First, the bad news…well, you already know the bad news. Marion, Arkansas, missed out on the new Toyota plant, which will go to our not-so-near Southern neighbor city in Tupelo. Now for the good news. Nike and Belz Enterprises announced on Friday that the giant footwear company will be building a new 1 million square foot footwear distribution center in Memphis.
Go here for the whole story.
When the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced its homeless-assistance awards February 20th, it granted $4.6 million to programs helping the homeless in Memphis. HUD’s Continuum of Care program rewards local agencies nationwide for meeting the needs of their homeless populations and funds promising new programs.
“It’s a performance-based competition,” explains Pat Morgan, author of the grant application and executive director of Partners for the Homeless. “We got $1.5 million more than our fair share, because we have been strategic in how we’ve gone after the dollars.”
Before joining Partners eight years ago, Morgan worked for the U.S. Interagency Council on the Homeless in Washington.
“I follow the golden rule: The one with the gold makes the rules,” she says. “In Washington, we looked at the best practices and research from around the country.”
Along with organizations such as MIFA and Catholic Charities, Partners is a member of the Coalition for the Homeless, a local association that coordinates the efforts of member organizations to assure that services are available. HUD defines the needs of the homeless as permanent and transitional housing, job training, mental-health counseling, substance-abuse treatment, and child care.
“The funding will continue as long as the programs are doing what they’re supposed to,” Morgan adds. The $1.5 million increase from last year will finance several new programs. One will develop permanent housing for chronically homeless disabled people. Another will build 24 units of permanent housing for people who frequently land in jail on charges of vagrancy or panhandling.
Partners’ portion of the grant will develop the Homeless Management Information System, a database of homeless individuals in the city. It will include a person’s name, race, Social Security number, and date of birth. The data will allow various local agencies to track the homeless population and see who’s accessing services and for how long.
“We can look at this huge database and see who’s been where. We’re developing a Web-based system that all of the agencies can look at,” Morgan says.
The improvements in local data gathering contributed to the overall effectiveness of homeless services. The National Coalition to End Homelessness reported earlier this year that only .5 percent of Memphis’ homeless population live unsheltered on the street, while 44 percent of the homeless live unsheltered nationally.
Despite the city’s respectable record, Morgan sees one major need.
“How are we going to get these people from the streets and into the [existing] housing? That’s a piece that we’re missing,” she says. “We have some outreach, but it’s not built into [agencies’] goals to get people their benefits and get them housed.”
A Memphis man calls the cops and tells them he was carjacked in a downtown parking lot. The police later find the car, and the driver tells them he didn’t steal it — the first guy loaned it to him. Turns out he’s telling the truth when the first guy ‘fesses up. Then both fellows admit they had been smoking crack all morning. Like we didn’t see that coming.
A controversy is brewing over Germantown’s official logo. The old version showed a horse and rider circled by a red “G.” The new version still has that “G” (green this time) but with an oak leaf above the words “Excellence. Every day.” We don’t know how much impact horses still have in a community that once had 15 mph speed-limit signs on Poplar for the four-legged creatures, but we do think the new logo looks like something you’d design for Vanderbilt.
The Memphis Zoo has asked 
Greg Cravens
Memphians to send get-well cards to their polar bear, Cranbeary, who broke a leg after tumbling into the deep moat in front of her compound. Zoo visitors say the female bear was pushed over the edge by her male companion during some roughhousing. We’ve had some dates that have ended up pretty much the same way.
Because of some unfortunate racial incidents, Sigma Alpha Epsilon is no longer an “official” fraternity at the University of Memphis and will not be “recognized” by the school for at least one year. We suppose that means SAE won’t be included in the school yearbooks, but since parties and other activities can continue at the fraternity’s privately owned house, we really can’t see how this will affect very much. If anything, the parties might be wilder than ever.
Maybe he should have sold it.
When Mayor Herenton suggested several years ago that serious consideration be given to the possible sale of Memphis Light, Gas & Water to an investor-owned utility company, he found few supporters, aside from the banks and brokerage firms that would have done the underwriting. The more typical response was that the idea was kooky and unthinkable and
just what you’d expect from “King Willie.”
So now MLGW head Joseph Lee is appearing before a federal grand jury, there are indications that politics have corrupted the utility, and the ordinary Memphians who are the shareholders of MLGW get bad news, high bills, Memphis Networx, and diversion of money from the water division to a professional basketball team.
It might seem to add up to a great platform for former MLGW CEO Herman Morris to run for mayor against Herenton this year, but it’s not that simple. There’s enough credit and blame to go around for both of them. Morris, by the way, has made no official announcement but has told several people he is interested. The filing deadline is not until July, and qualifying petitions can’t be pulled until April.
Herenton, remember, promoted Morris to CEO from legal counsel and gave him a free rein. When Morris’ term expired, Herenton let him continue and even approved giving him a raise to a salary higher than the mayor’s own. Morris left with a generous pension and severance package, although not as lucrative as the one he originally sought because Herenton thought it was too much and blew the whistle.
Right after the big windstorm in 2003, Herenton famously made a campaign visit to Little Rock while Memphians coped without power. In a press conference after the storm, he passed questions about MLGW’s slow response to Morris. Neither man can claim stellar marks for that one.
Herenton replaced Morris with Lee in 2004 and replaced several board members as well. That was overdue. The board had been dominated by cronies, consultants, and preachers for too long.
Late last year, Herenton chose his communications assistant (and Democratic Party activist) Gale Jones Carson to be MLGW’s head of public relations. She says the political favors that have been recently uncovered at MLGW predated Lee’s tenure. But the argument makes no sense. Herenton appointed both Morris and Lee, as well as the board members. And if he wanted to cut down on the politics and the impression of political skullduggery, he should have gone outside his inner circle and hired someone other than Carson for the PR job. There is no way she can be seen as a neutral spokesperson, given her history, especially if Morris jumps into the mayor’s race.
Candidate Morris would be questioned about his performance at MLGW. What does he know about “the list”? It seems there was such a thing when he was CEO. (See our story on page 15.) Why did he allow MLGW surpluses and PILOT payments to be used for Memphis Networx and the financing of FedExForum? Can the city afford the pensions, union pay scales, and health-care packages that were approved on his watch?
In short, both Herenton and Morris are likely to be careful about throwing stones. MLGW’s office headquarters is crawling with loyalists and grudge-holders for both of them. And now federal investigators are on the case. This looks like a story with staying power until the October election and beyond.
Like a lot of people, I’ve had trouble following the twists and turns of logic in media coverage of the war in Iraq. But maybe it’s starting to make sense. Sort of.
Of course, four years ago, during the last phase of agenda-building for the invasion, a key message was clear: Iraq, under the despotic Saddam Hussein, menaced the region and the world. Most of all, the tyrant was said to be brandishing weapons of mass destruction.
Now, with the fifth year of the war set to begin in a matter of weeks, we might wonder why the U.S. war effort continues at full throttle. The polls show that most Americans are finding the pro-war claims to be unpersuasive. Those claims rely on a multitude of buzzwords and rhetorical flourishes.
In the 48th month of war, the media lines that sustain it are quite notable. Beyond the standard methods of spin, eminent war promoters seem to realize that they would be ill-advised to state the essence of their position with clarity. But I think I get the picture of the underlying case for more war:
The U.S. government gave Saddam’s regime appreciable support during most of his worst crimes, but he crossed Washington with the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990 and was really bad ever since.
The American invasion was necessary due to weapons of mass destruction that the Iraqi government didn’t have. The presence of WMD in Iraq was crucial to rationales for going to war, but the actual absence of WMD is irrelevant to the legitimacy of that war and to the necessity of continuing it in 2007.
During the last few years, we’ve been told U.S. troops must remain in Iraq or that country will descend into civil war. Now, Iraq is in the midst of a terrible civil war, and U.S. troops must remain to prevent a civil war.
The president refuses to abandon his administration’s purported effort to promote democracy in Iraq. All independent polls show that a strong majority of the Iraqi people want U.S. troops out of Iraq, pronto. But, as a force for democracy, the U.S. troops must not leave.
The longer the occupation continues, the worse the situation in Iraq gets. And the occupation must continue.
Virtually every major claim and prediction that President Bush has made during the past five years about Iraq has turned out to be false or disproved by subsequent events. Today, his assertions are still being reported with great credulity and scant journalistic skepticism.
We live in a democracy, and the polls show most Americans want withdrawal of U.S. troops to begin now rather than at some indefinite time in the future. Meanwhile, the number of U.S. troops in Iraq is actually increasing.
The United States is using its military to further inflict violence upon Iraq, and there is more violence in the society as a whole. Meanwhile, top U.S. officials say that the “surge” of American troops into Baghdad is an effort to quell violence.
Many of the same politicians in Washington who avidly supported the invasion of Iraq are the ones now being accorded the most media prominence and credibility. Meanwhile, the politicians who were strongly opposed to the invasion before it began are still accorded little media prominence and are often tacitly dismissed as the usual anti-war suspects.
While the realms of politics and media offer profuse accolades to U.S. troops, the veterans who return from Iraq are getting grievously short shrift. The health care and other services available to returning vets are scandalously inadequate. The news coverage of Iraq-war-scarred veterans is routinely an evasive exercise in cherry-picking that dodges the horrific consequences in the aftermath of combat.
The war was wrong. The war is wrong. The war must continue.
Got it? Norman Solomon’s latest book, War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death, is now available in paperback.
Okay. I have had it with the climbers. They are eating away a piece of my soul. I saw the other day that yet another group of people made the brilliant decision to make the difficult trek up Mount Hood in Oregon in a blinding snowstorm. Maybe it wasn’t snowing when they started their climb. And maybe the
snow wasn’t even predicted. I don’t know. But, damn it, it is WINTER, and it snows in winter, and when you get on that mountain, as we’ve seen in recent months, it can snow, and if you are climbing, you are screwed. But no. This other group made the climb, one of them fell off a cliff, the others got banged up, they almost froze to death, and rescue teams had to spend who knows how much money and manpower to rescue them. Well, they are idiots. And instead of being told that by the media, they were heralded as heroes for surviving, and they spent a great amount of time on television being interviewed about what it was like to be stranded on the mountain in the snow. I wish I had been the one interviewing them so I could have asked them why they were stupid enough to climb the mountain in the snow and why they couldn’t just spend their time sitting in a bar and smoking like normal people. I almost said that to someone from Los Angeles visiting Memphis recently. She asked the age-old obnoxious out-of-towner question in that really whiny, horrible tone of voice: “Where are all the people in Memphis? Why aren’t people out walking everywhere?” I was having to be nice, so I bit my tongue. I really wanted to say, “Shut up! They’re all in bars smoking and eating cheeseburgers like real people. Put your freaking BlackBerry down, get off of your cellphone, and shut up about people not being on the street walking! And they’re not out climbing a mountain in a freaking zero-visibility blizzard! They’re probably at home watching American Idol and wondering why Paula Abdul looks like she spent the show’s season break somewhere in a jungle subsisting on nothing more than plants whose makeup includes some incredibly hallucinogenic properties that haven’t worn off yet. Her inexplicably bad facial work does not really help, either, not to mention that appearance on a television news broadcast out of Seattle during which she appeared to have robbed a pharmacy. Oh, how I wish I had been with her, because she was obviously feeling no pain whatsoever. If so, those bangs of hers would be killing her face. People here are not out walking because they are at home drinking and smoking and watching the latest news on Anna Nicole Smith, so just shut up!” Speaking of which, I have not been following that saga, but I do wonder if they have buried her body yet. And I swear I did look up at the television the other morning and saw a judge-turned-news-analyst and I KNEW HER. Ah, the six degrees of separation or Kevin Bacon — or whatever it is. I hope she doesn’t know George Bush or Dick Cheney, because that would mean I know someone who knows them and that would make me queasy. Is George Bush still even the president? I think, other than mentioning him here, and I don’t know why I am doing that, I have pretty much successfully forgotten all about him. I did catch part of a press conference a few weeks ago, and I do believe that his eyes have gotten even more close together and monkey-like than they were the last time I saw him. And he still crosses them when someone asks him a question he doesn’t want to answer, either because he doesn’t understand it or have an answer or because it’s a question with only one answer and it’s one that’s going to make him appear to be even more stupid than he usually appears. If that is even possible at this point. But who cares anymore? He’s probably on vacation anyway. Maybe he will get off that mountain bike and go climb Mount Hood in a blizzard. One can only dream. In the meantime, I have to go catch the latest on Anna Nicole because I am actually the father of her baby.
by JACKSON BAKER
After opening his mayoral campaign Wednesday afternoon at The Peabody with a
formal announcement event that had its ups and downs, former MLGW head Herman
Morris regrouped with a sizeable group of supporrters later in the evening at
the Botanic Gardens.
The gathering had a well-heeled look to it. Good wine,
elegant canapés, and hors d’oeuvres were to be had, and the room teemed with a
crowd that was clearly well above the median, income-wise.
That was ironic, given Morris’ use of the term “Tale of Two
Cities” earlier in the day to describe a city riven between the prosperous and
the poor. Though clearly upscale, his crowd was racially diverse,
however, in keeping with the candidate’s emphasis at his opening on being a
bridge between the races.
In his remarks at the evening event, Morris was fluent and
obviously comfortable with his audience, and his resonant bring-us-together
rhetoric, coupled with his aura (and stated promise) of professionalism, was
just what the crowd was looking for.
In a few scant hours, Morris had manifestly improved as a
speaker and seemed already to have grasped that practice would make him, if not
perfect, then at least good enough to compete. If he had a failing on this first
night of campaigning, it was a difficulty in finding the right way to close.
Sooner or later, of course, all rookie politicians come to realize that only
Tchaikovsky could get away with five finales to the same set-piece. In the
event, what Morris did was spin from one exhortatory coda to another until his
wife more or less concluded for him, with a pitch to supporters to buy prints of
one of his oil paintings, which were on display in an exhibit room just around
the corner
The candidate’s paintings – well crafted and traditionally
done — were, as they say, worth the price of admission, and several of the big
spenders gladly sprung for the selected print, a ploughing scene involving a man
and a mule and called, curiously enough, “Self Portrait.”
Should it come to pass that Morris does indeed get elected
mayor, the evidence of his oils was that he could probably do his own bona fide
self portrait to hang in the Hall of Mayors at City Hall. And there was a spirit
to the affair Wednesday night that anything might be possible.
But that could be illusory. Councilwoman Carol Chumney is
in the field, after all – and is sure to remain there, come what may. Morris and
his supporters all acknowledge that. And it would seem obvious that the two
challengers – Chumney with her following of disestablishmentarians and
barnburners, Morris with his bi-racial elite corps – would end up splitting the
same anti-Herenton vote. John Willingham will get some votes, too – though the
former county commissioner has by now taken on the aura of a perennial candidate
and seems destined to bring up the rear.
But at least Herman Morris, after all the prior talk and
anticipation, was finally hitched up to his plough. It’s up to him now to sow as
he will and reap what he can.
Congressional press releases are typically self-serving and, well, boring. But sometimes you get one that makes you go hmmm. This latest effort from 3rd District Rep. Zach Wamp being a case in point. We’re still trying to figure out how Wamp and Richard Simmons hooked up. But perhaps that’s better left unexplored.
The occasion for this splendid photo op? A bill sponsored by Wamp and fellow congressman Ron Kind designed to introduce physical education classes into the No Child Left Behind program.
Simmons said: “There remains only a ghost of physical education walking the halls of many schools in the United States today. Fitness has become a ghostly presence! This must change, and sooner rather than later.”
A ghostly presence? Um, okay. But this whole thing has us spooked.
We hereby shamelessly remind you of Flyer Politics editor Jackson Baker’s prediction that new 9th district congressman Steve Cohen would attract unprecedented attention in Washington, D.C.
In fact, Baker predicted that Cohen would achieve both prominence and celebrity at a rate unexcelled even by his born-to-be-famous predecessor, Harold Ford Jr.
Cohen’s apparently well on his way to making Baker a swami. Turn to the Comedy Central channel tonight and watch Cohen match wits with the host of the Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert himself. Q.E.D.
In publicly rejecting MLGW president Joseph Lee’s resignation Thursday, Mayor Herenton declared, “I will not, cannot in good conscience participate in a media, political witch hunt that is currently operating in the city of Memphis around the leadership of this utility company.”
“Let me also say that I cannot approve any initiative that has the support of the Commercial Appeal, Carol Chumney, and Myron Lowery.”
He referred to the troika as “an array of evil.”
After rejecting the resignation, Herenton encouraged Lee to focus on regular folk, and their mistrust of the utility’s meter reading and billing.
“This is one disturbing issue, that I have been overwhelmed by criticism and concerns in the community. I’m asking Mr. Lee, help me and the citizens understand to help me and the citizens of Memphis to understand the spiraling increase … that leads many to believe that the billings are excessive and arbitrary,” Herenton said.
In the wake of the latest round of scandal, Herenton announced his solution. “Next week I will be requesting from the Memphis City Council an allocation of funds to provide assistance to needy citizens, many of whom are on fixed incomes,” he explained.
The mayor used the language of the VIP scandal to shift focus to MLGW’s service of financially needy customers. “Those are the people who deserve special treatment and financial assistance,” he said.
“I will be asking the City Council to support my request for $5 million… to assist us, in helping us to help the people who need it most.”
Though Herenton offered his respect and support to Lee, he seemed to distance himself from Lee’s ethics with an unusual gesture. Herenton read aloud a letter he sent Lee upon the latter’s appointment to the MLGW presidency in 2004.
In it, Herenton warned Lee about the new “friends and supporters,” he’d acquire, who would seek to “benefit from your position.
“You will be faced with denying requests of self-serving elected officials,” Herenton prophesized.
“You have entered a political and social world that will test who you are as a man.”
After finishing the letter, Herenton addressed Lee directly, saying, “Mr. Lee, you’re a good man, and you’re still in my prayers.”
Lee returned to the usual Thursday business of MLGW board meetings. The board passed a resolution “approving an instruction to staff to remove names of elected or appointed officials, or VIPs from MLGW’s Third Party Notification List that were set up outside the normal process.”
Another resolution approved “requesting that elected and appointed officials within the City of Memphis and MLGW acknowledge that their personal and business utility bills…payment histories, delinquencies, and cutoffs are public records….”
— Preston Lauterbach