Here is all of the information you need to participate in the first local election of 2023. 

Emmy award-winning entertainers Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle are set to co-headline their first show at the FedExForum.

Defining Midtown is perhaps the key question of Memphis geography, in part because it helps define the rest of the core city. If Midtown is encased by Downtown, South Memphis, East Memphis and North Memphis — and maybe that’s debatable, too — then defining Midtown partly defines the rest.

Despite this year’s low water levels, many volunteers and onlookers showed up on Sunday to participate in this year’s Ski Freeze Memphis event — including six-time top fuel champion Clay Millican. 

“I pray that all of us can live in the moment and that we can get some of the best moments we can out of life” in 2023, host Eric Brinson said.

The U of M spring semester starts Jan. 17 but campus reopens for business Jan. 3. It is the second local university to announce damages from the recent winter weather.

Most Christian Brothers University students — with the exception of those in the nursing and physician’s assistant programs — are affected by the semester delay.

While these areas might bear the brunt of that area’s aging infrastructure, it’s not limited to them. 

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MLGW lifts boil water advisory

The Downtown Memphis Commission is working on bringing the historic New Daisy Theatre back online next year after being vacant since 2018. The venue will host its first event on Jan. 12.

The nonprofit provider was awarded a four-year federal grant that will be used to develop a new crisis outpatient program.

While some restaurants remained closed Monday following the Christmas holiday, others were open, finding unique ways to adapt to the boil water advisory.

Sonia Walker is retiring as associate pastor of First Congregational Church. 

Members of Oak City Church braced below-freezing temperatures to attend Christmas Day service Sunday, Dec. 25.

As an influx of projects slowly but surely rise against Downtown Memphis’ horizon, the city inches toward walkability. But “you don’t get walkable communities thinking solely of pedestrians.”

As Ya Ya and Le Le prepare to return home to China in the coming months, Memphis Zoo officials are preparing to make an official bid for a new mating pair of pandas. 

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Leaders, residents say goodbye to giant pandas

The 60-acre Parkside at Shelby Farms mixed-use development received a development agreement extension until Dec. 31, 2023.

“If we adopted a new approach to vacant land, we could actually reduce the amount of work that is required — and money that is spent — by our city as it intervenes and attempts to maintain health and safety at abandoned land.”

The 5% surcharge on items bought and rooms rented at the Downtown Sheraton hotel goes to finance a renovation of the existing 600-room hotel by the Renasant Convention Center. 

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City Council passes Klondike tax vote, but residents’ concerns remain

The unanimous Memphis City Council vote approving the tax increment financing district in Klondike follows months of delay. Debates about residents’ displacement and representation will stick around into the new year.

“It is really important for us to take care of our Downtown space,” said Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn “C.J.” Davis. “It is the face of the rest of the city.”

A public hearing highlighted skepticism about past efforts to bring blighted areas back to life, and fears the North Memphis neighborhood’s current residents could be displaced.

A new multi-year report from the U.S. Geological Survey found the range of black carp in the Mississippi River basin now includes the entirety of the river, from New Orleans to the southeastern edge of Iowa.

Humans and hounds head to Hollywood Feed for suitable-for-framing holiday souvenirs.

“The menorah was always lit in the Temple, and it was a symbol of the eternal and unbreakable connection between God and the Jewish people,” said Rabbi Jeff Dreifus of Temple Israel.

Of the 100 stores Workers United says are honoring the strike, two are in Tennessee.