Author: Micaela Watts

Early voters in Tennessee are showing up in record numbers for this presidential election.

According to the Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett, 1,675,679 voters have either voted early or cast their absentee ballot. This number easily surpasses the 1.24 million Tennessean that voted in the March presidential primaries, which was also a record-breaking number.

This election’s number of early voters has also passed the previous record of early voters in 2008 by more than 95,000.

“I’m thrilled that people are engaged and took advantage of the convenience of early voting,” said Hargett in a statement released today.

The Flyer is awaiting confirmation to make sure Hargett actually meant “engaged” instead of “terrified”.

Hargett may be impressed by the early voter turnout, but the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee is not thrilled with Hargett’s recent assertion that Tennessee has federally protected authority to “purge” voters who have not participated in prior local or national elections.

Recently, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit struck down an Ohio law that allowed for the purging of registered voters who had not participated in recent elections. Hargett has said that the Tennessee law allowing for the same end result is substantially different than the Ohio law that was struck down.

Taking a cue from Republican nominee Donald Trump’s best oratorical practices, the ACLU-TN said in a letter to Hargett’s office, “wrong”.

“Tennessee’s procedures are predicated on a person’s failure to vote and will undoubtedly be found to violate the National Voter Registration Act and the Sixth Circuit Court’s decision,” the letter said before going on to call for the state secretary to inform county commission offices that the law is invalid in order to prevent any additional voter purges.

One broadcast news station in Nashville reported that in Davidson County, 19,000 would-be voters have been disqualified.

The ACLU-TN is asking for any Tennesseans who feel they might have been deemed ineligible to vote due to previous inactivity to contact them.

The Tennessee Department of Corrections released their yearly numbers today from Operation Blackout, a state-wide sweep where parole officers and local law enforcement officers team up to check homes of registered sex offenders for any Halloween-related violations.

In a 10-day span, officers performed more than 3,000 compliance checks on homes of registered sex offenders, and netted 378 violations. Halloween yielded an additional 1,214 checks and 33 violations.

It’s worth noting that the compliance checks cover a wide range of guidelines, and 378 violations does not necessarily mean there were 378 offenders donning masks and roaming neighborhoods.

Under Tennessee DOC guidelines, offenders may not leave their porch lights on, decorate their houses for the fall or Halloween season, leave their domiciles between the hours 6:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m., or open the door for anyone other than a law-enforcement officer.

The Arkansas Supreme Court disqualified one medical marijuana initiative from the November ballot, but voters will still be able to vote for a competing amendment. 

The court disqualified Issue 7 because it found that there were not enough valid signatures on the petition to qualify it for the ballot. The court disallowed more than 12,000 signatures, leaving the petition with 65,412 signatures. The petition needed nearly 68,000 signatures. 

Supporters of Issue 7 have said that it was written from a patient-centered position, as it allowed more qualifying conditions for the use of medical marijuana as well as the ability for a patient to grow their own plants if they lived a certain numbers of miles away from a dispensary. 

Arkansas for Compassionate Care, who led the campaign for Issue 7, posted today on their Facebook page that they would continue to fight in court for the allowance of the initiative on the November ballot. The post also urged Arkansas voters to still vote yes to the competing amendment, Issue 6, should they ultimately lose in a higher court.

If both initiatives fail, it could be years before Arkansans have the chance to vote on medical marijuana. 

The appeal on the TVA’s two wells won’t be heard today as the Sierra Club wants more time to gather evidence and experts.

The Shelby County Health Department granted the delay after objecting to it initially, but they asked the club to make haste, “recognizing that TVA is experiencing significant costs during this period of appeal and has expressed its strongest desire to have this matter heard at the Board’s earliest opportunity.”


The Sierra Club filed the appeal on Oct. 4. According to the Rules and Regulations of Wells in Shelby County, at least 30 days is required between the receipt of the appeal by the Health Department and the hearing, which would make the earliest eligible day Nov. 3.

The proposed TVA wells would draw 3.5 million gallons of water daily from the Memphis Sand Aquifer, the source for Memphis’ famous and delicious drinking water, in order to cool a new power plant under construction.

According to Scott Banbury, local coordinator for the Sierra Club, at least four wells are needed to adequately cool the plant. TVA has already been granted three permits that can no longer be appealed. If the last two permits are denied to TVA, they will be forced to consider other options for obtaining the needed water.

Today, the Memphis Shelby Crime Commission released figures that show violent crimes are up slightly from this time last year, while property crimes continue their overall decrease. 

While the figures, which are based on preliminary data from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, do show a 3.4% countywide increase in major violent crimes (murder, aggravated assault, robbery, and rape), the overall trend is down more than 15 percent from this time in 2006. 

Property crimes continue their decade long decline with a four percent reduction in property crimes from this time last year, and a whooping 37.9% from this time 10 years ago. 

District Attorney Amy Weirich said in a statement today that, “Since 2006, we have seen a continuing decline in the rate of major property crime. However, after steady declines from 2007 through 2011, our major violent crime rate has been up and down. It remains the biggest part of our crime challenge,”

Micaela Watts

‘This is the right thing to do.’ Memphis Police Director Michael Rallings announced a partnership with the Department of Justice that will focus on reviewing the MPD’s community policing policies and use of deadly force.

It turns out that the Department of Justice showing up at your door can be a good thing, you just have to send out the invitation in the first place. 

That’s what Chief Noble Wray of the DOJ’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services reiterated in a press conference today. Flanked by Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland, U.S. Attorney Edward Stanton III, and police director Michael Rallings, Wray announced the launch of an independent assessment of Memphis Police Department’s community policing techniques and policies related to use of deadly force.  

“This is a collaboration, and it’s important to know that,” stressed Wray, adding that the COPS program is an independent, objective assessment that the MPD entered into willingly. 

“The purpose is to improve trust between a law enforcement agency and the community it serves,” said Wray. Currently, the COPS’s program is in various phases of review with 14 other police departments across the country. Just recently, the office released 94 findings and 272 recommendations to the San Francisco police department after finding discriminatory policing practices against people of color. 

The process can take up to two years, and the findings will be released in a public report. Experts in the field of policing will be interviewing police officers and concerned citizens alike during the review. They will also host “listening sessions” which will serve as community forums for citizens to come and voice their input. 

According to Strickland, conversations about inviting the COPS program to Memphis started in April, but an objective review of the MPD had been a priority of his since his first day in office. Rallings echoed the mayor’s desire for a transparent process to improve community policing, simply saying, “This is the right thing to do.”

Public scrutiny of Memphis’ police department has been amplified in the last year, following the death of Darrius Stewart, an unarmed black teenager who was shot and killed in a confrontation with former police officer Connor Schilling. Stewart’s death occurred in a time where nation-wide public concern about police relations with minority communities is at an unprecedented high. 

Memphis citizen’s discontent with their own police department took physical form in early July of this year, when more than 1,000 protestors shut down on the Interstate 40 bridge into Arkansas traffic for several hours. Rallings said that the bridge protest did not spur the department’s decision to enter into the assessment, as the talks with the DOJ had already been underway. 

Rallings acknowledges that a detailed investigation of this size and scope will likely yield some uncomfortable findings, but regardless the department is ready and willing to comply. 

“We want to improve,” said Rallings, “And in order to improve…you have to open yourself up.”

The first listening session will be on Nov. 29 from 6:00p.m. to 9:00p.m. at Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church in Midtown, Memphis. 

Micaela Watts

Multiple generations gather in the sanctuary of Clayborn, eager to see and contribute to historic landmark’s storyline.

Today, more than 150 people filled into the sanctuary of the historic Clayborn Temple to witness new life breathed back into a resurrected stronghold of the Civil Rights Movement.

Standing in the south shadow of the FedEx Forum, Clayborn Temple, once a buzzing hive for both congregation members and civil rights leaders alike, has been boarded up and empty since 1999, after years of downtown development had gradually forced congregation members out of the neighborhood. 

In October of 2015, nonprofit Neighborhood Preservation Ins. bought the deed to Clayborn in hopes to embark on a multi-million dollar renovation project. Under the leadership of Rob Thompson and Frank Smith, media began to tour the nearly forgotten landmark last week. Today, the church doors were opened to the public, as the team spearheading the project invited guests to come in and discuss what they thought the new future of Clayborn should include. 

Tentative plans for the church will have it alive and thriving once more in time for the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s death, in April 2018. Continued public input will be sought by leaders of the project.