Reevaluating Salemtown's "Future Needs"

Eight years ago in the run-up to Metro Council elections I surveyed what were in my opinion Salemtown's "future needs" that deserved Metro government attention. I did not just pull these needs out of the air. I read planning documents that had been put together with the community feedback of residents of Salemtown. Then I picked ones that I thought were realistic and realizable in one or two council terms.

Now that we are in another council election year, I want to go back and reevaluate whether those needs have been addressed or not.

• 3rd Avenue greenway from Morgan Park to MetroCenter. In 2007, I wrote:
  

  [Metro] should address is conversion of the public property bordering the Treatment Plant to a landscaped greenway spur connecting to Morgan Park. That spur should include a decorative wall to hide the unsightly Plant from the view of the neighborhood. The strip of land running from Hume Street on the south to Coffee Street on the north is currently unlandscaped green space with a chain link fence and some trees and rose bushes.
  
  Currently, there is nothing about the green strip that attracts pedestrians strolling around the neighborhood. The rose bushes on the chain link fence seem almost like a token, half-hearted effort by Metro to beauty-up the strip. The space as it stands more designed to encourage people to hurry past in cars, because there is really nothing to see but a sewer plant.

  
  Nothing has changed along 3rd Avenue North, except the rose bushes are gone and there are more developments flying up on private property. The chain link fence still catches blowing trash. Metro has made no effort to overhaul and to reboot the public roadside strip into something people can use and enjoy. Metro has made no effort to block the blight and institutional ugliness of the water treatment facilities and their large grass-covered ash dumps blocking a clear view of the river. This area still has unrealized potential. The residents along 3rd deserve better.


• Renovation and buffering of the I-65 interface with Salemtown. In 2007, I wrote:

  we need a more vigorous and comprehensive effort by our next council member to pursue a wholesale renovation to the I-65 corridor through Salemtown that includes many of the community-sensitive compromises that TDOT made with West End-Hillsboro neighbors when they put I-440 in the 1980s.
  
  The Neighborhood Plan calls for noise walls and heavy landscaping along the perimeter of Salemtown. The plot of an interstate up against the walls and yards of urban neighborhoods without the addition of sound buffers is unconscionable. Our next council member needs to find ways to help us motivate TDOT to correct its obvious oversight.

  
  The state transportation department renovated the interchange between Rosa Parks Blvd. and I-65 in 2011, which improved the roads for auto traffic, but did little to benefit Salemtown. While TDOT did do away with concrete covered medians on Rosa Parks in favor of grass, they did not landscape them. Bushes and ornamental grasses could be useful obstacles for cars driving over the medians. TDOT cut down trees along the interstate, which served as partial buffers for road noise in Salemtown and then they refused to consider sound walls like those along I-440 in west Nashville. Instead, they threw the responsibility back on to Erica Gilmore, who did nothing to advance the cause of abating the roar of eighteen wheelers, despite the fact that in her 2007 campaign she acknowledged the problem. Salemtown still needs help with interstate buffering and better landscaping.


• Convert the Fehr school building back to a functioning public school. In 2007, I wrote:
  

  Salemtown is a neighborhood of families that will not stay that way very long unless some measures are taken to keep it from becoming a place super-saturated with amenities only for singles and young families with no children.
  
  One of the things that should happen to attract families with children to locate and to stay here is to replace a quality neighborhood public school here. However, there are no feeder schools proximate to the North End. Fehr School sits right in the middle of Salemtown. Decades ago it provided an education for neighborhood children, but it is used to provide other Metro Services now, having little to do with the neighborhood itself.

  
  Erica Gilmore and the Metro Historical Commission deserve credit for making progress on this future need. In 2011-2012 they picked up the cause that many of us had been working on for years: preserving the civil rights landmark from demolition. The Metro Action Commission, which was headquartered at the school, dug in its heels at times against historic overlay, but they finally gave in and Fehr is now protected. In 2011, MAC moved to a new headquarters downtown, which meant that folk seeking utility bill assistance from social services would no longer have to line up early on cold mornings in front of Fehr. Head Start currently occupies Fehr, which suits the educational purpose of the building. In the past few months, I have participated in constructive community discussions with Metro Public School officials, organized by current council candidate Freddie O'Connell, on converting Fehr back to a functioning neighborhood school. I am not sure that we are close to achieving that, yet. If it happens I would hate to see Fehr become a charter school. If anything it should be an unadulterated public school open to all children in Salemtown and its environs.


• A neighborhood-attuned council member. In 2007, I wrote:

  Salemtown, just like the rest of 19, is experiencing tremendous growth and redevelopment. The result is that we do have some greedy entrepreneurs who could care less about working with the neighborhood honestly for balanced growth in which everyone wins. Recently we found ourselves in the unenviable position of contending with both investors and Metro officials because growth is outstripping infrastructure in our neighborhood. The investors don't care because they only want to make money. Departmental officials only want to cover their butts. And many of our residents feel caught in the middle with no where to turn.
  
  It is not supposed to be like that. We are supposed to have an advocate on the Metro Council who not only listens to the contentions, but who is willing to get right down in the middle of the ruckus and help the sides reach a balanced and negotiated compromise. That council member should also be one to assist neighbors in consulting Metro Departments that are not always responsive or accountable. The Council Member should be leading the charge on updating our sometimes century-old infrastructure, while encouraging measured and responsible growth.

  
  Erica Gilmore has been considerably better than her predecessor on the Metro Council, Ludye Wallace. Where Ludye rarely showed an interest in Salemtown, CM Gilmore has attended our events and, especially early in her tenure, responded consistently. She went to bat for preserving the Fehr school building and many neighbors are grateful for her work on the conservation overlay. But I cannot give her much more than a solid "C" for advocacy for our neighborhood. She initially mishandled the conservation overlay process but then acquiesced to demands for community meetings. She was generally inconsistent with important community meetings. We were not always notified about meetings. And on the important question of a new minor league ballpark, she seemed prepared not to hold any meetings at all. When she did hold community meetings she ran them with a tight fist instead of encouraging open debate, negotiation and balance. The meetings were always framed as developers answering questions rather than getting feedback, and during one unpleasant confrontation with Salemtown Neighbors over rezoning, she seemed to question the association's legitimacy. We deserved better representation. I hope we get it in 2015.


• Extend the riverfront redevelopment transit loop into Salemtown. In 2007, I wrote:

  Salemtown proper is cut off from the Cumberland River by the Central Wastewater Treatment Plant. The Plant ... cuts our neighborhood off from direct contact with the river. So, the closest landing contacts our residents have with the river would be East Germantown and Downtown.
  
  So, it would make sense to extend the proposed transit loop past East Germantown to Salemtown and possibly MetroCenter. This could be done most easily by footpaths: extending the proposed greenway from East Germantown to the Cumberland River Levee Greenway in MetroCenter. But if a trolley run is planned for the Downtown to East Germantown leg, I hope that the future District 19 Council Member would look into the possibility of doing what he or she could to extend that trolley leg to a Salemtown transit stop (perhaps a greenway turnaround at the 3rd Avenue Treatment Center strip).

  
  So much water has passed under the bridge since I originally wrote this. I'm not even sure that the 2007 Riverfront Master Plan that included various landings applies. My point was that the trolley lines should stretch beyond downtown and East Nashville. More to today's context: with the opening of the new ballpark and the continuing densification of North Nashville, we are going to need more of the transit options that the east-west corridor currently enjoy. Trolleys running down 3rd between downtown and MetroCenter make sense more than ever. We got the extended greenway from Morgan Park to the Downtown Connector and Cumberland greenways. We have our walkable connection to the river that we did not in 2007, so if landings are still planned, we're in good shape. Mass transit still needs some work. We need pilot bus rapid transit projects for North Nashville. Light rail would surpass my wildest dreams (and is likely beyond what the next CM could accomplish). In Salemtown we need traffic and parking plans with street permits for residents, given the crush we will experience with the opening of First Tennessee Park. Metro seems to have failed us by not providing a comprehensive, smart northern transit plan (walking, biking and driving) with the building of the new ballpark.

Most of the changes that I argued we needed in 2007 still apply. Some have taken different forms over time. But most of upgrades Salemtown ought to have--many of which were expressed by previous community plans--are yet to be realized. I hope that the next council member from this district can help us realize them.

North Nashville event this weekend: preservation talk and walk at Beaman Park

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 in the park. As part of that campaign they are sponsoring a talk (at the park's nature center) followed by a tour of the barn:

Last month the Tennessean interviewed Mr. Grau:

Historical restoration expert and contractor Gary Grau examined the barn on behalf of the friends’ group, finding it in mostly fair condition, with leaks in the roof and damaged support posts, flooring and walls. Past repair attempts introduced materials that didn’t match its original poplar construction.

Grau said the gambrel-style “Dutch barn” roof is of special interest because of its size and its wind-resistant rounded shape.

Restoration makes sense, he said, especially as the number of such barns still standing dwindles. He said the site could be used for events and demonstrations.

“The restored barn should be such that when visitors step inside, they step back in time and are able to visually experience what early primitive farm life looked like,” Grau wrote in his report.

Beaman is one of the more unique parks in Nashville, and so we plan to attend. It is a short drive from Salemtown. We are excited about the restoration project as well as the formal opening of the Proctor Farm Trailhead in the future.

Beaman Park: fall leaf collecting photos

Yesterday we took a day hike on Beaman Park's Ridgetop Trail. It was a crisp day with lots of fall color. This place is a crown jewel for North Nashville.

An I-40 "park-over" would do more to spur Jefferson Street renaissance than a ballpark

Studies show that public parks have positive impacts not just on neighborhood quality of life, but on rises in property values and on the growth of broader benefits like jobs and youth programs and attractions for visitors from outside local neighborhoods. This is likely why a city like Dallas (TX), not known for its abundance of greenspace, took the innovative step of creating urban park land in an unlikely place: as a land bridge over a below-grade freeway.

Kyle Warren Park in Dallas

Observers note that the "park-over" has mitigated the divisive, unsafe and intrusive effects of a major freeway, but it has also spurred major mixed-use infill and revitalized the urban core. According to one Dallas planner: 

I was interested to visit the park to see if it lived up to the hype. The landscaping and paving materials are high quality, and movable outdoor furniture creates flexibility for groups to socialize or have lunch at nearby food trucks. I also noticed a well used and expansive outdoor library where people can borrow books and magazines during their visit. From my conversations with visitors, it seems Kyle Warren is evolving into a destination itself, with many visitors driving from the suburbs just to spend time in this high quality public space. While the location of the park is on the fringe of Dallas’ downtown, surrounding office towers give the space a “center of it all” quality, with colorful, brightly lit skyscrapers creating a unique backdrop after sunset.

Everyone with any historical sense knows the sadness of the slashing, blighting impact of Interstate 40 on the Jefferson Street neighborhoods of North Nashville. Local and state government have taken minimal steps: landscaping and creating a plaza underneath an overpass of the highway near TSU. But those improvements are not prominent and seem trivial given the history of the area. They're still buried underneath an interstate, which draws the main attention.

I have yet to see real estate advertisements that catalyze the plaza as a local attractor. That should be a source of embarrassment to politicians and community leaders who touted the plaza before and during its installation a couple of years ago.

Besides, North Nashville deserves more than a plaza underneath a freeway, which seems backwards.

In addition, Metro officials and state government should work together to park-over I-40 at places where the roadway is recessed. The interstate itself should be buried by social spaces that draw the community together. One recessed place is the stretch between D.B. Todd Blvd on the west, Scovel Street on the north, 17th Ave N on the east, and Jefferson St on the south:

Prime North Nashville spot for a park-over

A park over that stretch of I-40 could be an asset to Fisk University and neighborhoods previously severed from each other by the interstate. While a park-over would work with the existing properties, a further option could be to buy up the private properties between Jeff St. and the highway and flip them into green space as well.

With the tremendously positive impact that parks play in community quality of life, parking over the interstate would do much more to benefit North Nashville than a ballpark at Sulphur Dell, which is limited by a specialized, privatized and seasonal uses.

Charlie Tygard's ongoing infatuation with signs enabled by Metro Council approval of ads in parks

Erectile dysfunction ads are everywhere else, so why not in parks?

It's a vicious circle: the Mayor's Office will not fully fund Metro Parks, which leaves Metro Parks to scramble to come up with other ways to get revenues, which prompts council members--with buddies in the sign business or corporate donors looking at every possible marketing angle--to pitch privatizing in order to bring parks more money without holding the Mayor responsible for fully funding parks. Since Metro Council operates in such a vicious circle--made more vicious by a Mayor who has proposed and generated budget-busting capital projects--it must have been welcome relief to the blundering herd that CM at-Large Charlie Tygard pitched his latest smoke-and-mirrors pretense to help out Metro Parks.

With little debate Metro Council has approved this bill not once, but twice. Approval on third reading will open parks' gates to advertisers, large and small. The rationale is that our green space is growing so much that alternative sources of funding need to be found. However, Karl Dean has slashed parks programming by authorizing cuts to community center hours since he first took office. Hence, this move will likely lower expectations for increases in public revenues for parks. It will place the onus on Metro Parks to hire sales staff to market ad space in parks to corporate clients. It fits right in with the privatizing that the Dean administration has already done in other municipal services like public schools.

Rationalizing advertisements and signs by minimizing their impact is not a new tactic for CM Tygard. In 2007 he tried to justify putting car washes in residential neighborhoods by insisting that the signs advertising the businesses would be "attractive, monument-style" signs, as if comely signs would convince neighbors to accept car washes nearby. In 2009 he led the fight for LED signs in residential neighborhoods and he repeated over and over that they would not be large or flashing, as if that would never be an eventuality if allowed. In 2013 he promises no neon signs on the Parthenon (according to his sign-making buddy, Bobby Joslin, LED light strips are "alternative to neon", so maybe they'll look better in Centennial Park) and he issues talking points on signs that he predicts people will not see in parks:

The bill would give the parks board the power to create rules about ads and sponsorships. That would give the board the power to not accept ads from booze or cigarette companies, for example, or strip clubs.

“I don’t think we want to tackle the condom manufacturers,” Tygard said.

No? Well, what about predatory lenders, one of whom is Nashville's second fastest growing company (and a major campaign donor)? Is allowing ads from companies who market high-interest loans to park patrons who may be at vulnerable moments but who cannot afford them better governance than allowing Trojan to market condoms? It is interesting that CM Tygard was quick to prohibit ads that may or may not involve personal vices, but not ads that may or may not involve corporate irresponsibility.

Again, generating and justifying these alternative funding schemes that benefit his friends in the private sector has always been CM Tygard's M.O. And he has been downright hostile in the past toward publicly funding green spaces: during its construction Mr. Tygard derided the Courthouse Public Square as a "monument to government". This time the Metro Council is going along with his scheme.

Will people care when they start to see visual clutter in parks like signs with, "This mulch trail is brought to you by Waste Management"? Not likely. But it will stand as a precedent to allow Metro Parks to expand ads and increase their clientele later. Restricted ad space will likely generate greater competition and bigger offers that Metro Parks may have problems resisting. Look at the logic of the marketplace: smaller signs give way to larger signs. And who knows. One day we may begin to see illumination and LEDs on ads in parks as the first wave of private ads will have done the job of desensitizing us to more intrusive marketing that is bound to follow after the money rolls in.

Let's just admit that the buck for a budget crisis stops in one place

Tennessean columnist Bruce Dobie launched a provocative salvo at Metro Nashville Public Schools today. In the middle of his barrage, the charter school booster made an irresponsible judgment about our public schools:

We are on an unsustainable spending path at MNPS. Soon, the schools budget will comprise more than half of Metro’s budget.

What makes his comment irresponsible is that Dobie basically passes the buck for MNPS spending by leaving Mayor Karl Dean's accountability for unsustainbility out of the equation. I am always amazed at how the Mayor's supporters shift the blame for our budget problems, as if our charter was not set up to make the county executive the determinant force when push comes to shove on the Metro budget.

But put the charter aside. Look at the way Karl Dean has actually governed.

For 6 years, Mayor Karl Dean has made 3 priorities the defining loci of his terms in office: education, cops, and economic development. He hammered away at it his at his first community meeting with neighborhoods at the Nashville Public Library and his lackeys and shills continue to pitch those priorities right up to today whenever someone questions the budget. Regardless of the sirens of budget crisis and our fluid, ever-changing conditions, the Mayor has strapped himself to any 1 of those 3 masts like some kind of dogged mariner.

The problem is that we have run out of time. Karl Dean has not run out of time. He is term-limited, which only means he is moving up to a challenge for his next political office, maybe Governor, maybe U.S. Senator. His minions in the echo chamber will realign with him. But the rest of us are stuck with the budget mess that is starting to spill out around us.

Symbolic of Dean: a neighborhood of children
and a closed, padlocked community center

Perhaps the school budget has grown large and unwieldy because Karl Dean strapped himself to funding it at the expense of other programs. Karl Dean's budgets are shell games where money is taken from programs (like parks and libraries) to prop up the big 3 priorities. Community centers are closed and locked on summer weekends. Major drag is caused by the economic development pole in the Mayor's holy trinity. Mayor Dean hands out corporate welfare and perqs like tax-increment financing indiscriminately to relocating companies (even ill-fated, costly failures). While he collects revenue from us all and has even raised taxes, he gives tax breaks to big companies and rationalizes it by saying they will hire people, which in theory is supposed to make up for the revenue lost in attracting the companies.

Consequently, the school budget is naturally bound to outpace other Metro services with the Mayor's agenda in place. How easy it is to blame public education and ignore the Mayor's other pets. How easy it is to ignore his costly economic policies in particular.

Double standards and special favors for businesses (code-named "economic development"), shunt revenues out of the Metro budget, while the Mayor has to keep up the appearance of "fully funding" the other 2 immovable legs of his administrative stool: police and Metro schools. That is the formula that has won the Mayor enough votes to win two elections while compromising Metro services for citizens. Far be it from the columnist to ever take an unflinching look at Deanastic economics.

Despite Bruce Dobie's claim, MNPS funding is not the primary offender in unsustainable spending on Metro's spreadsheets. To lay all the blame on Metro Schools is dishonest. I read Bruce Dobie and I wonder whether he is running interference for the Mayor's Office so that they will not have to take the fall for the budget mess and so that Hizzoner can continue the transfer of public wealth to private companies, inside and outside education.

What is Metro Parks thinking? (UPDATED)

In the past few weeks a tall metal object with the words "On Air" (pictured above) was constructed at Morgan Park near the playground and in front of the community center. It is obviously an homage to Nashville's broadcast past.

But is it meant to be a climbable jungle gym for kids?

If so, I'm not sure what the design wizards at Metro Parks was thinking. Unlike the playground equipment, which is set on top of a cushioned, rubberized surface that softens falls, the radio tower (or microphone?) is set in cement. And look closely at yellow electric bolts attached to the upper rings. The sharpened metal plates are exposed. I could very easily see a climber horribly impaled on them after a misstep.

This strikes me as one huge design fail.


UPDATE: thanks to a tip in the comments below I searched the Metro Arts website and discovered that this sharp-pronged metal tower is actually a bike rack that Metro Arts (managed by Jennifer Cole, wife of former CM Erik Cole) commissioned in 2010. That explains the concrete pad it is sitting on. Now, how are they going to keep the little tykes who frequent the community center and Morgan Park playground from climbing "Steelskin Studio On Air" and either falling on hard concrete or getting speared on those cutlass-like steel bolts atop the pylon? Is public art in a public park really "public" if it is not kid-friendly? How could Metro Parks approve installation of this design? Why couldn't Morgan Park get safer public art, like the "handlebar mustache bike rack"?


UPDATE: Metro Arts responded to questions raised about the new Morgan Park bike rack on Twitter.

Of course, no one was impugning their program. In fact, if they had bothered to look back in the Enclave archives, Metro Arts officials would have seen that I am largely supportive of the program of public art, especially against the demagoguery of conservatives.

But this post is plainly not an attack on their program. It merely questions whether installing a tall monkeybars-like feature with hazardous sheet metal elements near a playground is a wise practice, even under the auspices of "art".

One more thing. I think it is awesome that Metro wants to encourage more kids to bike. The problem is: how does a sculpture that does not even come across as a bike rack on first impression to average people encourage more kids to bike?

Dominance, not transparency, the high note in the Mayor's Office

Steven Hale writing at the Nashville Scene:

Greg Hinote in the blue shirt

Little of what Hinote does as deputy mayor is done publicly. And because he's so allergic to the spotlight, in the absence of any cultivated public profile, a vague reputation has coalesced around him — that of the mayor's behind-the-scenes enforcer, dispatched whenever the Dean administration needs to bring down the hammer.

Without prompting, two sources independently pointed the Scene to the same example. And for once, the nail — in this case, former Metro Parks Director Roy Wilson — is more than happy to go on the record.

Wilson left his Metro post in December 2009 under a cloud of controversy, following seven-figure budget overruns that he said the Dean administration knew were coming. At a hearing prior to his departure, which one source recalls as a "public shaming," several council members defended him against what they saw as excessive punishment for a sin other departments committed frequently.

Two-and-a-half years later, Wilson — now director of the Dekalb County Recreation, Parks and Cultural Affairs Department in Decatur, Ga. — says he was "railroaded and treated terribly unfairly."

"And it had a lot to do with Greg Hinote," he says....

Now, Wilson says, the only word he can think of for Hinote is "evil." He still believes the deputy mayor was the anonymous source behind critical coverage of him in The Tennessean and the Scene.

Not the first time we have read rumblings of unprincipled actions among Karl Dean's men.

I followed the unfolding Roy Wilson drama in 2009 and blogged several times on it myself here.

Despite my requests for information, Metro never got back to me

Right after the May 2010 flood, I emailed my council member Erica Gilmore asking whether Metro Nashville tested the soil around the Downtown Connector Greenway and Morgan Park to determine if the black and red liquids I saw floating in the flood and left behind on vegetation after the flood was toxic/carcinogenic to those exposed. Below is the email thread in the context of a flood relief meeting announced to her constituents:

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Emergency Flood Relief Meeting in District 19 at Mt. Zion at 7 PM

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erica.gilmore@gmail.com	Fri, May 7, 2010 at 9:02 AM
Reply-To: erica.gilmore@gmail.com To: Michael Byrd
Thanks so much. I will get answer to these questions. Thanks, ES Gilmore Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile From: Michael Byrd <micchiato@gmail.com> Date: Fri, 7 May 2010 07:59:52 -0500 To: Erica Gilmore<erica.gilmore@gmail.com> Subject: Re: Emergency Flood Relief Meeting in District 19 at Mt. Zion at 7 PM CM Gilmore: Downtown Collector Greenway, near the Metro Water biosolids facility, May 27, 2010 Thanks for playing your part in helping Metro respond to the needs of storm-affected residents. I plan to attend tonight's meeting. I know you are busy right now, so I wanted to go ahead and send you a couple of concerns I will ask about tonight if they are not addressed beforehand. 1. The flooding of East Germantown and the Central Wastewater Plant hit fuel and machine parts containers, industrial machinery, and large trucks. Fuel and other chemicals were spilled onto the Downtown Connector greenway and intersections and lawns in East Germantown and back into the river. Have or will tests be run to determine what kinds of toxins are in the neighborhood soil? How safe are we from exposure? Are people being warned to stay out of these public areas until clean-up? When does Metro expect to have spills completely clean? Are there stronger rules Metro can establish for storing toxic materials in East Germantown to prevent such accidents in the future? 2. During the crest of the Cumberland River some of us were at the site of flooding in Salemtown: Morgan Park. The park has been flooded since last Saturday and it is now slowly receding. In the hours before the crest on Monday, flood water continued to push up from sewers on 3rd and 4th Avenues and into the already flooded park. During that time a reddish-brown substance gathered underneath the water flooding the closed intersection of 4th and Hume. Do we have any idea what chemicals could have come out of these sewers? Given its close proximity to East Germantown, will any tests be performed on Morgan Park soil for toxic substances? The police have worked hard to keep people out of the water standing in the park, but does Metro have plans to clean up the water and any chemicals that may have flooded in when the river was rising? Again, thank you for your service to our community. Regards, Mike Byrd

I never heard back from anyone in Metro about my concerns after that. At the end of May 2010 I blogged on the persistent dark rings around trees and the fact that no one got back to me about these concerns. After 3 years of waiting, I am thankful that WSMV-Channel 4 raised them again and broadcasted them to a broader audience. I am also glad that I documented the spills and took photos.

Sadly, if Metro Nashville conducted no tests of the flooded areas around Salemtown and Germantown, then we may never know whether the toxic chemicals kept at Metro Water were really contained during the first week of May 2010. We also do not know whether we can have faith that we are safe from exposure using Morgan Park and the Downtown Greenway Connector along the Cumberland River itself, which receives the watershed that so many Middle Tennessee communities rely on.

The lily white Scene

Genma Holmes observes that the Nashville Scene's coverage of the Belle Meade Country Club's acceptance of its first African American also caters to a culture to which the publication is already predisposed:

The Scene and its commentators have debated in depth the merits of David Ewing, Darrell freeman and others becoming members, or not, of the exclusive club located in West Nashville. What I find more interesting is the lily white makeup of the media outlet that is reporting on the lily white complexion of a social club. I also find it ironic the number of events around town that are sponsored by The Scene and NFocus that caters to the constituents of Belle Meade Country Club. Now compare that to the number of events that have a more diverse, modest income crowds that are not sponsored. Hmm.

Every once in a while Scene writers will try on an article of populism or two, but it always comes across as awkward given the way the publication trains on and caters to Nashville's high bold-and-beautiful society running the West End-Warner Parks corridor. I have never understood why the the racial make-up of the Belle Meade Country Club matters so much to the kids blogging for the Scene. Surely, there are more pressing progressive challenges that this city faces, and the Nashville Scene seems generally slow to consider them.

Populist when convenient

What's rich about the Nashville Scene blog playing the populist card today against West End residents who don't want to see East Nashvillians riding rapid transit in their part of town: the journos' populism has been stone cold silent in response to their parent company's moving the summer event "Movies in the Park" from Centennial Park to pastoral Belle Meade after some urban anomie (apologies to Emile Durkheim) bit them last year.

Do they really expect to have any street cred in criticizing Nashville's westward patricians given what looks like their company's own garden-variety white flight from urban grit?


(Full disclosure: I have lived in the West End area and in the Five Points area of East Nashville in the past. While I have no firm allegiances, given my current status as a North Nashvillian, I agree that the more pretentious part of Nashville lies to the west).

Nashville Scene judges Belle Meade a better place than Centennial Park for kids, dogs, and families

Nashville Scene writers tend to mount the high horse when the subject of excluding certain groups of people in Belle Meade pops on to their radar. Yet, since May 17, they've said nothing about the fact that their parent company's Movies in the Park event has been removed from the gritty hydrangeas and the streetwise ducks of Centennial Park to the nerve-settling pastoral milieu of suburban Belle Meade's Percy Warner Park.

The "alternative" newsweekly's professional flack told local public radio that the rationale for the Belle Meade move is to keep "this a place where people feel comfortable bringing their kids and their dogs and their families". Reportedly, there was some gang activity at one of last year's events that included gun play (no injuries), and the intrepid newspaper blinked and it is fleeing to the exurbs with its films. Even so, the marketing director did not seem to grasp the sobering and breathtaking implications of what she was saying: predominantly white West Nashville is no longer as safe for kids, dogs, and families as 99% white Belle Meade.

Capt. Dobie woulda cleaned up Centennial Park's mean streets
because white flight was not an option

This should prick all kinds of historic issues for those of us in North Nashville. West Nashville is flooded with events and services at a level that we do not enjoy. Resources flow west and east in this city, and rarely north and south. So, if the Nashville Scene judges West Nashville unfit to hold events for kids, dogs, and families, how much more will they feel led to neglect the families in our diverse communities because of their own fears?

I don't necessarily blame Scene bloggers for promoting and not criticizing the move, because they have to think about their jobs in an uncertain journalism world. However, they've dropped a couple of perches from their moral high ground on the problems of prejudice in lordly Belle Meade. After all, country clubs in places like Belle Meade are by definition exclusionary. And where country club aristocracy was not built on institutionalized segregation, then it exists with the aid of economic inequities and hoarded resources that never even trickle down to working class and under-class folk. Criticizing the Belle Meade country club for leaving other wealthy people behind is inconsistent with stifling a critical voice against your own company retreating from every other strata of Nashvillian for Belle Meade without the aid of double standards. And starting off the new Belle Meade run with "The Help", a movie about white housewives and their black domestic workers seems at once a further twist and startlingly poetic.

Metro Parks did not respond when journos asked them about the move, which does not look good for them either. They do not seem exactly out in front of this story. What is worse, however, is the perception that they have no control over functions at their more urban public parks even in predominantly white West Nashville.

The move from white West End to the even whiter exurbs smacks of white flight. It also betrays a false sense of security that gangs are only an urban problem easily solved by a more suburbanized setting. As if youth gangs do not have cars. As if youth gangs have not been expanding in suburbia for the past 40 years. So, maybe Metro Parks hopes that the Belle Meade PD can be more effective at walling out gang activity than their own rangers and Metro Police have been securing parks. We also should not ignore the cynical possibility that this may be a strategy for the parks department to save money on security in a lean budget year.

Whatever the reason, it does not look good, and I wholeheartedly agree with those have observed on Twitter today that it may indicate tacit racism and classicism on the part of the newspaper and Metro government.

Jefferson Street's deferred progress finally coming back around

Buzz about a possible ballpark at Sulphur Dell had eclipsed promotion of the long-awaited National Museum of African American Music, and it seemed to push aside Jefferson Street's Gateway to Heritage public space development. Now the latter is starting to get media play with excuses made for the 3-year delay include that multiple government agencies had to analyze and approve:


While not ideal public recreation space, areas under highway overpasses can be made hospitable. Here are some photos I made of greenways and public art under and on overpasses in the Deep Ellum section of Dallas, TX.

There was never a good reason for any government agencies to allow government-owned properties along the Jefferson Street corridor to fall into the blight that it did. And our community is long past due for the improvements that would have likely sailed through in less time for more affluent parts of Nashville.

Metro gives up plan to convert golf course to park

Metro Parks Director Tommy Lynch issued the following statement very late last week via CM Karen Johnson's website:

we will withdraw our staff recommendation to the Park Board for the acquisition of the Nashboro Village Golf Course.

The very reason we have public meetings is to get the chance for community feedback. After last night’s meeting with residents in the Nashboro Village area, we agree with them that it is in the best interest of the community and the Parks Department to give residents in the area the opportunity to pursue private funding for the continuation of golf in the area. As well, the council member [Johnson] representing that district has pulled the legislation to authorize acquisition of the property.

Metro Parks will continue our efforts to fulfill the Open Space Plan as well as the Master Plan for Parks and Greenways in communities that welcome such initiatives.

Of course, Nashboro Villagers are entitled to relinquish public conservation to gamble that private golf course owners will take no legal action in the future to try to shrink or eliminate the current green space. But they should not imply that our public parks and greenways in other neighborhoods threaten property values while private golf courses do not.

Nashboro Village residents prefer to give up control of green space to private owner rather than gain more control over it through flipping it public

Several hundred Nashville Village residents showed up at a community meeting sponsored by CM Karen Johnson:

A 144-acre golf course in Nashboro Village could very soon belong to Metro government, and not everyone's happy about it. That's because the city plans to turn all 18 holes into a park.

Those who live in the area feel that purchase and transformation will destroy their property values and ruin their neighborhood.

"I bought this house 11 years ago because of the golf course over there, and I really, I don't want a park," said Gary Petersen ....

2009 golf-course crime: Nashboro Golf Club witnesses
heard 4 shots before a 21yo was found dead on the 9th hole

"This is a nice, quiet neighbor-hood," said Peterson. "I don't want it to deterior-ate, and it will,"

I live within a stone's throw of a public park, and it has had nothing but a positive impact on Salemtown. It has a playground and a community center both of which provide all sorts of leisure opportunities for all ages. The park is a popular place for walkers as it connects to the Greenway system and has scenic points with different kinds of flora. We use the park all of the time. I believe our neighborhood would deteriorate without such an open, green space available to everyone.

The whole notion that parks make neighborhoods deteriorate is not only illogical, but it is not supported by facts. It was irresponsible for NewsChannel5 to repeat an opinion about parks without fact-checking what parks have actually been found to do. Walkable open spaces enhance the real estate values of nearby development. Hence, they do generate higher revenues from property taxes. A California parks and recreation video provides details on the positive economic impact of public parks:

But public parks also create a more direct means of accountability both for neighborhood watches and for community policing. Private owners are not required to be responsive and accountable for crime that happens on their open spaces. And a private owner can eventually pursue rezoning to reduce the amount of open space rather than conserving it. Some Nashboro Villagers are touting a potential new owner; they better be careful what they wish for.

We are more vigilant of our park than we would be if it was privately owned and if we relied on someone else to watch it. Any time something suspicious happens or vandalism occurs we report it to the police and the parks department officials so that they can respond appropriately. Therefore, parks create a greater sense of community ownership and they foster personal responsibility more than a private golf course owned by someone else would. Maybe the Nashboro Villagers who oppose a public park prefer to stay out of the equation and let someone else take responsibility for green space, but I don't see how that fosters any kind of self-reliance.

My disagreement with these opponents of public open space does not mean that I believe that installing a new park is a wise idea in these lean budget times. Our park's community center hours and programs have been slashed and slashed regularly over the past half decade. We've had to suffer bored kids idling about the community and sometimes being destructive because they lack the constructive outlets that park activities provide. The Mayor's Office should not act irresponsibly by adding new staff, program, and management expenses that would further cut into the budgets of parks in other parts of Davidson County. It is one thing to argue that neighborhoods need more public open space. It is quite another to devote the resources required to manage that open space without harming other neighborhoods.

"People's mic" a pragmatic tool for community focus in the absence of amplification

The New York Times has an important article on the political power of public spaces for organizing dissent movements and protests. But one of the author's points about a tactical tool Occupy Wall Street in New York City relies on leaped out at me:

It so happens that near the start of the protest, when the police banned megaphones at Zuccotti Park, they obliged demonstrators to come up with an alternative. “Mic checks” became the consensus method of circulating announcements, spread through the crowd by people repeating, phrase by phrase, what a speaker had said to others around them, compelling everyone, as it were, to speak in one voice. It’s like the old game of telephone, and it is painstakingly slow.

“But so is democracy,” as Jay Gaussoin, a 46-year-old unemployed actor and carpenter, put it to me. “We’re so distracted these days, people have forgotten how to focus. But the ‘mic check’ demands not just that we listen to other people’s opinions but that we really hear what they’re saying because we have to repeat their words exactly.

“It requires an architecture of consciousness,” was Mr. Gaussoin’s apt phrase.

Critics of popular social protest dismiss these mic checks as "creepy" and conformist rather than considering the alternative and pragmatic role they play. I believe this criticism is generally specious and willfully ignorant. Here is the people's mic in action:

Again, the entire New York Times piece is excellent because it articulates how public spaces provide opportunities for alternative communities to form. We require common spaces set off and protected from private enterprise for various reasons, but this is not the least of them all.

Further convention center drag on the budget underreported in local news media

While NewsChannel5 reporter Heather Graf filed a puffed PR piece on the progress of construction of the Music City Convention Center and while the rest of the local news media was ignoring the shaky state of the demands the convention center is placing on the Metro budget, WPLN's Blake Farmer at least inquired after the implications of the recent market roller coaster for Metro finances.

While few are talking about this and the Courthouse is taking pains not to be too transparent about it, Mayor Karl Dean's 2010 blueprint to refinance debt in order to avoid raising taxes or cutting services is in limbo at best and in trouble at worst. Such is Metro's undue dependence of the vicissitudes of Wall Street and the Mayor's high-stakes risk of starting the single largest capital project in Nashville history with no safety net except the revenues that go to pay for the really unimportant stuff like police, parks and schools:

Turmoil in the financial markets has temporarily put the brakes on a bond refinancing by Metro Government. The city is trying to get a lower interest rate on roughly $100 million in bonds, originally used to pay for construction projects at parks and schools.

Metro Finance director Rich Riebeling says as a policy, the city must save at least 3.5 percent to justify refinancing any debt.

“It’s all subject to market conditions, and because of the volatility in the market right now with the stock market and interest rates, everybody kind of up in the air, we want to wait and sit back a week or two, see how it shakes out.”

And who doesn't feel more secure knowing that the Metro Finance Director has staked Nashville's financial security and Metro's delivery of services on Wall Street uncertainty? And all in the name of lavishing our resources on tourists and of doing the greatest good for the smallest number of nobles.


UPDATE: A commenter below asks about rumored plans to deal with budget shortfalls by cutting retail slated for the Korean Veterans Boulevard side of the new convention center. Can anyone confirm or deny?

Where is Dean's due diligence on appointments?

You would think with the recent IQT debacle, the Mayor's Office would be pausing to revise its commitments (or lack thereof) to due diligence of its executive decisions. Despite claims by uncritical supporters that Karl Dean exercised due diligence in the case of IQT, it is not clear that due diligence or process mattered.

I heard from a Nashville leader who had been corresponding with IQT that the company refused to supply Metro with "standard due diligence" items that could have allowed background and financial checks. According to that insider the city did not spend "a ton of time" on the IQT deal. Metro saw the prospect of new jobs, "got excited" and made it easy for IQT to move without the due diligence items.

That leader's perspective is consistent with a July 22 Nashville Business Journal report that the "unraveling" the IQT deal revealed "no consistent, coordinated effort ... for vetting companies that seek tax money in Tennessee."

Weeks later we are approaching what should be a strictly Metro Council appointment to replace David Torrence at Criminal Court Clerk. Yet, Karl Dean has already usurped control and anointed former Vice Mayor Howard Gentry, who is generally above reproach, but he has few credentials for a job in Criminal Court and he might not even qualify for a short list of candidates to the position. This anointing sends a clear signal to the rubber-stamping Dean-wing CMs how to cast their votes during next Tuesday's council meeting; for the lazy, voting with Dean means CMs not having to be responsible for due diligence.

So, of course, Mr. Gentry will sail through next week without any objective procedure determining his selection. But this is not the first time Mayor Dean has picked people for departments, boards, and commissions because he knows them and not because they were objectively judged to be the best candidate for the position. The litany of cronyism:

• Ana Escobar, Metro Clerk (was with Dean at Public Defenders’ Office. No one else interviewed.)
• Rita Roberts Turner, Human Resources Director (was with Dean at the Public Defenders’ Office. Proved not to be a good fit as Dean's Chief of Staff. At job opening, Dean moved her, with no one else interviewed.)
• Keith Durbin, Metro I.T. Director (moved up from Metro Council. No one else interviewed.)
• Stephen Anderson, Metro Police Chief (promoted, with no national search conducted.)
• Billy Fields, Mayor’s Office of Neighborhoods (no one else interviewed.)

While those appointments were Dean's to make, the Mayor's selection of Dawn Deaner to Public Defender (she was also with Dean when he was at that office), was the council's, but according to one source I spoke with, Dean cued the rubber stamps on his support of her appointment.

Compare Dean's record to that of Dean's predecessor, who had a thorough vetting procedure that included nationwide searches, pro recruiting firms based on competitive bids and finally, local selection committees. I found out that the selection process produced brochures describing relevant departments, positions, qualifications and duties. The firm and committee typically submitted a "short list" of candidates to the relevant Board or Commission, which then shortened the list further to finalists to present to then-Mayor Bill Purcell. Consequently, the appointments came from all over the country and went to highly qualified candidates:

• Ronal Serpas, Metro Police Chief (recruited from Washington State)
• Scott Potter, Metro Water Services (locally grown, but demonstrated qualifications)
• Rick Bernhardt, Metro Planning Department (again, qualified and local)
• Dr. Bill Paul, Metro Health Department (recruited from Chicago)
• Roy Wilson, Metro Parks Director (recruited from Houston)
• Rick Connor, Public Works Director (recruited from Texas)

If the Mayor is going to usurp what little power the Metro Council has, common sense would dictate that he should only do so to assure due diligence and procedure in selecting candidates for office rather than simply doing so to advance his own interest in surrounding himself with unquestioning loyalists. The lack of process sends a terrible message to the departments, boards and commissions that they do not have to exercise due diligence themselves. The appointment of Jennifer Cole, wife of Dean supporter, CM Erik Cole, to the Metro Arts Commission may have been mimicry of dubious diligence since Ms. Cole had no arts experience before her appointment. Not only does a lack of process expand cronyism, but it also increases the chances that leaders across the system will rush to IQT-like washouts again.

By the way have you noticed that the media is deafeningly silent on these hiring ethical dilemmas? I've heard that we may see stories raising questions about the lack of searches after Howard Gentry's appointment, but not until then. What are the journos afraid of?

Some of today's Salemtown storm damage

Sorry for the crappy quality of these photos. I departed from my habit of using a digital SLR for photos and used an iPad 2 camera, which is not exactly robust.

Limbs & power lines down in Morgan Park along greenway

Wind-destroyed tree on house on 4th Av N

Public parks vs. pro sports stadiums

Charles Maldonado recently wrote one of the more important stories on the Metro budget that you will read from a local news source, but I want to draw one particular lop-sided comparison from his excellent article:

The land under LP Field was valued at $6.3 million at the beginning of the last decade, according to Metro Property Assessor records. It’s gone up to $6.9 million, an increase, but only 10 percent ....

On the other hand, the value of Riverfront Park went from $6.3 million to $23 million between 2005 and 2009. The largest individual infrastructure expense there was the $2.3 million station for the Regional Transit Authority’s commuter rail line the Music City Star, installed there in 2009.

Maintaining and improving public infrastructure that serves the broadest swath of Nashvillians is at least as important as serving the constrained and special interests of pro sports consumers. In this case, sustaining Riverfront Park has been a greater return for Nashville on property value than keeping up LP Field has.