Month: March 2019

Categories
Music Music Features

Ruby Vroom: Mike Doughty Recreates His Seminal First Album

CREDIT: Ben Staley

This year marks the 25th anniversary of a breakthrough album, one that, by bringing sampling up front and into a live context, came to redefine what a typical indie band could do. Soul Coughing’s debut, Ruby Vroom, came at a time when hip-hop sampling had reached new levels of versatility, incorporating everything from jazz breaks to cinematic soundtracks. Yet the New York-based group was doing something entirely different: a mash-up of jazz-derived grooves, eclectic samples, and the juxtaposed meanings of lyricist/singer Mike Doughty. Though they evolved as the 1990s wore on, their trademark sound was signaled from their first release. And so it’s entirely appropriate to celebrate the debut’s quarter-century mark with a tour that recreates the album in its entirety. I spoke to Doughty, now happily ensconced in Memphis, about the tour and its upcoming stop at Bar DKDC on Sunday.

Ben Staley

Mike Doughty

Memphis Flyer: Have you revisited the Soul Coughing material much since you went solo in the early 2000s?

Mike Doughty: Sure, I’ve definitely been playing individual songs in different formats — with bands, with just a cello player, or solo, absolutely. But not a whole album. I don’t understand why bands didn’t start doing this years ago. It’s really fun to be inside this longer piece of music. You can really feel yourself in the lake of it, you know?

It must be different when you’re revisiting your own work.

Not really. You sort of forget about that part. I guess I’m very in the moment when I’m doing it.

I always thought your lyrics were semi-extemporaneous.

Not really. A lot of them were written based on the sound of the words. So I guess that’s why it sounds improvisatory. My bands in Memphis — MOTICOS and Spooky Party — who I play at DKDC with, those are entirely improvised bands. So I’m plenty into improvisation. On this tour, I have a system of hand signals that I use to cue people to start and stop and get louder and quieter. So there’s almost live remixing going on in the middle of the tunes. I’m encouraging the players to improvise, but I’m not doing vocal improvisations.

What kind of band do you have on this tour?

It’s a quintet: me, Scrap [Livingston] on upright bass, and then guitar, drums, and sampler. And it includes three members of Wheatus, who are also on the bill on the tour. They’re not at DKDC because there’s three backing singers in that band and an additional keyboard player [Memphian and Dixie Dicks member Brandon Ticer]. So Wheatus is a bit large for that little nook.

I expect you’ll bring new arrangements to the old songs?

Yeah. A lot of it is similar, but also, it’s just the nature of how I play music that things are sliced and diced.

The samples, I suppose, will offer a lot of room for experimentation.

Yeah, that’s different. Just by the nature of it, that’s more improvisatory. And I play sampler, as well as Matthew Milligan. Sometimes I’m singing, sometimes I’m playing the sampler and not singing. It’s all live-triggered. It’s not like we just click on a thing and a loop plays.

Will Sunday’s show carry extra meaning, bringing the tour to your adopted home?

Yeah. I’m really excited to do it in Memphis. I absolutely love living here. I had the dumb idea of moving to Nashville when I was leaving New York, and a friend said, ‘You know, I’ve always wanted to move to Memphis.’ And I had never even considered it. So during my exploratory Nashville trip, I drove over and literally got an apartment in Midtown, just having visited for a couple days. I was like, ‘I’m sold!’ There’s something that feels really mystical about Memphis to me. There’s something magical about it. I just immediately felt at home. It’s been four years for me, and I bought a house two years ago. I live in Cooper-Young, so I’ll just walk home after the show.

Mike Doughty brings his 25th Anniversary Tribute to Ruby Vroom to Bar DKDC on Sunday, March 31st, at 8 p.m. $10.

Categories
Theater Theater Feature

Friends & Foes

Philip Ridley’s Radiant Vermin is a comedy about a newlywed couple discovering the dream home they’ve always wanted can be theirs if they’re willing to do what it takes. What it takes is both awful and potentially in the service of some grander, even more awful agenda. Think Whose Line Is It Anyway? meets American Psycho (but British), all rolled up in a gloriously ham-fisted metaphor for a related set of familiar urban plagues.

Storytelling techniques eliminate the need for sets and costumes. Shocking events are shared directly with the audience via light narration and flashbacks, with three actors taking on all roles. Things come to a head in a climactic garden party from hell, when neighbors who’ve all recently moved into the almost mysteriously trendy area converge. With its terrific cast leading the way, Quark Theatre’s creative team plays every note in this darkly comic aria perfectly, delivering surprise laughter and even more surprising flashes of tenderness.

Michelle Gregory, Lena Wallace Black, and Chase Ring make up the tightest ensemble in town. They pull off an energetic balancing act that threatens to soar too far over the top, but stays just grounded enough for the human stakes to matter.

What’s the worst thing you ever did for security? Comfort? Luxury? Did you even know you were doing it? And who are the real rats? These are some of the questions at the core Radiant Vermin, a show that gets in its audience’s face a bit, while spoofing some contemporary British problems that sound awfully American.

Radiant Vermin is a kind of Macbeth for moderns exploring creature comforts and how they help us manage guilt and other unpleasant feelings. It asks us who the real rats are.

Radiant Vermin is at Theatre South through March 31st. I cannot recommend it enough. www.quarktheatre.com. There are a lot of plays about the civil rights movement in the mid-20th century. Too Heavy for Your Pocket may remind theater fans of things they’ve seen before, but any resemblance is purely superficial. Set a few bus stops outside of Nashville, in 1961, Jireh Breon Holder’s disarmingly unpretentious drama follows the lives of two young African-American couples who are just starting out in life, and practically glowing with the promise of a hopeful future. Things aren’t perfect. Day to day struggles include repossessed cars and infidelities. But these troubles are offset by opportunity, togetherness, and a genuine sense of hope. Were it not for the vintage threads and the occasional mention of Martin Luther King’s oratory, it might be easy to believe that Too Heavy is set in the later 1960s or early 1970s, as the spirit of protest collapsed into politics.

The characters Holder introduces us to are cut from patterns designed by Lorraine Hansberry, taken apart by August Wilson, and satirized by George C. Hunt. Sally’s a young, pregnant wife married to Tony, a kind but philandering husband. Evelyn’s a nightclub singer making ends meet for her husband Bowzie, a flawed but promising young man with an opportunity to attain a college degree — if he doesn’t screw everything up. Too Heavy risks cliche at every turn, finding newness and nuance in old tropes,

After attending Howard, in Nashville, young Bowzie — as close as this ensemble show gets to a protagonist — becomes aware that the relatively happy country life he’s lived doesn’t equate to justice. Against the caution of family and friends, he joins the Freedom Riders — the integrated activists who took buses into the most segregated parts of the deep South. That’s when the friends begin to confront the meaning and real cost of a brighter future.

With Patricia Clark directing, and an ensemble comprised of Marcus Allen, Rheannan Watson, Aaron Isaiah Walker, and Elizabeth Baines, Hattiloo’s production is unfussy with a subtle painterly quality to the overall design — like the set and characters all slid off a Charles White canvas. Its power is derived from uncommon intimacy, and there’s a lot of it bubbling just under the surface of this new old-fashioned play.

Too Heavy for Your Pocket at Hattiloo Theatre through April 14th. Hattiloo.org

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Women of the South are Speaking Out

CREDIT: BertaCaceres.org

International Women’s Day was March 8th. National Women’s History Month started on March 1st and ends on March 31st. As this month comes to an end, I can’t help but feel that March needs to extend for a few more days, maybe weeks.

The days of the month don’t necessarily have to change (Just think about whoever would have the job of rearranging the rhyme “30 days has September.”), but what if we could live each day as if it were International Women’s Day, or each month as if it were National Women’s History month.

BertaCaceres.org

Honduran activist Berta Caceres

I don’t mean the type of celebration that, for example, ICE did on its Instagram page. That was a whole performative mess. The image posted on March 15th that read “ICE celebrates Women’s History Month, Strength through Diversity” left me with so many questions. Who is this intern that manages their social media? Are they a mastermind who has curated their Instagram page to make the irony and contradictions in ICE propaganda incredibly easy to find? Or do they really believe this stuff?

Either way, we better not be running things that way. We’re not going to be like those Democrats who tweet and post about listening to black women one day and then attack Ilhan Omar, a black Muslim woman, the next. When black women bring attention to the connections between black, brown, and indigenous struggles, as Omar has in addressing genocide in Central America and the role of the U.S., they are frightened. They are frightened by what black women have to say when they finally hold the mic.

Indigenous leader and environmental activist Berta Cáceres is known for her expression, “They fear us because we are fearless.” Cáceres was a Lenca indigenous woman born in La Esperanza, Honduras. She was dedicated to the protection of indigenous life and land. She led indigenous movements to defend natural resources that were threatened by the illegal projects of multinational companies exploiting natural resources and breaking international law. On March 2, 2016, Cáceres was assassinated in her home. Cáceres knew she was being targeted for being an outspoken advocate for human rights, as many environmental activists are. “They follow me. They threaten to kill me, to kidnap me, they threaten my family. That is what we face,” she stated.

Two years and 12 days after Cáceres’ assassination in 2016, Rio de Janeiro councilwoman, Marielle Franco was shot in her car on March 14, 2018. Franco was a queer Afro-Brazilian politician and human-rights activist. She was a favela resident, mother, and defender of human rights. Like Cáceres, Franco spoke out against injustice. She was known for addressing police brutality, economic inequity, and reproductive rights. In her campaign for city council woman, her motto was “I am because we are.” Growing up in the favelas, under-resourced, highly dense neighborhoods in the periphery of the city, she was a symbol of the resilience of Afro-Brazilians in creating community following the abolition of slavery.

Lia De Mattos Rocha, a friend of Franco, wrote about Franco’s life in a piece originally written in Portuguese and later translated into Spanish, then English. She noted how Franco marked a change from the traditional ways of Brazilian politics. “The change that we wanted to see in our institution,” she writes, “was embodied by her. Marielle was different from them, but she was like one of us: She came from struggles, social movements, black university collectives, Carnival groups, funk artist culture.”

Marielle Franco and Berta Cáceres were black, indigenous women who confronted structures that did not see them, or people like them, as human. They charged forward with dignity and marched fearlessly, knowing that black women and indigenous women like them have historically been targets of corporations and the state. Women like Franco and Cáceres continue to be targeted. They are familiar with this threat, and they carry that weight every day.

It is difficult for me to speak about them in the past tense, because in my heart, I feel them and their energy, commitment, and passion as alive. I see them in many black and brown women I know today. While these women are not in Honduras and Brazil, there are thousands of black, brown, and indigenous women there at this moment who very much embody Franco and Cáceres. But the women I know are in the U.S. South, the Mid-South, the deep South. They are often not seen; their work may not be shown in highlights of the evening news; but their communities see them. We see them protecting black and brown people, families, and communities, fighting for our dignity and our future. We see their pain and exhaustion. And in the bright moments of coming together, we see them shine.

I speak the names of Berta and Marielle into the days beyond International Women’s Day and National Women’s History Month. Their stories go beyond these few words, as do the stories of black, brown, and indigenous women around us. All we have to do is listen — really listen — and follow their lead.

Aylen Mercado is a brown, queer, Latinx chingona and Memphian pursuing an Urban Studies and Latin American and Latinx Studies degree at Rhodes College.

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

Soccer and Beer and Memphis: A Perfect Combination

(Credit: Memphis 901 FC)

The last professional soccer game I attended was the Memphis Rogues. I played the game a little in lower school, but can’t be accused of taking it seriously. If I’m going to be honest, I’m one of the few University of Alabama alumni who doesn’t take that sports program seriously either. I have, however, been to enough baseball and football games to know that what, and more importantly, how you drink at these things is crucial. And that may be the real sport.

Memphis has a professional USL soccer team now, the 901 FC, and I felt compelled to see its inaugural match-up with the Tampa Bay Rowdies. Admittedly, soccer is a lot tighter on the clock than football, and baseball doesn’t even have one. Soccer games all run 90 minutes, more or less, so you haven’t got hours to burn. The good people over at the Bluff City Mafia — the 901 FC’s supporter club — got around that hurdle by kicking off the pregame festivities at 2 p.m. down at the Brass Door. This was followed by a short, boozy march — complete with flags and chanting — to AutoZone Park for the 6 match. Good people.

Memphis 901 FC

A full house watches Memphis 901 FC at AutoZone Park.

So, given the time involved, Game-Day Drinking is like its cherished cousin, Day Drinking: It’s important to set the right pace. You don’t have to dial it back to “lunch with Grandmother,” but you certainly need to keep it a click or two below peak “Warren Zevon.”

For her part, the enchanting Mrs. M thought that arriving at the Brass Door at 4 p.m. was the perfect touch of fashionable lateness. By that time, the place was filled with an impressive amount of whooping and hollering. Impressive, because there was absolutely no reasonable cognitive association these happy people could possibly have for a team that had never played before. Except, of course, that it was Memphis’ soccer team. And there they were, leading bar-wide cheers with perfect strangers. It makes a fella proud.

Beer-wise, there was a lot of Guinness being slung about, but there always is in Irish bars. And for a game-day brew, it’s not a bad choice. The ABV is a relatively low 4.2 percent, and while it tastes heavy, the truth is that at 125 calories, it’s only 15 more than Bud Light.

Outside, the steam was rising from a recent rain, and inside, it was crowded — and I’m fat. So I went with a Wiseacre Ananda — light and crisp — but you might want to avoid it for a long haul. Mrs. M had a Bud Light; a lady is entitled to her mysteries.

The lovely thing about soccer is that it is one of the few times Memphis seems cosmopolitan, as you move through a crowd hearing Irish-English, Australian, along with some lively Spanish in Latin American accents. Mrs. M’s grandfather was English, so I was curious — for purely sociological reasons — to see if all these chants and beer-swilling would trigger some first-rate English football hooliganism in her. She was too busy making friends with some people from Philadelphia, but the night was still young.

We marched and chanted and finally turned the corner into AutoZone Park. For some reason, being in a stadium always makes me slink back to domestic brews, although you can get a limited selection of local craft beers at the game.

The readers who had to google to find out just who the hell the Memphis Rogues were might not have the association of cheap domestics and sports, but they work well. You want it to be tasty and drinkable, but you also don’t want to think about it too much either. I had a big, tall Budweiser. True, soccer really isn’t America’s game, but Bud is owned by the Belgians now, so it’s a topsy-turvy world these days.

Incidentally, Mrs. M never went even remotely hooligan on me or anyone else. That woman is a delight.

Categories
News News Blog

Strickland’s Proposal for Fire, Police Raises More Criticism


Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland’s proposal to give 3 percent pay increases to all commissioned Memphis Police Department (MPD) officers and Memphis Fire Department (MFD) personnel continues to receive pushback from unions representing the two agencies.

After the mayor announced the move last week, he was hit with criticism from both the fire and police unions, who said there was not enough discussion of the increases.

Strickland touted the proposal is his weekly newsletter on Friday.

[pullquote-2]

“It’s the right thing to do for the men and women who quite literally put their lives on the line every day,” Strickland said in his email. “I’m incredibly proud of what we’ve partnered with the city council to accomplish, thanks to improving revenues, fiscal discipline, and some private donors.”

Dan Springer, the deputy director of media affairs in Strickland’s office, said the proposed 3 percent increases aren’t related to the private donations mentioned by the mayor. Instead, Springer said it refers to the $6.1 million grant previously given to the Memphis and Shelby County Crime Commission (MSCC) for retention and recruitment.


Details surrounding private donations to the MSCC were recently at the center of a lawsuit filed earlier this year by Wendi Thomas, founder of MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, and the Marshall Project, a New York-based nonprofit news organization.

Less than a week after the suit was filed, the names of the 2018 donors were available on the MSCC’s website, according to MLK50. Some of the largest donors last year, giving more than $100,000, include AutoZone, First Tennessee Foundation, and Memphis Tomorrow.

The cost of raises for 1,632 fire department employees and 2,089 police officers would be about $9 million. That’s nearly all of the additional $10 million Strickland said is added to the budget each year.

“The pay increases we propose will eat up the vast majority of that — which I think sends a strong message of just how big of a priority public safety pay is,” Strickland said last week.

MPA

Michael Williams, president of the Memphis Police Association

Michael Williams, president of the Memphis Police Association (MPA), questions the motive behind the proposed pay increase, saying that officers are “being used as political pawns.”

“We knew that we would not get a raise last year,” Williams told the Flyer. “But because this is an election year, we are being used as that golden nugget.”

Williams also said that 3 percent is not an adequate increase, but only a “gesture.”

“We have fallen too far behind and now we are playing catch-up,” Williams said. “It will not make a dent in what we really should be getting paid for the job that we do.”

Between 2010 and 2015, officers didn’t receive any raises. During that time from 2011 to 2013, officers instead had their pay cut by 4.6 percent.

Even after the 3 percent increase, Williams said MPD will remain one of the lowest-paid departments in Shelby County.

“We deserve to be brought up to equal pay of the highest-paid department in Shelby County for now,” Williams said. “That would be a great start and we feel is not asking too much.”

[pullquote-1]

Ursula Madden, chief communications officer for the city, responded to Williams’ claims saying that “it unfortunate that MPA views a 3 percent raise in this light.”

“If council approves this raise, this administration will have increased police officer pay between 8.75 percent and 10.75 percent since 2016,” Madden said. “Would the mayor like to do more? Absolutely. But, we have a finite amount of resources and this is the best we can do.”

After Strickland announced the increases last week, representatives of both the fire and police unions said the announcement was made without proper negotiations and that they hadn’t agreed to the 3 percent proposal.

MFA

Thomas Malone, president of Memphis Fire Fighters Association

Thomas Malone, president of the Memphis Fire Fighters Association (MFFA), said Strickland’s announcement of the pay increases came at the same time he and others from MFFA were meeting with city officials to discuss the increases: “No decisions had been made.”

Malone said he wasn’t bothered by the amount of the increase, but by the fact that there was no real negotiation period before the proposal was made public.

Malone met with city officials Wednesday morning to renegotiate the amount, proposing a 3.8 percent increase rather than the 3 percent set forth by the mayor.

Malone said the meeting was “uneventful” and that the group is at a standstill until the mayor presents his budget to the Memphis City Council next month.

“I think we made an offer that was very well thought out and data driven,” Malone said. “From our research it’s an amount that the city can afford. We are not trying to break the bank here.”

The mayor will present the 2020 fiscal year budget to the city council on April 16th. The council has until the end of May to discuss, alter, and pass the budget.

Categories
News News Blog

TVA Plans to Remove Coal Ash from Allen Site

CREDIT: Southern Environmental Law Center

Southern Environmental Law Center

Aerial shots of TVA’s Memphis power plants.

UPDATE:

Shortly after TVA announced on Wednesday that it would remove coal ash from ponds at the Allen Fossil Plant, state Senator Brian Kelsey announced he’d filed a resolution calling for the removal of coal ash from ponds at the Allen Fossil Plant.

“Clean water is one of our most precious resources in West Tennessee,” said Senator Kelsey. “We should be doing everything we can to ensure that it remains safe and clean for future generations.

“Action must be taken to ensure that arsenic and other toxic compounds found in the coal ash landfill sites are not leaking into our water supply. It is essential that the coal ash containment ponds at the plant be emptied and closed as quickly as possible in the interest of public health.”

Senate Joint Resolution 29 asks the TVA to take action to ensure Memphis water is protected from a potential breach.

ORIGINAL POST:

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) plans to remove the coal ash from its now-idled Allen Fossil Plant in Memphis.

TVA now has two coal ash ponds at the Allen plant and some coal ash around what TVA calls the metal cleaning pond. Coal ash is left behind after coal was burned to fuel the plant and make electricity. That ash, however, is toxic and arsenic and other chemicals have leaked into groundwater under the coal ash ponds at Allen.

TVA closed the ponds after it stopped using the fossil plant, switching to new plant that uses natural gas to make electricity. But the agency considered sealing the ponds and storing the ash in place. But TVA announced Wednesday that option is off the table.

Instead, TVA will consider options that remove the ash. They are now deciding where the ash will go.

One option has TVA building and using a “a proposed beneficial re-use facility to process (coal ash) materials. The other would move the ash in “to an offsite landfill location.”

Southern Environmental Law Center

Aerial shots of TVA’s Memphis power plants.

Removing the ash, too, could make the “closure area land available for future economic development projects in the greater Memphis area,” according to a statement from TVA’s website.

“Bottom line is TVA does not own this property, and we think this is the best option for the future economic development options,” TVA spokesman Scott Brooks said in a statement.

Members of the local branch of the Sierra Club and the Protect Our Aquifer (POA) groups said the decision to remove the ash was a step in the right direction.

“Closure-in-place was never an option in mind, not in anybody’s mind,” said Ward Archer, president of POA. “That’s the equivalent of doing nothing, basically. It can’t be done. We all know there’s no protective clay layer below (the coal ash ponds). They have got to get (the coal ash) out of there.

Scott Banbury, the Sierra Club’s Tennessee chapter conservation programs coordinator, said the move was “great news.”

“We knew already their preferred option was to dig the (coal ash) up and move it somewhere else,” Banbury said. “It’s nice that they are saying that publicly.”

Categories
News News Blog

Faith Leaders Urge Governor Lee to Welcome Immigrants, Refugees

CREDIT: Courtesty of U.S. Customs and Border Protection

Courtesty of U.S. Customs and Border Protection

immigration detention center.


Eight faith leaders from the Memphis area joined about 70 others from around the state Tuesday afternoon in delivering a letter to Tennessee Governor Bill Lee, urging him to affirm the value of welcoming immigrants and refugees.

In the letter, the signatories identify themselves as faith leaders, “representing many traditions and denominations across Tennessee, concerned about the future of our state.”

Leaders from the Memphis area include:


• Peter Gathje of the Memphis Theological Seminary
•

Joan Laney and Morgan Stafford, as well as

Revs. Larry Chitwood,

Bernardo Zapata, 

Fred Morton, and Tondala Hayward of the United Methodist Church.

• Rev. Luvy Waechter Webb of Evergreen Presbyterian Church

The letter says that “no Tennesseans should be made to feel unwelcome,” and that refugees and immigrants “make our communities stronger.”

[pullquote-1]

“We are, therefore, deeply saddened by much of the recent rhetoric and legislative actions that run counter to these deeply held beliefs,” the letter reads. “In this legislative session alone we have seen bills aimed at denying birth certificates and housing to immigrants, as well as an extreme resolution in support of ending birthright citizenship. These actions display our state, and our state’s government, as unwelcoming and cruel.”

Though most of the legislation that the letter refers to has failed in the Tennessee General Assembly this year, the letter says the discourse surrounding the bills, “whether they pass or not, is harmful.”

[pullquote-2]

The legislation of concern is largely sponsored by Rep. Bruce Griffey (R-Paris), who has said he wants to make Tennessee the “last place” an undocumented immigrant would want to live.

Rep. Bruce Griffey (R-Paris)

The first piece of legislation, HJ R47, is a resolution that would have affirmed President Donald Trump’s efforts to end birthright citizenship. The resolution failed last week in a House subcommittee.

Griffey is also responsible for HB 0562, a bill that would have imposed taxes on money transfers in order to raise funds for the construction of a wall at the country’s southern border. That measure also failed earlier this month in a House subcommittee.

Another bill introduced by Griffey, HB 0614, would have made it a crime for landlords to lease to undocumented immigrants. It was sent to a summer study Tuesday afternoon in the House Commerce Committee.

One of the few remaining immigration-related bills sponsored by Griffey is HB 0662. It would prevent the state from registering birth certificates to a child born to “a mother who is not lawfully present in the United States unless the father is a U.S. citizen” and can provide documentation to prove it.

It is not clear when that legislation will be heard in a House committee again. 

“Hateful rhetoric and the threat of extreme legislation creates fear within our communities, families, and congregations,” the letter continues. “We ask that you put yourself in the place of a refugee family or the Tennessee-born child of immigrants. Would you feel welcomed, loved, and accepted in this state amongst this current dialogue?”

Pleading to Lee’s faith, the letter asks the governor to “live up to that call by affirming the value of immigrants and refugees from out state.”

“We know that you are a person of faith, and we know that faith leads you to value and respect the worth and dignity of all people, no matter their documentation status or country of origin,” the letter reads. “May you remember that they too are Tennesseans, and they too are children of God.

“We are praying that you set an example for this legislature and all Tennesseans by showing what it means to lead with compassion and moral conviction.”

The faith leaders’ Tuesday actions were co-organized by the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition, the Tennessee Justice Center, and Open Table Nashville.

Categories
News News Blog

Cohen: TVA Coal Ash Clean-Up Timeline ‘Unacceptable’

CREDIT: USGS

USGS

Groundwater discharge from an aquifer test at the Tennessee Valley Authority Allen Combined Cycle Plant in October.

Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA) clean up of the coal ash at its now-idled Allen Fossil Plant could take up to 20 years and Rep. Steve Cohen told TVA leaders Tuesday that’s too long.

TVA said it will close its remaining coal ash pond at the Allen plant. The federal agency is now in the process of deciding just how it will deal with the coal ash that remains at the site. Options include sealing the ash and storing it in place and removing the ash.

Cohen wrote a letter to TVA’s “outgoing and incoming presidents and CEOs” on Tuesday after a meeting with the Tennessee congressional delegation. In the letter, Cohen said “they are not treating the cleanup of the coal ash found in the groundwater at the Allen Fossil Plant in Memphis with sufficient urgency.”

[pdf-1]

“While it was my understanding that corrective work will begin this year, I was alarmed to learn at the meeting that cleanup could take as long as 20 years,” Cohen said. “TVA’s timeline to address its coal ash – the primary source of pollution at Allen – is unacceptable. The citizens of Memphis and Shelby County deserve nothing less than full commitment in this matter.”

According to a brief news release issued by Memphis City Council chairman Kemp Conrad Tuesday morning, members of the council and leaders with Memphis Light, Gas & Water were in Chattanooga Tuesday to meet with TVA leaders. 

Categories
Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Cozy Corner to open on Sundays

CREDIT: Michael Donahue

Michael Donahue

Cozy Corner family member Sean Robinson at the legendary Memphis restaurant, which will begin its Sunday hours on April 7th.

For the first time in its more than four-decade-history, Cozy Corner Restaurant will begin opening on Sundays. The barbecue restaurant at 735 North Parkway will be open between 11 and 4 p.m. on Sundays beginning April 7th.

”When my dad first started he serviced the Memphis Queen Line on Sundays, but we’ve never been open on Sundays,” says Val Bradley, daughter of Cozy Corner founder, the late Raymond Robinson.

Her son, general manager Bobby Bradley says they decided to open on Sundays “just to try to give us another opportunity to serve the customers a little barbecue. Some people want to come out and have food after church.”

Bradley and his family have a tradition of eating together on Sundays, but that will “definitely change,” he says.

That doesn’t mean the family can’t continue eating together on Sundays. “Honestly, we could move it to after 4 instead of directly after 5. There’s a way of having family time and make allowances for things we need to do.”

Categories
News News Blog

Legislators Want to Curb Local Control of Plastic Bags, Food Containers

CREDIT: Maya Smith

Maya Smith

Plastic bags like these could cost you 4 cents apiece.

The Tennessee Chapter of the Sierra Club is seeking signatures to help stop bills in the Tennessee General Assembly that would ban cities’ abilities to put any restrictions on plastic bags and single-use containers.

The House version of the bill passed on the floor in that chamber Monday. The Senate bill is slated to be heard Tuesday in the Commerce and Labor committee.

The bill ”prohibits a local government from adopting or enforcing a resolution, ordinance, policy, or regulation that:

• regulates the use, disposition, or sale of an auxiliary container

• prohibits or restricts an auxiliary container or

• Enacts a fee, charge, or tax on an auxiliary container.”

“This [bill] provides that this state is the exclusive regulator of food and drink sellers, vendors, vending machine operators, food establishments, and food service establishments in this state,” reads the bill. “This [bill] prohibits a local government from imposing a tax, fee, or otherwise regulating the wholesale or retail sale, manufacture, or distribution of any food or drink, food or drink content, amount of food or drink content, or food or drink ingredients…”

The Sierra Club called the bill “horrible legislation” and said it “would take away local communities ability to enact any restrictions or fees on single use containers, bags or eating implements (straws).”
[pullquote-1] “Single use plastics clog our stormwater systems, pollute our waterways, kill wildlife, and eventually result in microplastics in our water supplies,” reads the Sierra Club website. “Local communities know best how to handle their unique challenges with single use plastics and unless the state wants to enacted a ban across Tennessee, the General Assembly should stay out of their way.”

As of Tuesday morning, the club’s petition had 700 of the 1,000 signatures the club is seeking.

The Memphis City Council paused a vote on a new, local fee on plastic bags earlier this month as the state legislation made its ways through the Assembly.

The fee here is meant to curb plastic bag usage to reduce litter, especially in the city’s waterways, according to council member Berlin Boyd, who sponsored the resolution here.

The fee was initially 7 cents per bag but was lowered to 4 cents. If approved, it would take effect January 2020.