphis began as a first step toward privatizing all city solid waste collections during the tenure of a different mayor. Related stories: City faces critical decision on one of its most basic services