Donation of ad revenues to "SOB: Save Our Barn"

I have a long-standing practice of donating Google Ad revenue checks from this blog to worthwhile local non-profits who give so much back to the community. Past causes I've donated to include: Fisk University, Buena Vista Enhanced Option School, Cumberland River Compact, Second Harvest Food Bank, 88.1 WFSK FM, North Nashville Flood Relief Group, Nashville Jazz Workshop, Friends of Nashville Farmers' Market, the Nashville Symphony, and the Cheatham Place Kids Christmas Party.

Friends of Beaman Park has started a capital campaign to raise funds to stabilize and restore the 100-year-old barn on the Proctor Farm Trailhead on farm land donated in the park. This time around, I will donate $100 in ad revenue collected to the cause of "SOB: Save Our Barn," as run by Friends of Beaman Park.

This barn will serve as an attractive landmark at the lower trailhead of relatively high-elevation Beaman Park. The park is a unique and striking place in Davidson County, vital to our common good. Please join me in donating to preserve this historic landmark.


UPDATE: Just discovered that SOB has a new logo.

Is the Farmers' Market growing more exclusive by jettisoning the flea market?

The Piraeus, home of ancient Greek schlock

In Plato's Republic, Socrates goes from Athens to the Piraeus, a port side passage where the masses thronged. He went down from high society to the places of parades and cheap entertainment. More importantly, it was the place of commoners, outsiders and those considered barbarians. From Plato:

I went down yesterday to the Piraeus with Glaucon the son of Ariston, that I might offer up my prayers to the goddess; and also because I wanted to see in what manner they would celebrate the festival, which was a new thing. I was delighted with the procession of the inhabitants; but that of the Thracians was equally, if not more, beautiful.

The Piraeus was a liminal space for a free philosopher of Athens: a threshold out of high society to the mundane world of people of much lower status. If Athens was the one, then the Piraeus was the many.

The Piraeus leaped to mind when I read the news that the North Capitol area Farmers' Market is now terminating its flea market in favor of what sound like bigger ticket vendors more stringently selected:

After spending more than a year visiting and collaborating with other successful markets across the country, the staff has developed a new system of standards that will ensure that shoppers will know the source of all items sold in the market and that the vendors will have been involved in the creation of their products.

“There are other places to go if you want a flea market experience,” says NFM Executive Director Tasha Kennard. "We recognized that in order to be the best market we can be we have to do things differently. The actions of the staff and the board show our commitment to and appreciation of the value of local farmers and products.”

What other flea markets exist within walking distance of North Capitol neighborhoods that allow the experience of the Farmers' Market adjoined by a great public park like Bicentennial Mall? I do not know of any. The article goes on to say that Farmers' Market flea market vendors are to be exiled to the Fairgrounds in south Nashville. Is a gated-community consciousness growing in North Nashville?

I'm not a buyer of kitsch, but I recognize that there is a reason it exists. It is a form of cheap art or expression that those middle-class-and-below can afford without a line of credit. Will those same commoners still be able to enter the Farmers' Market and browse with the idea of buying? It does not sound like it. A member of Urban Planet criticizes the move:

I agree that the produce and flowers should be local, but I disagree with kicking Flea Market vendors out. Growing up in the area - before it was hip and cool - the flea market has always been a part of the Nashville Farmers Market, even when it was on the other end of Bicentennial in open air tents. If the vendors pay their rent and don't sell knock off items, why should they have to move. I love going to the Asian couple tha has the $1 bins of little household items and wudknots. Many of these people make their livelihood at the Flea Market and displacing them because of a "few" that do not like cheaply made items is a shame. That's what a Flea Market is - I would rather have these vendors at a facility where they pay montly rent/taxes, than to have them posted up on the side of a road or in vacant lot selling their items, because that is what's going to happen.

So the Market will be displacing 50+ vendors in the flea market for a handful of "artisan" vendors that will sell $10 handmade soap, $20 soy made candles, and $30 hand-made scarfs. I'm all for supporting local-made products, but not everyone likes those type of things. Being that the market is located in a historically and predominantly black zip code, I would think they would want to cater to all residents - not just the folks in the new apartments, condos, and million dollar shotgun houses.

Their is plenty of space at the facility for everyone to coexist. They have already gone up on their rents three-fold now I guess this the last straw to kick them out [SIC].

I understand why many gentrifiers look down their noses at cheap tacky stuff that has been sold in the same place for decades, but I have no problem with flea markets because there are common goods that are higher than stuffy taste or stiff-necked wealth. Inclusiveness and respect are two such common goods.

What stands out to me is that First Tennessee Park, the Nashville Sounds' new ballpark, is specifically mentioned as a catalyst changes at the Farmers' Market. Some of us have warned that the new ballpark may not have the desired effect of growth in existing Jefferson Street businesses. Instead, it may leverage relocation of larger businesses that drive out the smaller ones. Is that good? It depends on what your expectations are. The Farmers' Market is like canary in a coal mine on that score.

Make no mistake: the Farmers' Market is a Metro owned public space. Make no mistake: if the Farmers' Market discourages buyers who cannot afford handmade artisan crafts, they will not visit the Farmers' Market, which will make it a less diverse place. Make no mistake: a space that no longer welcomes diversity, including class diversity, is no longer legitimately public.

I've been a neighbor of and a regular customer at the Farmers' Market for a decade since moving to Salemtown. I did not patronize the flea market, but I also never saw the need for it to go away. I do not understand why later arrivals (and apparently a neighborhood association) do.

By the way, I would be deliriously pleased if the Farmers' Market could certify that all of its produce comes from local, organic, family farms (like those in Scottsboro/Bells Bend) and not from Tennessee's powerful agribusiness plantations. I'm not deluded enough to believe that the schlock-haters are clamoring for a bridge that far. They seem satisfied enough with elbowing out the riff raff.


Disclaimer and full disclosure: This blog has been a donor to past efforts to preserve and to develop the Farmers' Market.

Previously unpublished photos of the May 2010 Nashville flood indicate urbanizing Bells Bend was and is an idea fraught with peril

Recently, Bells Bend advocate Sumter Camp sent me 2010 flood photos that he has had stored away for almost 5 years. With the 5th anniversary of the Great Nashville Flood a few months away, it is worth reconsidering the impact of the flood on various communities.

Parts of the May properties, which were originally proposed to become a "second downtown" sprawling across the Bend would have been underwater if the Planning Commission had approved the build. Given that buildings and other impervious surfaces displace flood waters, the 2010 flood waters would have likely pushed further into the Bend if May Town Center had been allowed. As Nashville Next sets new goals for infill that have the potential to drive lower income people out of city neighborhoods, we should expect increasing pressures to urbanize our vanishing agricultural villages like Scottsboro/Bells Bend. The flood is a cautionary tale instructing us to organize and to push back against such pressure.

Advocates for protecting our agricultural areas like Bells Bend share complimentary interests with urban activists who demand affordable housing and rent controls in city neighborhoods. They should be building bridges to one another for the sake of common cause.

The caption descriptions are paraphrases of Sumter's own descriptions. I am grateful to him for giving us yet another look back at the 2010 catastrophe.

Cumberland River at the bottom with the right-hand bank
just outside of the last curving row of trees.
The power lines cross the southern-most corner of the May property.

Looking the opposite direction of the preceding photo.
John Tune Airport is at upper right. Charles Bass Prison is just below it
and to the right (water in between all of the pods).

Southern end of the Bend looking west. Old Hickory Blvd runs from right to left
just above the centerline of the photo. Partially flooded I-40 lies beyond.

Bells Bend photos: Nashville's vanishing back country

Last week I attended a meeting in Bells Bend and was rewarded with breathtaking views from the home of one of the Bend's protective residents. While I have made many visits to Bells Bend over the years (the agricultural community is less than a 20 minute drive from Salemtown), this was the first time I had ever seen it from this vantage point.

Places like Bells Bend are always targeted by developers and planners for urbanization. Not too long ago developers wanted to put a second downtown on Bells Bend. A Democratic Party insider who currently runs the communication office of a declared candidate for the Mayor's Office supported that plan and impugned the community's culture as "sleepy" and referred to the nonmonetized value of the Bend as "dirt". Thank goodness such foolishness was turned back by a community that organized other neighborhoods to oppose the plan, built a network of farmers and entrepreneurs to provide proactive influence and encouraged Metro planners to consider a different vision.

As I surveyed the view of the undeveloped land between me and the Cumberland River, so close to downtown, I thought it would be a matter of time before the next developer lusted to pave over the natural beauty or some politico foolishly argued that there was nothing in the Bend. We need to be ready to defend the Bend again when they do.

3rd Annual Heirloom Tomato Fest and Square Dance photos

Last night we drove out of a driving rain in the North Capitol area to the 2014 edition of the Heirloom Tomato Fest in Scottsboro / Bells Bend. While it was wet in the Bend, it only rained a couple of times in the two hours we were there. Square dancers were not deterred in the least by the wet conditions. Grilled cheese, pesto and heirloom tomato sandwiches were offered to go along with the beer enjoyed by revelers. Spirits of those who attended did not seem dampened by the wet conditions, and those who wore their rain boots seemed even happier.

photo credit: Canaan Byrd

Metro Historical Commission to present completed map of Bells Bend history tomorrow

This comes on short notice, but it looks like a worthwhile event for those of you with interest in local oral history and those of you who have been advocates of Bells Bend in the past. Tomorrow, Saturday July 26th, at 2:00pm at the Wade School Tim Walker of Nashville's Historical Commission will review a completed map of historic sites that have been identified via local knowledge.

The Historical Commission and the Nashville Public Library documented and recorded oral histories from Scottsboro-Bells Bend neighbors. They also gathered the neighbors together to pinpoint specific areas connected to those histories. The map that Mr. Walker will present is the culmination of that interaction. Organizers hope to recognize these important areas with historic markers.


UPDATE: Dozens of neighbors attended the Scottsboro/Bells Bend community meeting at Wade School on Saturday, which was designed to gather more historical information in light of the 70+ significant sites already documented in the community. Tim Walker told those in attendance that he made his first visit to Bells Bend a few years ago and was immediately impressed that such a unique place with rural culture existed so close to urban Nashville. He also asked the group to come up with more information that might have been missing from the oral histories they had collected and to identify more sites. Community leader Joe Engle told the audience that there was no deadline for collecting information and that the project would continue indefinitely.

While pressure might continue in the future to suburbanize or to urbanize Bells Bend, it is refreshing to hear a Metro official praise the unique culture of the area. Many of us have been believers in that kind of diversity for much longer. I want to believe that this exercise also has a way of defining community character which might be even more resistant to developers who drool at the thought of high-density infilling the Bend. Above all, the history should not be lost with the passing generations. This was a positive event all the way around.

Fundraiser: Square Dance in Bells Bend next weekend

For a good cause in support of our rural neighbors a short drive from Salemtown:

Will a new Sulphur Dell ballpark bring more gentrification or will it spur sensitive revival?

The tensions that come with profound change and growth are mirrored in the comments of two North Nashville leaders with very different priorities and visions for "nexting" along Jefferson Street.

Jefferson Street became great once from humble beginnings and could do so again in the future, said [Ed] Kindall, who was born in a house on Jefferson Street in 1945 and has lived in the community most of his life.

He just wants to see some of the past preserved when the community comes back.

“It’s not that we don’t want Jefferson Street to be pretty,” he said. “We just don’t want it to be gentrified.”

Sharon Hurt, president of the Jefferson Street United Merchants Partnership, sees hope for Jefferson Street in the plans for a new Sounds stadium at the Sulphur Dell location.

The proposed Sulphur Dell project would border Jefferson Street near Fourth and Fifth avenues. Hurt said the project would bring jobs to the community and could spark a revival for Jefferson Street.

“This could be the beginning of the rebirth of North Nashville,” she said.

I generally find myself on the opposite side from Sharon Hurt on most issues affecting the neighborhoods just a few blocks from Jefferson Street business corridor.

She supported the failed plan to build a "second Downtown" (May Town Center) on North Nashville's urban farmland, Bells Bend. She supported the decision of the National Museum of African American Music to abandon its logical location on Jefferson Street for honky-tonked Lower Broadway. Now Ms. Hurt raves about the Mayor's ballpark project without expressing any of the questions former school board member Kindall raises about untrammeled, insensitive gentrification.

I share Mr. Kindall's concerns on this score. I wonder how a new ballpark can help but destroy historical and cultural qualities of North Nashville in a headlong rush to drive up real estate prices and gentrify without careful planning and input by the whole community beyond business interests. Growth at all costs based on the ambitions of the few will do us more harm than good. The history of Jefferson Street deserves better treatment and consideration.


10/01/2018 UPDATE: based on the latest news reports, the answer to the question I asked 5 years ago is that the new ballpark, called "First Tennessee Park," has ushered in gentrification at a brutal pace. According to one report from last July:

Development is changing history in a local neighborhood, but Belinda Campbell's home has stood the tests of time.
"There's history here, and they're not looking at the history. All they're looking at is coming in and making a quick buck," Campbell said.
Change has come to the neighborhood.
"Down the street there are two houses, one $999,000, one is over a million, one's got elevators in both of them," she sid.
Development is driving up property taxes and the cost of living. Campbell's family has been in the neighborhood since the 1960's.
"They are fixing it where we can't even stay in our community. I think they're pushing us on the outskirts of town," Campbell said. "It really hurts me deeply that something that you've been having for years, they're trying to force you out of your own home."
Belinda works from 7p.m. to 7a.m. as a caretaker. She then feeds the neighborhood kids at her son's church camp. She sleeps two hours a day just to make a living.

Another follow-up report from last week continues to paint a dire picture for North Nashvillians:

As developers buy up properties, elderly residents are being forced to move. Aline Lyles, 85, must leave the Buena Vista neighborhood, the place she's called home her entire life. A developer bought her building on Monroe Street, and she was told her lease will be terminated.
"These new homes is driving the old folks out of their homes," Lyles said.
She looked at half a dozen places. The retirement home in Buena Vista is full and she said she was placed on a waiting list. 

In the past year Metro Council approved funding for a new major league soccer fields at the Fairgrounds. If North Nashville is a barometer for the future, neighbors around the Fairgrounds should expect accelerated dislocation and displacement of those who cannot afford to keep with up the skyrocketing land values spurred by real estate deals brokered between politicians and tycoons.

These are the salad days for builders and developers. For regular Nashvillians times are getting tough.

District 19 council member listed among others on developer's "secret tapes"

Over the weekend the Tennessean reported that "secret tapes" exist that contain 40 hours of conversations between a May Town Center developer and over a dozen council members regarding his team's plan to build a sprawling "second downtown" on Bells Bend. Noteworthy is the mention of District 19 CM Erica Gilmore:

 

By early 2010 — when the first recording was captured — May Town leaders had turned their attention from the Metro Planning Commission, where the development had stalled in a 5-5 vote, to the 40-member council, where the project needed 27 votes for approval because of the planning commission setback.

Ultimately, the council in March 2010 voted to defer the May Town project indefinitely.

According to May’s recent filing, plaintiffs secretly recorded conversations with council members Megan Barry, Phil Claiborne, Tim Garrett, Erica Gilmore, Jason Holleman, Edith Langster, Lonnell Matthews Jr., Jerry Maynard, Bruce Stanley, Ronnie Steine, Charlie Tygard, and then-council members Michael Craddock, Randy Foster and Jim Hodge. It also cites “others.”

The parties discussed the project, speculated about votes and offered their impressions of Jack May, Mayor Karl Dean, Tony Giarratana and others, according to the brief.

The Metro Planning Commission refused in a close vote to approve the proposal, which put the burden on Metro Council to approve it only with a super-majority. The proposal was eventually withdrawn, so we do not have recorded votes of these CMs.

However, some of these council members made their opinions clear during the planning public hearing process. Here is an excerpt of the May 2009 public hearing minutes:

Councilmember [Mike] Jameson first explained that he was asked by Councilmember Barry and Councilmember Cole to include their names as part of the record as expressing their opposition to the proposed May Town Center. They were unable to attend the meeting....

Councilmember Holleman acknowledged Councilmember Matthews support for the May Town Center, however, expressed his concerns with respect to the May Town Center development affecting the entire region as opposed to only Council District 1. His district is in the pathway of connecting this development to the rest of the city and he expressed his concerns regarding its impact on District 24. He explained the work that he and his constituents have completed on the West Nashville Community Plan update and spoke of how the May Town Center would impact their transportation network and infrastructure. He also explained that he and his constituents have not had the chance to review the Traffic Impact Study recently released from RPM and would like for the Commission to allow them an opportunity to review the study and provide their comments regarding the study at the next Public Hearing scheduled for June 25, 2009. Councilmember Holleman then pointed out some of the highlights included the Traffic Impact Study and how they would directly affect his district. He requested that the Commission deny the zone change request until he and his community can further digest any impacts on their district.

Councilmember Craddock expressed his support for the May Town Center development as the project is a good quality development; and that the proposal would lessen the burden on the Nashville’s taxpayers. He spoke on the issue of spiraling property taxes and the need to seek good quality development to further enhance the City of Nashville. Councilmember Craddock then acknowledged the importance of not allowing a development of this size to adversely affect surrounding districts and to need to find the best way to implement the project for the betterment of all living in Nashville.

Councilmember Matthews .... stated that over the year, he has obtained the necessary information in which he could now support the proposed May Town Center development and explained all of the positive attributes that could be derived from the development. Attributes such as increased jobs for the area, and additional opportunities for corporate relocations to the City of Nashville .... He stated he would assist the bill as it makes it way through the approval process at Council .... As Councilmember Matthews closed, he explained all of the conversations he has with all involved parties and expressed his support for the May Town Center.

I attended that public hearing, and I do not recall seeing CM Gilmore. I am curious about what her views on the May Town Center proposal are on those "secret tapes". I am also wondering, as a constituent, whether I have a right to know what my CM says to developers about voting intentions on significant projects.

Bells Bend farms live, May Town development is dead

I have steadfastly followed the prospects of the residents of Bells Bend for several years now. Including news last year that Nashville Yazoo micro-brewery had developed a partnership with local organic farmers to bring hops to local beer production.

Of course, what spurred my interest in Bells Bend long before that was the cause to save the farmland from May Town developers who wanted to flip it into a second downtown without regard for community planning or the wishes of Scottsboro-Bell Bend who would have been displaced by developers's sprawl. The developers put a full court press on North Nashville to try and convince us that the trickle-down jobs that would result would benefit us. Many of us here did not buy the pitch. West Nashvillians who would have been inundated by extra traffic resulting from three new state-built bridges across the Cumberland River also had something to say about the matter. And many, many other Nashvillians were sympathetic because they knew it could have just as easily been them facing bulldozers and unsmart growth. Opponents of May Town grew and galvanized to support the cause.

Now a whole lot of people beyond concerned neighborhood leaders are celebrating the partnership between Yazoo and Bells Bend. Check out Nashville Scene on the bandwagon:

In this autumn's batch of Yazoo Brewing Co.'s pale ale, one flavorful adjective will trump the rest: local. Because the bright-citrus-and-cilantro-scented hints of fresh-cut grass on the head of the limited edition Bells Bend Preservation Ale come courtesy of hops grown in the fertile fields of Davidson County ....

In recent years, the rural area, minutes from downtown, has been the target of development efforts, such as the proposed May Town project. Residents objected to the mixed-use development, fearing it would flood their quiet country roads with traffic and end life as they knew it in the bucolic acres near Scottsboro. They organized, branding their cause with the lyrical logo of whooping cranes, in honor of two endangered birds that took up residence in a Bells Bend field.

The May Town controversy subsided when city officials denied approval for the project, but the whooping crane remains a symbol of the community's commitment to preserving its open spaces and agriculture. This fall, the bird is also the symbol of Yazoo's dry-hopped beer.

The May Town drama did not just subside because of city officials who did not go along. It also ground to a halt because of the hard work and organizing of neighborhoods across Nashville who wrote letters, cajoled council members and commissioners, showed up for every public meeting, and held their own meetings to strategize against the public relations campaign conducted by wealthy developers, pitch men, and lawyers. I tried to document as much of the story as possible here on Enclave because I do not believe it should be forgotten.

I'll continue to watch the annual celebrations of Bells Bend--which now has a sustainable, self-perpetuating relationship with a successful local entrepreneur--content in the knowledge that I joined something larger than myself, a throng of other leaders whose conviction to save rural Bells Bend from urban sprawl made these days possible. I am thankful for that.


UPDATE: Upon further reflection, I remembered how proponents of protecting Bells Bend (agri)culture were labelled "NIMBY" ("Not In My Back Yard") and cast as negative for opposing May Town. It was always clear to me that the neighborhood leaders taking on the developers were positive, progressive actors in the story and that they were "QIMBY" ("Quality In My Back Yard"). Quality is exactly what they got in the organic production of hops for Yazoo to craft a new line of ale.

Some had questioned the sincerity of the May Town proposal years before the project's own developers did

Partners in the development team Jack May put together around two years ago to urbanize Bells Bend, build a "second downtown" on farmland, and suffuse the small community with automobile traffic with 1-3 bridges, allege now that Mr. May was committing fraud and exercising irresponsible conduct.

According to [plaintiff Jeffrey] Zeitlin, when he and William Kantz entered into a partnership agreement with the Mays, they were led to believe that Jack May was retired in Mexico and “would help fund the project.”

Zeitlin contends, however, several misrepresentations by the Mays ultimately led to the crumbling of the partnership and the development plan.

According to the lawsuit, the Mays made an “unconditional promise” to gift certain land in Bells Bend to Tennessee State University — land that the partnership didn’t own.

“The Defendants did not make the gift as promised to TSU and did not intend to make the gift when the Defendants extended the promise,” the lawsuit reads. “As a result, the Partnership’s good will and Zeitlin’s interest therein was damaged.”

Zeitlin makes a similar claim involving a bridge that Jack May told the city of Nashville he would “write a check” for, to help boost the proposed development.

The lawsuit also claims that the Mays added partners in breach of the partnership agreement and failed to account for Zeitlin’s capital contributions to the partnership.

The partnership may have been damaged by the alleged dishonesty, but many more Nashvillians would have been damaged had the deal not been narrowly defeated. Many of us on the anti-May Town side warned without fail that this concept was a Trojan horse destined to bring more harm than good.

May Town team breaking down and confirming suspicions of some

Partners in the development team Jack May put together around two years ago to urbanize Bells Bend, build a "second downtown" on farmland, and suffuse the small community with automobile traffic with 1-3 bridges, allege now that Mr. May was committing fraud and exercising irresponsible conduct. Here is part of the account:

According to [plaintiff Jeffrey] Zeitlin, when he and William Kantz entered into a partnership agreement with the Mays, they were led to believe that Jack May was retired in Mexico and “would help fund the project.”

Zeitlin contends, however, several misrepresentations by the Mays ultimately led to the crumbling of the partnership and the development plan.

According to the lawsuit, the Mays made an “unconditional promise” to gift certain land in Bells Bend to Tennessee State University — land that the partnership didn’t own.

“The Defendants did not make the gift as promised to TSU and did not intend to make the gift when the Defendants extended the promise,” the lawsuit reads. “As a result, the Partnership’s good will and Zeitlin’s interest therein was damaged.”

Zeitlin makes a similar claim involving a bridge that Jack May told the city of Nashville he would “write a check” for, to help boost the proposed development.

The lawsuit also claims that the Mays added partners in breach of the partnership agreement and failed to account for Zeitlin’s capital contributions to the partnership.

This is not the first time questions have been raised about the business dealings of Jack May or the advantages he enjoyed with the help from others. In 2008, we learned that long-time office holder Democrat Gary Odom was able to obstruct the Governor's Office from closing a tax loophole that allowed business partners who were related to each other to escape taxes in the billions on property and in the hundreds of millions on profits. Odom helped the May brothers make a killing on their business. A reporter observed, "May and the rest of the Bells Bend development crowd gave campaign cash to Odom, who then gave it to Democratic lawmakers running for reelection, who then voted to make Odom their new leader in the House."

When the Bells Landing team did not get the vote they wanted from the Metro Planning Commission after Jim Gotto (a GOP advocate for the Mays) called to end debate after a long public hearing in order to vote, they requested special consideration from Planning for another vote. May Town Center opponents squeaked by with a single-vote win, but if they had so lost, the chances were slim that they would have garnered the same reconsideration. Luckily, according to one witness present at the meeting to vote on a re-vote, the developers backed down when they saw they did not have the votes present:

Observers said Jack May stood in the audience talking on his cell the phone before the meeting and seemed to be scanning the commissioners present. There did not appear to be sufficient votes present in favor MTC. Immediately before the meeting started, he walked over to the staff table and asked that his proposal to reconsider be withdrawn. Shortly afterwards, some two dozen opponents from Bells Bend adjourned to the parking lot for strategy discussions.

After the 2009 Planning Commission vote, editorializing stories curiously appeared in a local African-American paper making claims about community support without reference to data. Likewise, some on Mays' team selectively applied polling data on the question of developing Bells Bend without reference to the whole picture. Advertisements went out indicating that Jefferson Street would be revitalized by May Town Center, but according to one neighborhood leader, Jack May seemed to distance himself from the ads during a West Nashville community meeting sponsored by Emily Evans.

These events have been characterized by bobbing and weaving by developers from the beginning. We shouldn't be surprised to see that, as the Bells Landing team fractures (we may never know the exact constitution of the team), they begin charging one another with deception. Many of us who opposed May Town Center insisted all along that we were being sold a bill of goods rather than a viable community plan.

They ain't got Jack

The developer who tried to push-poll North Nashville into support for May Town Center while promising us "jobs, jobs, jobs!", is on the lam from his former partners who are looking to sue him for failing to keep his promises:

Nashville investor William Kantz is trying to sue Jack May over his handling of the failed $4 billion May Town Center project — if only he can find him.

Kantz is one of four original members of the partnership that owns property in the rural Bells Bend area that is home to the proposed development ....

Kantz alleges that May, who spearheaded the controversial project, seized control of the partnership and added members in violation of a partnership agreement and failed to deliver on promises made to members ....

While May has residences overseas and has been known to be spend extended periods of time at them [a lawyer says] ... May’s present travels are suspiciously convenient.

I have to wonder how irresponsibly May Town Center would have been developed if approved and what kind of low-wage, menial jobs would have actually been provided to North Nashvillians.

Bells Bend farmers & Yazoo Brewing Co. giving a more progressive meaning to "development"

The Tennessean has the good news on the first locally brewed beer to be brewed with locally grown hops:

this is the first time [farmer Eric Wooldridge] has produced a substantial amount of hops for brewing .... The next growing season, Wooldridge said, he plans to plant even more hops, and Yazoo intends to continue making beer with them.

“They’ve found a varietal they can grow out there,” said Neil McCormick, Yazoo’s director of marketing. “And the thing with hops is they keep coming back stronger and stronger.”

Meanwhile, the farm and Yazoo will celebrate their first batch with the Bells Bend Hops Festival and Square Dance on Saturday. It’s an event Wooldridge also hopes to grow — maybe even incorporating home brewers — in the years to come.

For those who can’t make the party, McCormick said some of the 18 kegs of Bells Bend Preservation Ale also will be served at the brewery’s annual Family Picnic and eighth anniversary bash on Oct. 1 ....

with its hops grown just a 20-minute drive from downtown, Bells Bend Preservation Ale serves as a reminder that we’re a town both cosmopolitan and farm-country.

“It’s a good way to raise awareness,” Hall said, “of what they’re trying to do in Bells Bend.”

There is a fledgling agricultural/urban market here for growing, producing, and buying locally that does not need to be interrupted with cockeyed developers' urbanized designs for Scottsboro-Bells Bend. This is the kind of conservationist alternative consistent with the vision and the community plans of May Town Center opponents who were once hated on and charged with "holding back progress." The haters should acknowledge that local sustainability and small-scale niche growth is progress consistent with community-based principles.

Hops (as other local produce) require dirt to grow. Who knew?

Last March the Bells Bend blogger at Sulphur Creek Farm hinted at the hop project they were working on with local micro-brewer Yazoo Brewing Company:

I came home from hospital rounds to an empty bean-pot, and at least eight bean-stained bowls. Tom, Jim, Keith, Keith's friend, Sumter, and maybe Joe spent most of the day in the drizzle, laying down mulch, planting hops, and hanging string vine supports

Fast forward to last week, which seemed like happy harvest time for both Sulphur Creek and Yazoo families:

Came home yesterday to hops harvest: Keith's second year crop looks really good. Tom hoisted someone with a machete up in the tractor's front end loader to cut the strings and bring the vines down.

By the time I arrived, folks were gathered in front of the shed (ok, around the beer cooler) pulling the flowers off the vines--fragrant green thumb-sized stacks of petals. Yazoo plans to use the hops fresh for a small run of Bells Bend Ale ....

Linus and Lila Hall from Yazoo Brewery, and their two blonde daughters, were on hand ....

First hops harvest! And our thanks to the good folks at Yazoo, whose products have promoted social interaction (and some fundraising!) at the farm for many years.

Supporting local agriculture and local business is a good thing. I checked with Yazoo owner Linus Hall who says that Bells Bend Ale will be available in about three weeks.

Would this unique venture be possible if the Planning Commission and Metro Council had approved Jack May's rezoning scheme to sprawl a "second Downtown" across his and other partners' large holdings on the Bend with contempt for the community plan? Would a rural-scale partnership producing for a small batch micro-brew be possible with large bridges providing choking vehicular traffic over the Cumberland River to the Bend via the Charlotte Park neighborhood and points farther west?

While it may not fit urban Nashville, this is the kind of diverse, locally structured enterprise that the Scottsboro-Bells Bend community plan seems to promote. So, why ruin a good thing with city scale and urban density? Maybe because you believe that Bells Bend's unique lifeworld does not rise much above the level of dirt:

May, the owner of lots of dirt in the rural West Nashville community, tried in vain last year to gain approval of the Metro Council to have a four billion dollar privately funded mixed-use development to be named May Town.

Guess the dirty hippies didn't get their invitations.

While the developer of that project decided it wasn't worth the hassle, May is stubbornly sticking to the plan of turning the sleepy Bells Bend community into a thriving mini-metropolis [instead of a venue for "dirty hippies"].

Maybe this particular commentator won't be purchasing Bells Bend Ale since it does not produce as many jobs as a corporate savior would, but I intend to buy some and not just because Yazoo makes great beer. This is an enterprise that I would like to see deepen and grow. Watch for Bells Bend Ale and support our local agriculture by buying some in a few weeks.

And do a little rain dance for our friends in the Bells Bend Neighborhood Farms project. I understand their crops could use some rain.

Let's hope it is the final nail to keep the zombie in the coffin

Nashville Urban Organizer Sarah Bellos interviewed with other food activists this week in the Tennessean:

"In 2010, with the nail in the coffin of May Town Center, citizens from Bells Bend to Bordeaux exercised their right to speak out and protect the foundation of our food system — land. Nashvillians joined a national and global effort to protect what may be some of our most productive and crucial growing space: the land right at the urban fringe. Add to that cohesive local school food and community gardening efforts across the city and we have begun a foundation for increasing our food sustainability and security in Nashville.

Mayor Karl Dean saved May Town Center for a time such as this

Let's revisit Mayor Karl Dean's attempt a couple of weeks ago to wrangle the Fairgrounds redevelopment plan from spiraling out of his grasp via one of his rare news conferences. At that time he reanimated the May Town Center monster:

Dean reminded reporters about May Town ... during a news conference to unveil a new Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce report that claims retrofitting the fairgrounds property off Nolensville Pike to suit 1 million square feet of corporate office space would generate 6,500 new jobs, $200 million in capital investments and $2.5 billion in overall economic impact for Davidson County.

“Here’s the issue,” Dean said. “The fairgrounds is located two miles from downtown. It has access to all the infrastructure that you need to have a successful business growth area.

“Go back to the May Town debate,” Dean continued. “When folks talked about May Town — and that debate is behind us, and we probably don’t even need to be talking about it, but I will for a second — the debate became about [how] we have to have an area where we can develop and expand our tax base in order for this city to succeed. You can’t sit back and say, ‘We’re never going to do anything anywhere in all of Davidson County. We’re just not going to expand our tax base. We’re not going to be welcoming to new businesses.’ ”

The fairgrounds doesn’t pose the same problems — infrastructural, environmental — as May Town, Dean said, invoking it again. Instead, recasting the fairgrounds would include boosting a neighborhood, restoring polluted Browns Creek, and creating a new 40-acre park.

First, it is totally disingenuous for the Mayor to insinuate that he does not intend to reopen old May Town Center wounds in this press conference. Of course, his comments were calculated to impel community fear at a new prospect of sprawl and to redivide neighborhoods against each other. The momentum of controversial developments like May Town Center and like the Fairgrounds thrives on community acrimony. We should not be talking about it, but the Mayor's case for the Fairgrounds requires it, so he would not forswear the chance to use the wedge.

As calculated as the timing of these comments may be (Jack May announced new plans to pursue a scaled-back May Town Center shortly after Karl Dean's press conference), they are also misleading. Metro does not hold any of the back country in Bells Bend that Jack May intends to urbanize. The fairgrounds is entirely public property, and the Mayor intends to hawk almost all of the non-flood-risk land to private developers to create an office park in spite of the fact that there is a large amount of unused office space in nearby Downtown. Expanding the tax base in Bells Bend would require the wholesale destruction of one of the largest urban green spaces in the US, and building bridges that would contradict the community plans of several different neighborhoods. If Metro owned the Bells Bend properties, May Town Center likely would have been dead on arrival.

Hence, the greatest deception in Mayor Dean's comments is that opponents of selling the Fairgrounds oppose development anywhere in Davidson County. I opposed May Town Center on its demerits, not on the question of development in general. I oppose selling the Fairgrounds on its demerits, not on the question of development in general. While I oppose any urban sprawl in Bells Bend at all, I can see myself supporting sensitive and balanced mixed-use development with a higher percentage of green space and with Metro maintaining control of most of the Fairgrounds property. I'm not a strict preservationist here, although I have more in common with the "Save the Fairgrounds" group than I do with the Mayor's Finance Director, Rich Riebeling, who has been lobbying to sell the Fairgrounds since the Purcell administration.

I could get behind an initiative for Fairgrounds redevelopment that would protect the public interest rather than pander to wealthy business interests in the run-up to the mayoral election.

Who knows? Maybe the Mayor has been silent on May Town Center so that he could use it as a wedge for a time such as this. But his mislead on the motivations of those who have concerns about both should not pass without correction.

2010 Nashville flood: Bells Bend farmers take their lumps

A tale of natural disaster and woe from the rural side of Nashville:

It rained. And rained. Something like 9 inches in less than 36 hours. Sulphur Creek was raging, crashing over our bridges and creating rivers running through our pastures. Land on both sides flooded, with a heavy three foot-deep current gnawing away at our compost mountains.

Our tiny side creek, usually a meandering two feet across, roared over its little bridge and made its own river about 70 feet wide, running both into the creek and down into the driveway.

We spent much of the morning drenched, as we slogged around moving things to higher ground: buckets, tools, beehives.

Fletcher called, worried about his chickens. The creek was cascading over the guard rails by the train trestle, intermittently blocking the road into the Bend. The chicks were ok, but the neighbors living in their basement were not, and the boys helped them move their furniture upstairs.

The Cumberland at Clees Ferry was up nearly to the top of the boat ramp, and later, I'm told, flooded far up the road, including the sod farm. This morning I passed semi-trailers completely under water at the Gun Club, and our side of Briley is closed, along with White Bridge Road.

We are counting our losses: substantial for us, but small compared to others in the area. Mainly, all 240 shitake logs, representing a massive amount of work by Eric the Farmer and his buddies, are on their way to the Gulf of Mexico. Think cutting trees, hauling them out of the woods, cutting them up into 240 4-foot sections, and drilling and packing with mushroom spawn, then stacking and re-stacking. That work has all just floated away.

Our raging pasture river pulled down about a hundred feet of 8-foot fencing, and, of course, the farm road is pitted and scarred and scattered with twenty-pound rocks carried here from somewhere upstream.

Jump over to read the rest. It isn't all bad.

Council member moves to trot out May Town Center dog once again

CM Lonell Matthews seems bound and determined to resurrect May Town Center in spite of his inability to get enough votes from Planning Commissioners to lead to planning approval. When we last left the proposal to sprawl a second Downtown across agricultural greenfields, it was in disarray and recommended for disapproval to the Metro Council. The Planning Commission's breathtaking action forced a super majority rather than a simple majority of council members to approve MTC.

Nonetheless, CM Matthews intends to move the proposal to council public hearing in March, where it will likely incur the unrelenting backlash of large numbers of civic leaders who consistently turn out whenever it appears on an agenda. Even a local blogger supportive of untrammeled growth questions the wisdom of Matthews' move:

The timing is curious, the subject is still slightly toxic and if the Councilman and May family are not careful, the backlash could be significant. Why? Simple, the Metro Council has just approved the financing package to build a brand new downtown convention center at a cost of $650 million and quite a few citizens are still mystified by this expenditure. Many still believe that taxpayers will be left ultimately holding the bag for a significant portion of the project’s construction and operating costs. Skepticism runs rampant and to be honest, the project’s organizers did not help themselves by allowing several publically embarrassing mistakes to be made during the planning process.

We do not know what cards CM Matthews has up his sleeve. However, if things remain as they were 8 months ago, I don't see how the MTC proposal can come out of a public hearing unscathed enough to give it a realistic shot. However, I don't put anything past this council.

Enclave's 5th Annual Best and Worst Metro Services: The Highlights and Lowlights of 2009

Another year past, another list of high achievers and low sliders:

• January
  • Council highlight: CM Mike Jameson challenged beer industry lobbyists to provide solutions for "better" law enforcement, given that the top 10 intoxication offenders had been arrested a whopping 1,350 times. Big brewski was baffled but still brassy.
  • Council highlight: CMs acknowledged police assertions that safety issues were more important than some fabricated right of club owners to blast bad karaoke as far down Broadway as sound would travel. Drunk Barry Manilow wannabes were pissed.
  • Public Works lowlight: This one's a holdover that should have made the 2008 list of shame, except that MDHA did not divulge the bad news until January. The federally-funded Salemtown streetscape plan was already making the torturous route through MPW's approval process late last fall, when someone there lost the designs for 2 or 3 months. Doh!
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: Karl Dean proposes that all Metro services be cut 10% as the discussion of a new convention center is starting to heat up.
  • Metro Legal lowlight: Courthouse lawyers bend to a former county Republican Party chair and refuse to release English Only's donor list, based on the farfetched and unfair notion that EO donors could be the subject of threats if publicized. Once we found out that EO had received 90% funding from a group in Virginia, Metro Legal was hard pressed to explain how an organization could suffer bodily harm.
• February
  • Metro Police highlight: Chief Ronal Serpas confronts red-state Tennessee over why it lets convicted rapists go free over and over. In the meantime, officers tell Salemtown that burglaries in the area dropped from 10 in January to 0 in February.
  • Metro Sheriff lowlight: another 2008 holdover. We learn that Daron Hall met with a white supremacist group in late 2008 and we find out that he is doomed to make the mistakes of the past, given that he confused them with a Republican group.
  • Metro Council lowlight: LED signs rear their ugly mugs in almost exactly the same form as they were previously deferred and CM Michael Craddock nudges the door open for them a little by spot-zoning an LED in the name of Jesus and all that's holy.
• March
  • Highlights? We don't need no stinkin' highlight.
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: Dean's goon squad twists council arms to rubber stamp his regressive stormwater fee scheme while using the recession as an excuse to cut fat cats with more black top breaks while the rest of us with permeable yardage pay more.
  • Metro Council lowlight: if dealing with the last council was like herding cats, dealing with this one is like punching kittens. CMs cave to Karl Dean. They defeat Jason Holleman's amendment that would have equitably distributed higher water fees. 14 CMs cutting against the grain is not enough as progressives like Erik Cole and Megan Barry pony up to the Mayor's pander bar. Ms. Barry rationalizes her vote afterwards by saying she was keeping a promise to the Mayor even though voters put her into office. Yeah, and let them eat cake.
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: The two river banks that the Riverfront Development Plan brought together, Karl Dean put asunder. With the recession again his pretext, Karl Dean suggests that he may delay planned and public-informed East Bank development and focus instead on the Downtown side. In the wake of predictable community blowback, Dean bobs and weaves before acting like starting with the East Bank was his plan all along.
  • Metro Council lowlight: even though legal opinions indicate that spot-zoning a tiny sliver of property for a private Christian school's LED sign would open the door to spot-zoning elsewhere, CMs approve the spot-zone.
  • Planning Department lowlight: Planning ties its own hands by letting securities expire. Due to software and staff shortages as well as communications snafus, Planning renders itself powerless to force developers to finish stalled projects.
  • Metro Council lowlight: abandoning a cause she once championed, CM Megan Barry, bails on LED sign opponents and votes with CM Charlie Tygard in support of the LED sign task force's proposal to allow signs in neighborhoods.
• April
  • Metro government highlight: a dismal March finally ends.
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: Karl Dean markets campaign on the expensive wavy box decorated like a cliche of the music industry even as he tells police they're in for budget cuts.
  • Metro Council lowlight: Instead, they should have just declared that God only hears the prayers of Protestant fundamentalists.
  • Metro Parks lowlight: Yeah, right, Roy Wilson. Sure they will.
• May
  • Metro Council highlight: Jason Holleman attempts to fast track stronger regulation--any regulation--of the expanding use of LED signage.
  • Mayor's Office highlight: Karl Dean puts development of the East Bank back at the top of the priorities list in the Riverfront Development Plan, right where the public wanted it.
  • MDHA highlight: after a year's delay in construction of the Salemtown streetscape, surveyors finally arrive in the 'hood.
  • Metro Action commission lowlight: no sooner does streetscape construction start than MAC derails it with MDHA approval. MAC doesn't help its reputation with Salemtown by refusing a request by an adjacent property owner to work a parking and insurance agreement for MAC clients illegally parking on his land.
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: Karl Dean reneges on a longstanding plan to move Metro Action out of Salemtown's Fehr School building to a facility suited to handle its high volume clientèle.
  • MDHA lowlight: the one where I learned that MDHA operates like a local shadow government; portents of things to come at a larger scale later.
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: Karl Dean signs on with a parochial deity, only afterwards to pull a Daron Hall by pleading ignorance.
  • Metro Council lowlight: Pam Murray. Need I say more?
  • Metro Codes lowlight: The officials who are supposed to respond to complaints about squatters in empty building failed to respond to numerous complaints by Germantown residents about squatters in a local warehouse, which eventually caught fire and burned.
• June
  • Metro Planning highlight: in a shocker the Planning Commission does not give the May Town Center proposal enough votes for approval, and Planning recommends disapproval to the Metro Council. They redeemed a lowlight Planning staff that had recommended inexplicably paving over Bells Bend.
  • No lowlight: the defeat of May Town Center in Planning made the rest of June all good.
• July
  • Metro Parks lowlight: Roy Wilson breaks his word on Morgan Park, yet again.
  • Metro Parks highlight: Curt Garrigan meets with Salemtown, apologizes for unrealized promises on Morgan Park upgrades and provides a definite timeline for completion.
  • Metro Planning lowlight: planners, welcome to the doghouse again. The community-informed West Nashville Plan bumped by possible May Town do-over.
• August
  • All of this month's lowlights are Mayor's Office lowlights with a little help from MDHA and McNeely, Pigott, and Fox: Karl Dean's convention center PR budget runs almost $400,000 over its $75,000 budget. His convention center hotel budget runs over $200,000 over budget. However, not to fear, since state law authorizes the Mayor to raid school funds to pay for expanding costs, even as his 2009 budget cuts help eradicate school music programs. And if you want to attend a Mayor's Night Out event to convey your concerns? You have to wait until after the event is held to find out where and when it is.
• September
  • Metro Council lowlight: Vice Mayor Diane "Hammer the" Neighbors reserves leadership positions on council committees for commerce-friendly, growth-focused, developer-blinded CMs
  • Mayor's Office highlight: Karl Dean parlays political capital into win on non-discrimination ordinance for gay and lesbian Metro employees, placating progressives who favor social issues.
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: Dean staffers cozy up to right-wing organization Eagle Forum in an attempt to unseat a progressive CM who simply asks too many questions.
• October
  • Metro Council highlight: CM Megan Barry decides to rejoin the effort to defeat LED signage even though earlier in 2009 she voted with a task force to allow LEDs in neighborhoods. Since neighborhood leaders went on without her and leveraged a check on the LED bill, she's got a lot to prove. She'll have her chance in 2010.
• November
  • Metro Police highlights: officers tell Salemtown that the Central Precinct leads others with a 16% crime reduction.
  • Metro Police lowlights: Chief Ronal Serpas gets surly with West Nashville leaders who have concerns about purchase of a former car dealership for the new precinct headquarters.
  • Public Works lowlight: One year after misplacing designs for the Salemtown streetscape, MPW once again is caught dragging its feet on the project.
  • Mayor's Office lowlight: the exit of the Office of Neighborhoods Director Brady Banks hardly makes a ripple.
  • Metro Council lowlight: CM Sam Coleman, reacting to the defeat of permitting guns in Metro Parks, moves to allow guns in rural parks and on exurban greenways, where they are probably needed even less.
• December
  • Metro Nashville Public Schools lowlight: They need new roofs and there is no money in the Mayor's budget to pay for them. But Karl Dean's solution for education? Building new charter schools: more roofs in our future to go without repair.
  • Metro Finance lowlight: Rich Riebeling dismisses with a smile questions about which cuts are coming to Metro services in 2010 to pay for the convention center.

Based on my count the strongest performers among the Metro service providers were were Metro Police and the Metro Planning Commission (which came through on behalf of the Bells Bend/Scottsboro community in June and which seemed to take seriously neighborhood backlash against LED signage). Bringing up the rear were MDHA, Public Works, and the Mayor's Office. Perennial bottom-feeder Metro Council lagged somewhere in between in 2009.

May year 2010 be a better one for service delivery to the Nashville community. We still deserve better.