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 3909 articles by Bill Dries :
Former Republican state Senator and Juvenile Court Judge Curtis Person Jr. died Friday at the age of 85. He began his political career as a Democratic state Representative and ended it 48 years later with a single term as one of only three elected Juvenile Court Judges in Shelby County over the past 55 years.
Here are some of the key dates in the MLGW-TVA saga over the last eight decades, starting with Nov. 6, 1934.
The political boss believed in public ownership of utilities from the dawn of his considerable influence over the city when he was a city commissioner. And Crump saw private owners of such utilities as political adversaries.
Memphis has left the Tennessee Valley Authority before, for a period that included the city building its own electric power plant. There are a lot of similarities between various turbulent chapters in the city's relationship with TVA as MLGW leaders again consider an exit from the federal agency.
The pastor of Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church thinks the first part of Mayor Jim Strickland’s effort to reform the Memphis Police Department didn’t go far enough.
The seven public school systems in Shelby County opened in one way or another before the Labor Day weekend with plans that vary to some degree.
The proposal would ban the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office from getting camouflage uniforms and bayonets from surplus federal military stocks as well as militarized and weaponized vehicles or aircraft.
The state's changes are in line with changing guidance from federal health officials. And they have already been adopted by the independent county health departments in the state's major cities, including Memphis.
Mayor Jim Strickland rolled out a 13-member group Wednesday, Sept. 2, to make what he termed “substantive, realistic and measurable” recommendations on police reform. It's the second phase of the administration's effort and includes some critics of City Hall's response thus far.
The Memphis Light, Gas and Water Division board could have a decision in two weeks on the firm that will oversee the next steps in deciding whether to stay with the Tennessee Valley Authority.
The tentative plan by the city parks and neighborhoods division includes mountain-bike trails around the borders of the 18-hole golf course and walking trails with workout equipment.
The Germantown Republican says he thinks mail-in absentee voting could be manipulated and said recent changes in postal service began during the Obama administration.
The approval of the ordinance Tuesday is part of the council's larger debate about the Black Lives Matter Movement. Several other resolutions from that larger discussion were also approved by the council.
The announcement came Tuesday as Memphis City Council members called for a better accounting of the various funds that help those behind on utility bills.
The council has two final votes scheduled as part of its ongoing discussion of police reform and a discussion of a third measure to create an online portal for the public to see some details of complaints of police misconduct.
The Daily Memphian Politics Podcast recaps some events from the past week and some of the recently certified election results are cause to go looking through some numbers from the historic 1991 city elections.
On "Behind The Headlines," the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate says she's raised 10 times more money since she won the August primary statewide. Bradshaw touts an alternative path back to the U.S. Senate in Tennessee for Democrats that relies on community organizers and their networks.
Using FedExForum as a gigantic polling location for the November election would be like “shooting flies with cannon balls,” Shelby County Elections Administrator Linda Phillips said Friday, Aug. 28.
Word of the commission comes the same week that a federal task force shot and wounded a teenager while serving a warrant in a case of mistaken identity.
President Donald Trump called earlier this month for changes at the top of TVA including Lyash. But after Thursday's board meeting in Knoxville, new board chairman John Ryder of Memphis said there are no plans to oust Lyash.
West qualified for the Tennessee presidential ballot this week with two members of the Ford family among those who signed from Memphis. The effort also included signatures from the Nashville and Clarksville areas.
Thousands of people began to contact MLGW Friday and Monday to work out payment plans, overwhelming the utility's phone bank and creating long lines outside branch offices.
The latest edition of our scorecard looks at several moves in the hiring freeze and what the rejection of a convenience store on East Holmes Road could mean for similar businesses in the rest of the county.