The Shelby County District Attorney’s Office held a special lighting ceremony Thursday, April 10, in honor of National Crime Victims’ Rights Week.

The four days of intense rainfall set a new record for the period in Memphis and raised the level of the Mississippi River at Memphis dramatically. 

After four years away, Mark Billingsley desires to return to the Shelby County Commission in 2026. He served on the commission from 2014 until 2022.

The Memphis City Council delayed indefinitely any decision on the proposed closings of two streets in Chickasaw Gardens, and environmental impacts of an xAI plant caused a riff in the body. 

“This is the rebuild and transformation of Frayser, but this is also a moment, a forerunner, of things to come,” said Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris, who first proposed building the school five years ago.

Shelby County Commissioners are still divided over whether their earlier no-confidence resolution in the Memphis-Shelby County Schools board led to plans to for a state takeover of the school system. 

As local groups push against xAI’s turbines as part of a fight against pollution, the Health Department director said she will schedule a public hearing on the permit for the company’s Southwest Memphis plant.

The Monday, March 31, County Commission meeting will be a busy one. On the agenda is an advisory board for Memphis-Shelby County Schools and a call for public hearings on xAI’s permitting process.

Although the resident contracted West Nile virus after they traveled to a region where its endemic, the case serves as a reminder to all residents to protect themselves against mosquito bites with the weather heating up. 

State Sen. Brent Taylor, R-Eads, and Senate leaders are asking the Tennessee Supreme Court to appoint a panel outside the legislature to investigate Shelby County District Attorney General Steve Mulroy. 

The HVAC issues have affected both the jail and the courthouse, according to statements from local officials.

“If we do nothing then we are really leaving ourselves at the will of the state,” said Commissioner Shante Avant. 

The May primary fields to succeed outgoing Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris could grow with no incumbent seeking reelection.

The comptroller’s report calls for greater transparency regarding criminal justice data. 

Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris has produced six letters, going back to April 2021, in which he asked the County Commission to vote on new ethics board members. 

The new pass is now available at Memphis libraries and community centers. It provides elementary students and their families free access to performances and events hosted by more than 30 local arts organizations.

While only two commissioners voted to get a raise, the panel showed more warmth to a proposed minimum-wage increase for county employees.

A proposed one-month moratorium on the Shelby County Board of Commissioners’ grant program was voted down, but the commission may change how grants are made. There could also changes to the ethics board. 

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The possible freeze, which follows the indictment of Commissioner Edmund Ford Jr. on bribery and tax evasion charges linked to grants, is one of the items on the March 17 agenda. 

The Shelby County Board of Commissioners stands by its decision to cap county funding for Regional One Health’s new campus, and it looks to a forensic audit of Memphis-Shelby County Schools.

Two Shelby County judgeships have been eliminated in the recent past rather than appointing new judges to the bench. 

State Sen. Brent Taylor, R-Eads, said the cost of the committee is “both justified and essential.”

David Pritchard, who is prosecuting the case, told Judge Thomas Parker he expects to hand over 80,000 pages of documents and 512 gigabytes of phone and computer records to Ford Jr.’s attorney Michael Scholl.

A Shelby County judge ruled Thursday, March 6, that the City of Memphis violated its contract with the Memphis Police Association when it created the controversial rank of 2nd Lieutenant. 

The grant program that allots each county commissioner $200,000 is at the heart of federal bribery and tax-evasion charges against Commissioner Edmund Ford Jr.