Author: Preston Lauterbach

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News The Fly-By

Best in Gun Show?

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence grades each state on its laws protecting families from gun crime. The grade represents an average of marks in seven categories, and in 2005, the Volunteer State received a D+ in the Brady group’s assessment.

After student Cho Sueng-Hui went on a shooting rampage at Virginia Tech University last week, many news reports mentioned Virginia’s lax enforcement of its gun laws. The state’s background check failed to turn up Cho’s history of mental illness, and his name was never sent to federal or state databases that listed him as a prohibited buyer.

According to Brady standards, Tennessee has acceptable laws in place to prevent minors from buying or possessing guns, but it goes downhill from there. Tennessee has no child access prevention laws, no safety-lock laws, and no private-gun-sale background checks.

Aside from laws designed to keep guns away from kids, Tennessee has few legal obstacles for adult would-be gun owners. No license is required to purchase a handgun, police are not permitted to maintain gun sale records, firearms can be purchased at gun shows without a background check, and no waiting period exists for firearm purchases anywhere. There are no limitations on assault weapons or the number of handguns that can be purchased at a given time.

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News The Fly-By

Victims: Wrights?

In a widely publicized display of grief, family members of slain county code-enforcement officer Mickey Wright raged outside a criminal courtroom April 6th at the announcement that Wright’s killer, Dale Mardis, had struck a plea bargain and received a 15-year sentence on a second-degree murder charge.

That may not have been the last fallout from the controversial decision.

Wright’s widow and his sister-in-law claim that they were not informed of their rights, as family of the victim, under state law. They also claim that they should have by law received adequate notice of the plea bargain from the office of Shelby County district attorney general Bill Gibbons, and that they were not consulted as the plea arrangement between Mardis and the district attorney became a solid agreement.

“Gibbons has indicated that he consulted with the family about the plea bargain. Our position is that we were totally shocked to learn that the prosecution was considering any type of plea bargain,” says Gail Miller, Wright’s sister-in-law. “We heard about it approximately two hours before the judge made his ruling.”

Wright’s widow Frances explains that the family has since learned that “a victims’-rights coordinator should have sat down and helped us prepare a victim impact statement providing financial, emotional, and physical effects of the crime on the family. We were never given that opportunity.”

Under Tennessee law, “the sentencing judge shall solicit and consider a victim impact statement prior to sentencing a convicted offender who has caused physical, emotional, or financial harm to a victim.” State law also provides that the family members of violent-crime victims be informed of plea arrangements prior to any entry into an agreement.

Frances Wright met with state prosecutor Thomas Henderson April 3rd, and he prepared her for what to anticipate. “Everything was on go,” she says. “They would be picking the jury that Monday and Tuesday [April 2nd and 3rd] … and going to trial next Monday [April 9th]. Thursday [April 5th] I get this call about 11:30 that they’re accepting a plea. I said, ‘We don’t want to do the plea thing.’ They said, ‘It’s really not your choice.’

“We understand that, but we don’t feel that the court considered the victims’ rights,” says Wright.

The Flyer asked Gibbons’ office to comment on the Wright family’s grievances. No one responded by press time. (The DA’s office has since responded to the Wright family’s claims.) In a statement distributed to local media (see Letters), Gibbbons said that his office always talks with a victim’s family in the case of a plea bargain: “I regret that we were unable to convince the Wright family that our decision was the correct one, given all the circumstances, including … the possibility that Mardis would serve less prison time or none at all if we went to trial.”

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News

DA’s Office Contradicts Wright Family Claims in Mardis Case

Jennifer Donnals, communications director for Shelby County attorney general Bill Gibbons’ office, responded to the claims of members of Mickey Wright’s family that appeared in this week’s Flyer.

Wright’s widow, Frances, and her sister, Gail Miller, say that the state failed to inform them of their victims’ rights, including the right to issue a victim impact statement for the judge to consider during the sentencing process.

Donnals says that a victim-witness coordinator with the district attorney’s office called Wright July 14, 2004. Then, according to internal DA office documents, via Donnals, the victim-witness coordinator mailed Wright a pamphlet called “Information for Crime Victims and Witnesses,” in keeping with victims’ rights procedures. The internal documents also note multiple phone calls to Wright from the victim-witness coordinator, and 15 personal meetings between Wright and the victim-witness coordinator.

Donnals said that the case for a first-degree murder conviction fell through and altered the procedure for the victim impact statement. “Victim impact statements are given when there’s a trial, after the conviction and before the sentencing. When a defendant pleads guilty, however, it is not automatic that there is a victim impact statement. In this case, the judge, I’m told, met with the family in his chambers and agreed to let them give a statement on the record in court, which they did,” she says.

Donnals said the DA office followed state victims’ rights statutes as closely as the timing of Mardis’ plea-bargain allowed. The first-degree murder trial was set to begin Monday April 9th, when Mardis and the state struck a plea bargain announced April 5th, along with Mardis’ 15-year sentence.

Wright says that she was not aware of the plea negotiation, and was informed that a deal had been struck about two hours before the announcement of Mardis’ sentence. “[The law] states that whenever possible, victims have the right to be informed and advised prior to the entry into any plea agreement, which we feel we did in this case. We wish it would have been more time as well, given the circumstances.”

Prosecuting attorney Thomas Henderson obtained new information in the case that cast doubt on the state’s ability to get a first-degree conviction. According to Donnals, the new information involved witness testimony that “would have made it impossible to prove first degree murder, [specifically], premeditation.”

Wright and Donnals respective claims about the timing of Wright’s notification of the plea bargain contradict one another. Wright says that she was called at 11:30 the morning of the 5th. Donnals says that “the family was present all day to meet with prosecutors in the case regarding Mr. Mardis’ agreement to plead guilty.”

— Preston Lauterbach

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News The Fly-By

Mission: Physician

A visit to a coastal village on the Eastern Cape of South Africa sounds like a pleasant vacation. A team of Memphis health-care professionals, however, worked harder than ever on a recent trip to Dutywa, a village in the region on the verge of becoming a city.

Local New Direction Christian Church pastor Stacy Spencer and church member Charlsetta Gipson organized the trip to bring medical services to residents of Dutywa and the surrounding area, which lacks medical infrastructure.

Spencer and Gipson recruited family-care physician Twyla Twillie, dentist Steve Ballard, sickle-cell specialist Patricia Graves, and obstetrician Lanetta Anderson-Brooks, along with about 10 registered nurses. The group spent three days last month serving roughly 300 patients a day.

“It was an interesting community to spend time with,” says Anderson-Brooks. “They don’t have any doctors that practice in the community, so the primary goals of this mission are, long-term, to open a clinic, and short-term, to introduce the concept to the community and see how well it would be received.”

The group chose Dutywa because of the village’s importance as a regional education center. “Kids within a 100-mile radius will get their education there,” Anderson-Brooks explains. “Most of the kids are living away from their parents in hostels.”

Dutwya struggles with growing pains. “It’s becoming a city, but there’s no infrastructure,” Anderson-Brooks says. “People have cell phones but no running water. People are suffering from basic health needs that can make or break a community, such as poor nutrition and bad water.”

The group made advance accommodations to ensure access to medicine and basic equipment. “We had a scout team go out six months prior to the trip, and they determined the needs. They knew I would be doing pap smears, so they had a bed that could accommodate a pelvic examination and a light,” says Anderson-Brooks.

While the Memphis group made referrals and hoped to positively impact Dutywa’s public health in the short-term, they realize that one mission is only a beginning.

“One of the biggest barriers to making a long-term change is understanding the cultural differences and then starting to work within those confines,” says Anderson-Brooks. “We have plans for 30-day, 90-day, and then a one-year follow-up. We want to set a new standard in the community.”

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Cover Feature News

Blue Crush

CREDIT: Justin Fox Burks

Thirty-four turned out to be Mario McNeil’s unlucky number. The 34-year-old African-American man and a friend headed to a favorite hangout, Divine Wings and Bar, the afternoon of March 16th. As the men entered the restaurant, an assailant opened fire on them. According to eyewitness accounts, the gunman jumped into the passenger seat of a Chevy Lumina and sped off. McNeil’s friend survived the attack. Paramedics rushed McNeil to the emergency room at the Med, but McNeil died as the result of gunshot wounds. He was the city’s 34th homicide victim of 2007.

Justin Fox Burks

Operation Blue Crush targets crime hot spots around the city and uses police resources to reduce illegal activity.

Police describe the suspect in the shooting as an “unknown black male.”

The vast majority of murders in Memphis are of the so-called black-on-black variety. The annual number of these crimes has grown from 83 in 2004, to 99 in 2005, to 106 in 2006. These totals account for 65 to 70 percent of all homicides in the city each year.

The Memphis Police Department (MPD) made a staggering 102,000 arrests last year. Yet the homicide statistics as a whole, and the black-on-black murders in particular, have swelled. MPD has instituted a new, technologically sophisticated strategic tool. Now Memphians will see if a new system of crime-fighting can suppress an old problem.

The city has battled its bloody image for over a century. An editorial in the October 10, 1870, edition of the New York Sunday Mercury included the line “to those desirous of shuffling off this mortal coil, to those weary of life, but who have not the courage to shoot or hang themselves, we recommend a trip to Memphis.”

In the early 1920s, a statistician for the Prudential Life Insurance Company named Frank Hoffman dubbed Memphis “murder-town.” Mayors Rowlett Paine andS. Watkins Overton financed research and publications debunking both the claim and Hoffman’s annual rankings of America’s bloodiest cities. While the mayors found plenty of caveats to attach to Hoffman’s numbers, neither could dispute the high total of homicide victims in the city.

Unable to solve the problem of violence, the city’s public-relations efforts turned to consolation. A headline in The Commercial Appeal in September 1928 spoke directly to the fears of a violent, racially split city: “Few Negroes Kill Whites.”

Justin Fox Burks

Richard Janikowski

That trend has held firmly. The stubbornness of residential segregation and the nature of crime in general, and of homicide specifically, have kept interracial murder rates relatively low in Memphis. MPD statistics list 15 homicides involving white victims and black suspects in the three years from 2004 to 2006.

Public attitudes on the issue of black violence in Memphis can be difficult to gather. Reporters asking questions tend to put folks on their best behavior. In the relative privacy of online communication, however, observers of black violence in Memphis speak openly.

An article on WREG.com entitled “Black on Black Crime Growing in Memphis,” which included homicide statistics for the first half of 2006, was posted on the American Renaissance Web site last year. American Renaissance is a self-described “publication of racial-realist thought.” Readers of the site are able to leave comments about articles posted. The responses to the black-violence article revealed a wide range of reactions to the problem.

One post reflects a misperception: “[B]lack on white crime is actually more common … nobody ever even mentions black-on-white crime.”

Another says, “It’s because of the stats like this that the locals near Memphis call the place ‘Memphrica.'”

Many commenters left messages similar to this one: “Well, white folks certainly DO have a stake in this, but how is it their responsibility? How is the weight on them? What are they supposed to do, walk around the city waving their fingers sayin’, ‘Now, now — don’t you go killin’ nobody.'”

Another sums up the frustration with standard — albeit disempowering — explanations: “It’s been said before but deserves to be said again. You can’t put all the blame on poverty, that’s way too simple.”

Richard Janikowski chairs the criminology and criminal justice department at the University of Memphis. As the architect of the much-ballyhooed operation Blue Crush, Janikowski hopes to bring Memphis policing strategy from behind the curve to the cutting edge.

Blue Crush is the local version of data-driven policing programs like CompStat in New York City and I-Clear in Chicago. MPD implemented Blue Crush operations beginning with a pilot program in August 2005, and the program went citywide last October. “The entire guiding principle behind Blue Crush is to get the right resources into the right place at the right day and right time,” Janikowski explains.

“There are criminologists around the country who say that the only way to cure crime is to cure all social problems,” Janikowski says. “This is the old ‘root causes’ thing. The lesson of the last two decades is that we can affect crime without affecting the root causes. Police make a difference. We can use innovative techniques to suppress crime.”

Blue Crush takes a geographic approach to fighting crime. It locates concentrations of offenses in a given area and charts the day, time, and nature of offense. “We track arrests … and look at Part I crimes [murder, rape, aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, motor vehicle theft, and arson], the most serious offenses, reported to the FBI,” explains Janikowski, though Blue Crush does not target homicide.

The program also does not track the race of an offender. “[Ethnicity] doesn’t directly figure in the data,” Janikowski says. “The reality is that [with] arrests in Memphis, just like nationwide, the overwhelming number identified in criminal activity are young African-American men.

“Geography trumps ethnicity,” he says.

Justin Fox Burks

Larry Godwin

The Blue Crush program generates weekly crime reports that identify hot spots — zones of heavy criminal activity within a precinct — to MPD, which then focuses resources on where police are most needed. Police inspectors — the rank of most precinct commanders — can decide the day, time, and tactics to launch a Blue Crush operation on a hot spot. Patrolmen credit Blue Crush with getting the proper number of officers on the street during operations.

Blue Crush also supplies MPD with the finances necessary to keep extra manpower in the hot spots. Officers work Blue Crush operations on their days off and earn overtime without costing the city. “Because we are the university, we have access to grants. Part of our job is to push the edges,” Janikowski explains.

The hot-spot approach feeds off of criminal psychology, which, as Janikowski explains, is not unlike regular human behavior.

“We tend to go to work the same way every day, go to the places we know and are comfortable in,” Janikowski says. “Offenders are the same way. They’ll offend in the neighborhood they’re used to.”

Janikowski has taken the geographic approach to reducing crime in Memphis due in part to some of the city’s unique historical and demographic features.

Urban renewal and the abandonment and reclamation of downtown in the past half-century have shaken up the city’s residential and criminal patterns. “As public housing closed down, we dispersed people,” Janikowski explains. “Offenders became more mobile than they used to be, and crime has expanded into areas that weren’t necessarily targeted before.”

While the idea that Memphis crime is expanding its horizons may not reassure residents, Janikowski insists that the situation aids crime-fighters. “The advantage to having offenders operating where they aren’t comfortable is that that’s when they make mistakes and get caught,” he says. “A group started doing robberies in Collierville. They robbed a woman in her driveway. Collierville PD got them because those fools got themselves lost in the subdivision.”

Susan Lowe

On the scene: an MPD officer at work fighting crime.

Every Thursday morning, high-ranking officers from each of the city’s police precincts gather at Airways Station to discuss the results of the previous week’s Blue Crush operations and announce plans for the next.

Director of Police Services Larry Godwin and 20 lieutenants, majors, and inspectors from across the city sit at a horseshoe-shaped table that faces a screen and podium. The scene recalls DC Comics’ Justice League of America, albeit with more guns and less colorful costumes. Another 50 police personnel sit at rows of tables to observe. One officer likens it to a scene from the TV series The District.

Janikowski welcomes a couple of guests to the meeting, pointing out that they can help themselves to a cup of coffee “and — of course — there are donuts.”

Godwin kicks off the meeting with a general address. He’s nothing if not concerned with the public perception of his officers. After receiving complaints about cops talking on cell phones while on duty, he urges greater discretion. “I could pull up beside an officer on the phone [in his car] and put a bullet in the back of his head, and he’d never know it,” he told those gathered at the meeting.

After Godwin’s address, those in the horseshoe take turns giving PowerPoint presentations from the podium detailing statistical breakdowns of particular crimes in their respective precincts. They flash graphs and tables on the screen. They compare the given week to the three leading up to it, as well as the same week in the previous year. If certain tactics fail to suppress a problem in a hot spot, they try something else. “Precinct commanders have to decide where police will operate in their precincts based on the [Blue Crush] data packages they receive. They know their area. They’ve got to decide how to best use their resources,” Janikowski says.

Crime does go down in the hot spots. The question remains whether or not Blue Crush reduces crime across the board.

Through these snapshots of weekly Part I crimes in the city, one learns that residential burglaries occur in nearly epidemic proportions. If “epidemic” seems too strong a word, ask yourself if 82 new cases of avian flu in a month in Hickory Hill would alarm you. Residential burglaries outnumber every other crime in virtually every precinct in the city.

Blue Crush in action deploys combinations of visible patrolmen to suppress criminal activity and plainclothes officers to gather intelligence on the street. Though officers are generally pleased with the extra manpower that Blue Crush operations mobilize, some wonder if full-time undercover officers could enhance results.

A white officer joked that he and his partner going plainclothes had little to no effect in their predominantly black precinct. He mocked the idea of two whites driving around asking groups of young blacks, “Got any dope?”

Street cops have other concerns. Some say that attrition in their numbers from retirement and relocation outpaces the number of new recruits. One officer said that he counted only 40 graduates from the MPD training academy since Mayor Willie Herenton’s call for an expanded force last fall. (The idea of a new publicly funded football stadium is unpopular among those who have not received a pay raise in two years.)

Janikowski explains that increased efficiency and proper usage of resources could address some of the force’s manpower issues. “Blue Crush is reengineering the entire police department and restructuring things,” he says.

“The TAC unit [the Memphis equivalent of a SWAT team] does barricade and hostage situations and dignitary protection. The rest of the time, they’re working out and shooting, and they look really tough while they’re waiting to get called out. They’re the best trained, in the best shape. Give them warrants each day to go and chase some folks. This has been happening over the last six months,” Janikowski explains.

While the issue behind much of the city’s crime is easily identifiable, it remains difficult to solve. “If I was going to pinpoint a particular problem, it would be gangs, because it relates guns, drugs, robberies, and burglaries,” Godwin says.

Janikowski adds that predominantly African-American gangs drive crime statistics disproportionately. “The gangs are making their money in the drug market, in guns, and in stolen goods,” he says.

Godwin notes some incremental progress: “About eight months ago, we locked up 55 known gang members. That doesn’t sound like a lot when you’ve got 5,000 gang members [in the city]. But when you’re hitting the upper echelon in those gangs, it puts them in turmoil.”

Janikowski, however, says that Memphis gangs are highly fluid institutions with high turnover rates and no hierarchy. “They’re not these solid, corporate structures like the Mafia. Even gang allegiance changes. Some guys have tattoos from the Gangster Disciples and Vice Lords,” he says, adding that they show resilience to arrests, deaths, and defections from within the organizations. “They’re like any other employer. When they lose an employee, they hire another one,” he says.

Gangs’ modi operandi feed the police strategy for fighting organized crime. “We embed undercover officers in the gangs,” Godwin says. “I’m a firm believer in the undercover program in the gangs. I don’t think going around in a car that has ‘gang unit’ written on it is going to get you into the gangs and get you those good arrests. You’ve got to be one of them. You have to buy the guns, buy the drugs, and watch them deal in prostitution. Then build cases that way and make them stick.”

“Good arrests” for the police are federal crimes, since state-level convictions seldom result in more than half of a sentence served.

“We get a lot of information from being embedded [in gangs]. We’re living with them. It’s like any other rumor mill. You hear things within the gangs. We start to try to verify those things and substantiate whether or not it’s a possibility that a hit is coming down here,” he says, adding: “I’m all for reaching out to gangs and saying, ‘One of your members was shot. Let the police handle this instead of retaliating.’ I wish we could reach out more and make that arrest before the other gang can retaliate.”

Which brings us back to unlucky 34. The proverbial word on the street says that an organized crime outfit wanted Mario McNeil dead. McNeil was, by various accounts, a devoted father, a small-business owner, and a singer in his church’s choir. Those mourning McNeil’s murder left 15 pages of remembrances on his online obituary guestbook.

Whether McNeil’s murder was the result of gang activity or a random act of violence against an innocent, his story is symptomatic of an old problem that could prove immune to new cures.

“There’s no magic bullet. I think that is something that the media tries to feed [people]. ‘If we had this, it would solve it,'” Janikowski says.

No one disputes the prevalence of black-on-black violence in Memphis. The numbers don’t lie. MPD strategy, however, is, technically speaking, color-blind.

“We don’t address [black violence] in any way different from any other crime. We look at areas. Some of those may be predominantly African-American [parts of the city], but we address them all the same. A crime is a crime to us,” Janikowski says.

The future of crime-fighting might also be impacted by this year’s Memphis mayoral election. Though Herenton stands firmly beside Godwin, mayoral candidate Carol Chumney promises to devote fresh energy to the issue of crime. Though Janikowksi favors the long view of crime statistics and advocates patience with the progress of any crime remedy, Chumney says that Blue Crush should be scrapped if it isn’t working.

“Nothing’s immune to politics,” Janikowski says. “As it becomes ingrained in the police department, as the public sees effects over time, it’s going to be the way we do business in the future. It may not be called Blue Crush, but this idea of data-driven policing is here to stay.”

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News The Fly-By

When the Saints Come Marching In

The March 20th death of Church of God in Christ (COGIC) presiding bishop Gilbert Earl Patterson closed the book on the Memphis-based denomination’s first century.

Patterson delivered old-time religion from the pulpit while possessing the mass-media savvy to spread the word far beyond his local congregation. Broadcasts of Patterson’s sermons, produced in-house and distributed to three cable networks, reached millions of viewers worldwide. Today, COGIC is recognized as the world’s largest African-American Pentecostal denomination.

Bishop Patterson will lie in state Wednesday, March 28th, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. at Mason Temple, located near downtown at 930 Mason Street. The temple is the resting place of COGIC founder Charles Harrison Mason and the site of Martin Luther King Jr.’s final public address, the “I have been to the mountaintop” speech, delivered April 3, 1968.

COGIC announced three more days of memorial events to be held at the Temple of Deliverance at 369 G.E. Patterson Avenue downtown. The local church memorial service is scheduled for 7 p.m. Thursday, March 29th, with the jurisdictional memorial service the following day at 7 p.m.

Patterson’s funeral begins Saturday at 10 a.m. All services are open to the public.

Bishop Charles Blake of the 22,000-member West Angeles COGIC in Los Angeles has been named interim presiding bishop, and he will officiate at the funeral.

COGIC expects thousands to attend, with saints — as COGIC members are known — flocking to Memphis from around the world. COGIC leaders are focused on this week’s activities but will soon announce a plan to install Patterson’s successor.

Patterson’s death and the subsequent leadership change could send ripples throughout Memphis. The denomination elects its presiding bishop every four years, with the next election scheduled for 2008. In a February interview, COGIC COO and second-in-command, Bishop Jerry Maynard said, “It is not in our minds to choose a person other than [Patterson] in 2008. In ’08, if there’s a Bishop Patterson, he will stay in the position.”

COGIC is an incorporated entity, and whoever is elected presiding bishop also carries the CEO title and makes the organization’s business decisions.

Thanks to Patterson’s presence in Memphis, COGIC has made a significant local economic impact. The national convocation held here each November attracts up to 60,000 saints and generates an estimated $30 million in business revenue and sales taxes. In addition, the organization hires and trains local minorities in skilled positions while also attracting talent from outside the region.

Though COGIC has rate agreements in place with some Memphis hotels through 2012, the election of a presiding bishop in another city could shift the denomination’s power center and move the convocation. In recent years, Patterson and other church officials have suggested that the event has outgrown Memphis.

See the current issue of our sister publication Memphis Business Quarterly for an article on COGIC during Patterson’s lifetime. Check www.memphisflyer.com for updates on this week’s memorial activities and the Patterson funeral.

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News The Fly-By

Q&A: Denise Parkinson, City Council candidate

If the core can learn from the edge — as business leader and public intellectual John Seely Brown attests — grassroots activist Denise Parkinson may be just the educator for the Memphis City Council.

One of the founders of the Save Libertyland! and a former mayoral candidate in Little Rock, Arkansas, Parkinson officially launched her campaign for the City Council’s District 5 seat last week against Jim Strickland. Carol Chumney currently holds the District 5 position but will vacate to run for city mayor. — by Preston Lauterbach

Flyer: What influenced your decision to run?

Parkinson: Memphis Light, Gas and Water, the Riverfront Development Corporation, and the Mid-South Fair. If you connect those dots, then you realize that there are shadowy, quasi-governmental non-profits that are systematically looting the system. It’s time for a change in the status quo.

It also has to do with seeing the skyline, the unique architecture of Memphis, being destroyed. I call it “government by demolition.”


What would you change?

For one thing, I would do everything I could to not set the precedent of paving over and bulldozing historic parks. I would do all I could to reopen the historic properties the city has closed. The Magevney House and the Mallory-Neely House have been closed for two, going on three years.

I want to make the city more family friendly, more kid friendly, and beef up our tourism. We’ve lost the way. We can unite the cultural and natural heritage of Memphis and make Memphis a destination again. When I was growing up in Arkansas, if you wanted to see a real city, you came to Memphis. That’s not the case anymore.

Are you running as a Democrat?

[Sighs] I suppose. What choice do I have? I think that when a City Council is abandoning the system of checks and balances and shirking their responsibility and being a rubber stamp for the mayor, [party affiliation] doesn’t matter.

Is there anyone in local politics that you look up to?

[Save Libertyland! member and County Commissioner] Steve Mulroy and Carol Chumney are two people with democratic principles that I would call my role models.

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News

Lee Keeps Job, As City Council Circus Continues

Embattled Memphis Light, Gas and Water president Joseph Lee appeared before the City Council today — against the advice of his attorney Robert Spence — to answer the council’s questions of his conduct of MLGW policy and procedure.

Lee had declined to be interviewed as part of the outside investigation of MLGW conducted during the past two weeks. The City Attorney’s office contracted Saul Belz to conduct the investigation of MLGW policies and procedures, and the council invited Belz to question Lee.

Spence explained that Lee would answer council members’ questions because Lee’s “ethics [and] his integrity have been questioned. And by questioning his integrity, you question his good name. He is here to defend his good name.”

An impassioned Lee addressed the council, declaring “I want it to be clearly, convincingly, and plainly understood that I have not received a benefit, gift, or anything of value from any council member, including Edmund Ford at any time… I did not participate in any criminal or illegal activity.”

Lee claimed that he had tried to bring a “level of compassion” to his work at MLGW. He brought a file folder bulging with his MLGW customer correspondence to illustrate. “I said that Edmund Ford was treated differently, and he was. But so were all of these customers,” Lee said.

“I have never instructed a staff person to cut [anyone] off. I say ‘work with the customer,’” he added.

Councilman Joe Brown called the investigation “tainted,” saying, “if it’s about policy, let’s talk about policy. All I can see is Edmund Ford. Is this about Edmund Ford, or is this about policy?”

Lee’s refusal to answer questions directly from Belz, who was sitting directly across from him, forced Belz to pose his questions through councilman Tom Marshall. Marshall, then, asked Belz what Belz would have asked Lee. Marshall posed the questions to Lee as laughter rippled through the audience.

Marshall urged Lee to speak with Belz directly, assuring Lee that “there are a lot of people out there that don’t necessarily think you’re guilty of much.”

Ford gestured wildly throughout the proceeding, and at times held a Bible aloft.

Lee defended himself variously, denying awareness of certain MLGW policies, claiming to run the utility with compassion toward its customers, and even citing the 17,800 accounts in arrears as evidence of this. Lee attributed the company’s handling of Ford’s account to staff recommendations that he accepted.

The Belz report, however, showed a more hands-on approach to the Ford account.

Marshall explained, “We couldn’t find any more instances where you directed an account other than that of councilman Edmund Ford’s, to be retained, and not cut off.”

Councilwoman Carol Chumney, the council’s MLGW committee chairperson, banged the gavel throughout the rowdy meeting, and demanded order from her fellow councilmen and the audience.

The fun had barely started. Ford took the floor, and launched into a lengthy tirade. He claimed that his kindness to his constituents had caused him this trouble. “Maybe that’s my problem,” he said. “I help people.”

Ford went on to claim that the well-publicized delinquent MLGW account in his name is for a property that he does not own. He accused Marshall of initiating the inquiry for personal reasons. “I want [Marshall] to stop it today, or I will write a letter asking [him] to step down [as City Council chairman.]”

Ford turned to Marshall and said, “I really want to be your friend.”

Brown called the MLGW shake-up a “coup.” He followed that up saying that those council members behind it could never muster the eleven (out of thirteen) member votes needed to oust Lee. Brown told Lee directly, “You don’t have to worry about being replaced by this body.”

Belz had presented the council members with a written report of his findings at 10 a.m. The council referred to the document throughout their questioning of Lee.

Councilman Jack Sammons noted an account record included in the report of a MLGW employee who requested an extension on his utility bill until the ensuing payday. The employee explained that his wife was recovering from a brain tumor. MLGW ordered a cutoff.

Sammons asked Lee how he reconciled cutoffs of customers experiencing hardships while allowing Ford’s account to go unpaid indefinitely without cutoff.

Lee claimed not to be fully versed in the utility’s cutoff policies.

Chumney circulated copies of Lee’s resignation to the council members as the meeting closed, and stated that she will move for the council to accept Lee’s resignation at the April 3rd council meeting.

Citizens attending the meeting expressed a range of opinions regarding the matter. “There’s nothing but a bunch of thugs running this place,” remarked a man, “why do you think Toyota didn’t come here?”

Another was more put out with Ford’s lack of discretion. “Edmund abused his privileges,” he said. “It’s like in college when you had the hook-up at the chicken place — you don’t go in for 20 pieces a day.”

—Preston Lauterbach

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News The Fly-By

Travel Timed

Shelby County motorists have noticed some unusual new construction on local interstate and state highways. Twenty-five camera towers, resembling light posts, have gone up in recent weeks.

Conspiracy theorists may jump to Orwellian conclusions, but the cameras are a piece of a new Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) program to circulate roadway information among motorists and facilitate the flow of traffic.

“It’s part of our SmartWay system,” explains Pamela Marshall, spokesperson for TDOT in West Tennessee. “We have 25 cameras already installed.”

Marshall says that by spring of next year, SmartWay will go live in Memphis with 115 cameras on interstates 55, 40, and 240 and state Highway 385. The cameras will enable the Tennessee Department of Transportation to keep a closer eye on traffic problems and monitor highway safety issues.

“It will give us a real-time, first-hand view of all 80-plus miles of interstate in Memphis and Shelby County,” Marshall says.

The SmartWay system is already in place in Nashville and Knoxville. It uses video surveillance and something TDOT calls “roadway traffic sensors” to monitor the volume and flow of traffic and calculate travel time. The system can quickly identify accidents and dispatch assistance while notifying other drivers to consider alternate routes.

While on the road, motorists can read traffic bulletins located on highway shoulders and overpasses and access up-to-date information by dialing 511 on cellular telephones. They may also get a sneak preview of traffic on their planned travel route at www.tdot.state.tn.us/tdotsmartway before departing.

SmartWay represents TDOT’s search for traffic solutions beyond new road construction. Other transportation departments have implemented similar programs nationwide.

“We’ve reached the point where we can’t build our way out of traffic,” says Marshall.

TDOT estimates the cost per mile of building a single lane of new roadway at $2.5 million. The deployment of SmartWay costs $500,000 per mile.

Because TDOT has no authority to issue traffic citations, Marshall emphasizes that SmartWay will focus only on traffic issues without venturing into law enforcement or, specifically, photographing speeders.

“The [TDOT] mission is to provide safe roadways. We’re not in law enforcement,” she says, “so that’s not part of what those cameras are.”

While motorists can report problem drivers to TDOT, Marshall suggests “if a motorist calls us, we can call law enforcement, but we recommend that if you have something to report, call [the police].”

In response to an area motorist’s claim that one of the cameras flashed, Marshall says “they’re not even hooked up. It must have been a UFO.”

Concerned citizens may view future camera locations at www.tdot.state.tn.us/tdotsmartway/memphis-future.htm.

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Cover Feature News

Power Play

CREDIT: (AP Photo/Wade Payne)

In publicly rejecting MLGW president Joseph Lee’s resignation last Thursday, Mayor Willie 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 refusing to accept his 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 the spiraling increase … that leads many to believe that the billings are excessive and arbitrary,” Herenton said.

(AP Photo/Wade Payne)

Herman Morris

Herenton then 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. 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.”

Every Thursday, the MLGW board of commissioners meets downtown at the utility company’s headquarters. Before the afternoon session, the floor opens to citizens wishing to address the board. Last week, Georgia King took the floor and asked a key question, not only for the future of MLGW but also for election-year city politics.

“When was the customer ‘VIP list’ started, and by whom?” she asked.

King was referring to the list of high-profile MLGW customers whose utility accounts were under the supervision of MLGW executives. The list, which was apparently generated as the result of an e-mail by then MLGW head Herman Morris, was released to the public by Lee’s attorney Robert Spence just after Lee’s grand-jury appearance last week.

MLGW board chairman Rick Masson assured King that an internal investigation would soon be under way to address the question.

Though Herenton had rejected Lee’s resignation earlier in the meeting, he left the door open to revisit the issue, after first decrying the array of evil, which he perceived as trying to force his hand to remove Lee following the revelation of Lee’s “preferential treatment” of VIP-list member and city councilman Edmund Ford.

(AP Photo/John L. Focht)

Willie Herenton

“I find it unacceptable at this point in time to consider accepting his resignation, when, apparently, the wave of public sentiment and the blitz of bias exerted by The Commercial Appeal and other members of the media, I believe, has had undue influence, perhaps, on many key decision-makers,” Herenton said.

The mayor then acknowledged that City Council chairman Tom Marshall had initiated an independent investigation of MLGW, and he contrasted the two approaches to solving the crisis of public confidence in the utility company — the “media, political witch hunt” of the evil array and the objective investigation.

Marshall told the Flyer that “the mayor indicated that he is deferring until the results of the investigation are complete. Ultimately, he will revisit the issue of the termination of Mr. Lee. If you listen carefully, as I perceive it, the mayor is still open to that possibility, depending on the outcome of this investigation.”

Joseph Lee

The mayor focused on the differences between having an agenda for Lee’s removal and the facts to support such a move. “Hopefully, the investigation will be thorough, unbiased, not tainted by any predispositions or judgments based on a biased media that is really focused on discrediting Joseph Lee and this institution,” Herenton said, adding, “I applaud the councilman [Marshall] for his leadership and hope that the individuals who have accepted that engagement will conduct it with the highest of integrity and professionalism.”

Marshall appointed attorneys Oscar Carr and Saul Belz to lead the investigation. The attorneys were slated to outline the investigation plan at the Tuesday, March 6th, City Council meeting. Marshall says that Belz will present the results of the investigation to the council March 20th.

“Part of my reason in not accepting this resignation is that that investigation has not been complete,” Herenton said. “I have no facts surrounding any recommendations that Mr. Lee should be removed from his position.”

Justin Fox Burks

Carol Chumney

While Herenton exercised his prerogative to reject Lee’s resignation, Marshall says that Lee’s future as MLGW president rests as much with the council as it does the mayor.

“The City Council has authority, as prescribed in the charter, with 11 [out of 13] votes, to remove the president of MLGW without the consent of the mayor. In addition to that, the council also appears to have the authority to remove all of the [MLGW board] commissioners without the authority of the mayor,” Marshall said.

The MLGW “crisis of confidence” issues encompass more than the creation and maintenance of the so-called VIP list. The independent investigation will also address the meter-reading and billing practices of MLGW, which Herenton said give the appearance of “excessive and arbitrary” billing. Herenton has attributed the questionable billing practices to a “a conspiracy to sabotage [Lee] from within.”

Marshall offers a simpler explanation. “I’m having trouble believing [the sabotage allegation]. I don’t think that such sabotage exists,” Marshall said. “There is the potential for incompetent billing practices going on, but not as the result of any kind of direct effort. If there is malfeasance, it’s the result of inability,” added Marshall.

MLGW board member Nick Clark expressed a concern for the utility’s business practices that may not go away with leadership change. “The core problem, in terms of the future of MLGW, is the politicalization of business issues, because that interferes with the operation of a public utility.

“Why does MLGW have a problem with the culture of mistrust with certain members of the City Council?” Clark added.

It hardly needs to be said that that mistrust goes both ways. At this point, neither the public nor anyone else has a clear grasp on just what the problems are at MLGW. Are bills really out of line? Is Lee a capable administrator or just a Herenton crony in over his head? Was Herman Morris’ VIP list anything more than a way to maintain good PR? Were favors granted to others besides Edmund Ford?

With any luck, the coming weeks will bring some answers. Meanwhile, the power struggle continues.

Attorney Saul Belz, who will lead the independent investigation of MLGW, is scheduled to appear before the City Council, in order to provide the council with the scope and timeline of the investigation. Visit www.memphisflyer.com for updates throughout the coming week.