Shelby County Jail (Photo: Shelby County Sheriff's Department)
The criminal justice system in Shelby County is murky, a new report says.
How many days does it take for a case to be taken care of? How many days are people incarcerated (if they can’t make bail) before their cases are taken care of? How often do people stay clean while they’re out on bail? How often are they re-arrested while out on bail? How often are people booked? How often do they ask for a trial?
Some answers came to these questions in a report issued Wednesday by a division of the Tennessee State Comptroller’s Office. That report was requested in February 2024 by Lt. Gov. Randy McNally (R-Oak Ridge) who wanted those answers (and more) about “issues in Shelby County,” specifically.
For the request, the comptroller’s Office of Research and Education Accountability (OREA) sent agents to Memphis. Over the past year, those agents interviewed about 70 people and spent about 100 hours at the Shelby County Criminal Justice Center. They conducted research, watched court proceedings, and analyzed datasets from at least 22 state and local entities.
From August to September, the agents gathered data on about 1,033 cases as they made their ways through the criminal justice process here. They watched 417 cases in General Sessions Court and 616 cases in Criminal Court. For the sake of equal comparison, they included 145 sample cases for the report that had similar data.
“The more than 1,030 cases observed represent a fraction of the cases heard in these courtrooms on any given day,” reads the report. “Across all eight General Sessions courtrooms that hear felony cases, more than 480 cases are heard daily. In the nine Criminal Court courtrooms, this number rises to over 500 cases heard daily.”
Here’s some of what they found in Criminal Court:
• Half of cases were completely through court (or disposed) in two months.
• A quarter of cases were disposed in 37 days or fewer.
• Nearly all the cases were disposed within 266 days, or nine months.
• Shelby County had the highest number of open felony charges (2,335) at the time, double the Nashville count of 1,024.
• Of the 95 defendants OREA watched, only seven re-offended while on pretrial release (bail or free release).
• A majority (60 percent) of felony charges did not change at the end of a case from 2018 to 2023. The remaining charges either decreased (about 20 percent) or increased (about 21 percent).
Here’s some of what they found in General Sessions Court:
• Over half of the cases were dismissed.
• A quarter of cases were disposed with a guilty plea.
• About 10 percent of cases were bound over to a grand jury.
However, no one in Shelby County is collecting this information. These observations are from a small sample size from a small group of OREA agents.
Without aggregate data, it’s impossible to judge the efficiency, throughput capacity, or overall health of the Shelby County Justice system. The OREA group thinks someone here should be responsible for gathering that data and sharing it with the public.
“The result is that the public cannot assess overall, aggregate trends and patterns; the public cannot see the big picture,” reads the report.
The group offered a list of detailed recommendations to improve the situation here, but it is unknown what next step may come in the situation.
Death row prisoners in Tennessee challenged the state’s new execution protocols in a legal complaint that claims the use of pentobarbital is unconstitutional as it can lead to a “tortuous death.”
Nine prisoners signed on to the complaint filed late last week by Amy Harwell in Davidson County Chancery Court. Harwell is the Assistant Chief of the Capital Habeus Unit at the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the Middle District of Tennessee.
The complaint argues those executed here “will experience extreme pain and suffering if they are poisoned to death with pentobarbital.” The plaintiffs also cite “Tennessee’s shameful history of mishandling its execution processes” as a reason to challenge the new lethal injection protocol.
Executions here have been halted since May 2022. Gov. Bill Lee ordered a full review of the state’s lethal injection protocols. In a scathing report issued in December 2022, Ed Stanton, former U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee, found that state officials didn’t follow their own rules in carrying out executions. That review also criticized the three-drug injection protocols used for executions at the time.
Lee hired a new Commissioner for the Tennessee Department of Corrections (TDOC), Frank Strada, with a major goal to get executions back on line in Tennessee. That work began in January 2023.
In late December 2024, TDOC issued a brief news release announcing that the new review had been completed and the agency had selected pentobarbital for its lethal injection executions.
“I am confident the lethal injection process can proceed in compliance with departmental policy and state laws,” Strada said at the time.
Earlier this month, the Tennessee Supreme Court scheduled executions for four prisoners to be carried out this year.
• Oscar Smith on May 22nd
• Byron Black on August 5th
• Donald Middlebrooks on September 24th
• Harold Nichols on December 11th
Smith was set for execution in May 2022. It has been reported he was taking his final communion on death watch before walking to the execution chamber when Lee called off the execution and called for the review.
Smith and Black, both scheduled to be executed this year, signed on to the new complaint that challenges the method of which they are to be killed by the state.
“The evidence keeps piling up to show that pentobarbital poisoning is excruciatingly painful,” said Harwell, an attorney for the plaintiffs. “Tennessee appears to have picked this method only because they were able to get their hands on pentobarbital, not because its use for executions complies with the Constitution or state law.”
States like Tennessee had a hard time getting drugs for the proviso three-drug cocktail. Many said that was the because drug companies that made them refused to sell them for execution purposes.
The complaint argues that killing by pentobarbital “can create a sensation of suffocating or drowning that has been likened by experts to the sensation intentionally induced by the practice of waterboarding — an unambiguous form of outright torture.” The drug can also leave prisoners aware as their bodies begin to experience physical damage “resulting in extreme suffering.”
In January, the U.S. Department of Justice quit using pentobarbital in executions on “significant uncertainty” on whether or not the drug causes pain and suffering.
“In the face of such uncertainty, the department should err on the side of humane treatment and avoidance of unnecessary pain and suffering, and therefore halt the use of pentobarbital unless and until that uncertainty is resolved,” then-Attorney General Merrick Garland said at the time.
Even if the drug was not a concern, the complaint doubts TDOC’s ability to carry out executions, given its track record. It says that over the past 25 years, the agency “has consistently struggled, and often failed, to fulfill [its] responsibility [to administer executions] in a consistent, reliable, and lawful way.”
“TDOC has burned through at least five now-discarded ‘protocols’ for performing executions by lethal injection … each of which collapsed under the weight of its own flaws and mismanagement after no more than, at most, a few executions,” the report says.
Lawmakers gonna law-make, and committee agendas for the Tennessee General Assembly are filled to the brim with a vast and complex array of proposals for a better Tennessee (depending on where you sit).
Hundreds of bills filed in Nashville cover everything from far-right-fueled covenant marriages to hunters finding wounded deer with drones to rules that take the high out of Tennessee cannabis products — and so much more.
Here are a few bills we’re watching.
Senator Brent Taylor (Photo: wapp.capitol.tn.gov)
Gender transition (SB 0676)
Senator Brent Taylor (R-Memphis) says this law ensures that if a gender clinic takes state funds to perform gender transition procedures, they’ll have to also perform “detransition procedures.”
The bill also requires a report to the state on a ton of information about any transition procedures: the age and sex of the patient, what drugs were given to them, when the referral was made, what state and county the patient is from, and a complete list of “neurological, behavioral, or mental health conditions” the patient might have had. Almost everything but the patient’s name and WhatsApp handle.
Forever chemicals (SB 0880)
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is pushing this bill, and maybe not just in Tennessee.
When Mark Behrens, a representative of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Institute for Legal Reform, explained it to a Senate committee last week, he specifically mentioned PFAS (also called forever chemicals by some), which are found in nonstick cookware, firefighting foam, and more. He also broadly mentioned “microplastics” and “solvents.”
Behrens claimed these may have a PR problem but they may also be in a situation where “the science [on them] is evolving and they may not have an impact on human health, or that impact may be unclear.”
So rather than the state banning them for just having a bad rap, any ban would have to be based on “the best available science.”
Senator Janice Bowling (R-Tullahoma) asked if this could be used to keep fluoride out of drinking water. No, she was told.
Medical Ethics Defense Act (SB 0955)
“This bill prohibits a healthcare provider from being required to participate in or pay for a healthcare procedure, treatment, or service that violates the conscience of the healthcare provider.” The bill itself is scanty on details. On its face, it sure sounds like it’s aimed at the LGBTQ community.
But bill sponsor Senator Ferrell Haile (R-Gallatin) said it was a “straightforward bill,” covering things such as assisted suicide or whether or not a pharmacist felt comfortable prescribing birth control.
Deer and drones (SB 0130)
This one is straightforward. It would allow hunters to use drones to find deer they shot.
WHO now? (SB 0669)
With this bill, Taylor, the Memphis Republican, says pandemics can only be declared by the American, baseball-and-apple-pie Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), not the Swiss, soccer-and-Toblerone World Health Organization (WHO).
Senator London Lamar (Photo: wapp.capitol.tn.gov)
Cash for STI tests (SB 0189)
Senator London Lamar (D-Memphis) wants to give higher-education students in Tennessee $250 for taking a voluntary test for sexually transmitted diseases.
Felonies for protestors (SB 0672)
You know how Memphis protestors like to shut down the Hernando DeSoto Bridge? Well, Taylor, that Memphis Republican, would make that a felony.
But it’s not just big roads and protestors. The bill applies to anyone obstructing “a highway, street, sidewalk, railway, waterway, elevator, aisle, hallway, or other place used for the passage of persons or vehicles.” Those would be Class E felonies.
But if the “offense was committed by intentionally obstructing a highway, street, or other place used for the passage of vehicles,” it would be a Class D felony.
What’s in a name? (SB 0214)
This bill would prohibit any public facility to be named for a local public official who is currently in office — and for two years after they leave office. The same prohibition would also apply to anyone who has “been convicted of a felony or a crime of moral turpitude.”
Covenant marriage (SB 0737)
This bill creates “covenant marriage” in Tennessee. And the most important thing the bill caption wants you to know about the law is that this kind of marriage “is entered into by one male and one female.”
Covenant marriage is, like, a mega, pinky-swear marriage. To get it, couples have to go to premarital counseling and their preacher or counselor or whoever has to get notarized and some kind of pamphlet to be printed by the secretary of state.
Getting out of a covenant marriage is, like, way hard. A partner would have to cheat or die, be sentenced to death or lifelong imprisonment, leave the house for a year, or physically or sexually abuse the other partner or the couple’s children.
These types of marriages are only available now in Arizona, Arkansas, and Louisiana.
Oh, and if you wonder where this is coming from, check out a video posted on our website that shows Senator Mark Pody (R-Lebanon), one of the bill’s sponsors, at church talking about “wicked” gay marriage. — Toby Sells
Taylor sponsored SB 0217. (Photo: Joshua Rainey | Dreamstime.com)
Clearing Homeless Camps (SB 0217)
A bill would give those living in homeless camps three days to vacate if their camp is targeted for removal in a new program that could cost around $64 million each year from the state highway fund.
Senate Bill 0217 would require the Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) and other agencies to regulate “the collection, storage, claiming, and disposal of personal property used for camping from the shoulder, berm, or right-of-way of a state or interstate highway, or under a bridge or overpass, or within an underpass of a state or interstate highway.”
The bill, sponsored by Taylor, coasted through its first vote by the Senate Transportation and Safety Committee last week with only one Democrat voting against it. Taylor said he had experience in trying to clear areas of personal property and called it the “most complicated thing [he] had done as an adult.”
“What this bill does is simply allow TDOT to go into communities like Memphis, Nashville, Chattanooga, Knoxville, or any other community and to go ahead and preplan how they’re going to deal with homeless encampments and go ahead and work with social services networks in that community,” Taylor said.
Taylor said this network will include law enforcement, so that all the duties will already be spelled out when an encampment needs to be removed. He also said this bill does not criminalize homeless people.
“This serves not only the state and the local community, but this serves the homeless folks as well,” Taylor said. “When they identify a homeless encampment that needs to be cleared, there’ll be nonprofits and social services available to the people in homeless encampments. We all have empathy, but whatever has driven somebody to have to live under a bridge, their lot in life is not getting better by living under a bridge.”
Taylor said the bill will help communities develop a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to tackle this issue in a way that’s beneficial to both the city and the homeless. Senator Heidi Campbell (D-Nashville) asked if the bill outlines how their belongings will be stored, to which Taylor responded that the decision would be left to the board.
“I understand the intent,” Campbell said. “I have a similar thing happen in my district. I just am concerned without the direction from the legislation, the homeless peoples’ items and things need to be considered, that we’re putting the discretion to be able to take stuff away from homeless people in somebody’s hands where it might not have been before.”
Lindsey Krinks, co-founder of Housing for All Tennessee and Open Table Nashville, noted citizens’ concerns for the bill — specifically, the disposal of homeless people’s belongings.
“What this bill doesn’t tell you is that the campsite removal costs will be passed down to local governments; we’re really concerned about that,” Krinks said. “We all want to see the number of people living in encampments decrease, but the way we do that is not to play a game of Whack-A-Mole. It’s to break the cycle of homelessness through providing housing and support to people.”
Krinks said the bill does not address homelessness nor the deficit of housing or shelter. She noted that the bill’s “aggressive” deadline of removal three days after receiving a complaint does not allow people to secure permanent housing.
Taylor said this bill will address these concerns as the agencies and TDOT will help people get connected to the services they need. He said continuing to let people live in encampments without services does not provide them with extra support.
“If you support homeless people and want to get them the services they need and help them live in dignity, then you would support this bill because we’re able to make that connection when we clear a homeless encampment between a person in need and social services they need to connect them,” Taylor said. — Kailynn Johnson
Happy high? (HB 1376)
State Republicans propose either stricter cannabis rules or none at all.
Despite warnings that the hemp industry would be decimated, the House Judiciary Committee passed a measure last week that would put stricter regulations in place.
Sponsored by House Majority Leader William Lamberth (R-Portland), House Bill 1376 would place the industry under the Alcoholic Beverage Commission instead of the Department of Agriculture and remove products from convenience and grocery stores. Only vape and liquor stores would be allowed to sell some hemp products.
The House bill was slated to be heard this week in the Commerce Committee where agreements with the industry could be reached.
“It does ban [derivatives] THCA and THCP. The reason for that is we have not legalized marijuana in this state,” Lamberth said.
Hemp is distinguished from marijuana in that it contains a compound called delta-9 THC. Cannabis with a concentration of less than 0.3 percent delta-9 THC is defined as legal hemp in Tennessee — and federally. Cannabis with concentrations greater than 0.3 percent is classified as marijuana and is illegal to grow, sell, or possess in Tennessee.
Hemp flowers also contain THCA, a nonintoxicating acid that would be banned in Tennessee under this bill. When heated or smoked, the THCA in the plant converts into delta-9 THC — an illegal substance in Tennessee in greater than trace amounts.
Clint Palmer, a representative of the hemp industry, told lawmakers the bill is similar to one passed in 2023 that led to a lawsuit against the Department of Agriculture that remains in litigation.
If the new measure passes, Palmer said, hemp businesses will be forced to shut down, even after spending millions of dollars complying with state regulations.
“Bill sponsors have said it’s the Wild West in regards to the current hemp program. This is far from the truth,” Palmer said.
The 2023 law put new restrictions on products containing THC, he said, and noted retail stores, manufacturers, and distributors are required to be licensed or face criminal charges. Palmer added that regulation is lacking from the Department of Agriculture, despite a 6 percent tax on hemp-derived products, half of which nets the department $1 million a month.
Lamberth has said that consumers should know the ingredients when they buy a hemp product. But Palmer said those are listed on labels, based on the 2023 law.
The House leader also indicated that the industry appears ready to sue the state again because the federal Farm Act sets standards on hemp. Palmer didn’t acknowledge whether a lawsuit could follow the new bill’s passage, but he said the Alcoholic Beverage Commission doesn’t “have a clear understanding of the hemp plant, and it’s clearly shown in this bill.”
The Senate version of the bill, sponsored by Senator Richard Briggs (R-Knoxville), is to be heard next by the finance committee. Briggs said last week as soon as the products are heated, they become marijuana.
“We could withdraw the bill and let’s just put another bill out there that says we’re going to have recreational marijuana,” Briggs said. “Let’s be perfectly honest. It’ll help the businesses, we’ll have great revenue, and everybody smoking the stuff will be a lot happier.” — Sam Stockard, Tennessee Lookout
Healthcare on the Hill (SB 0402 / SB 0403 / SB 0575)
Senate Democratic Caucus Chairwoman Senator London Lamar (D-Memphis) introduced SB 0403 and SB 0402 to tackle the issue of medical debt. SB 0403 proposes that hospitals match the amount of money they receive from the government to cover “uncompensated care” in erasing medical debt. According to the Tennessee General Assembly, taxpayers paid $153 million to cover payments for 107 hospitals.
“If a hospital takes public money, they should lift patient debt in return,” Lamar said. “Healthcare should heal, not bankrupt. This is about real relief for working people — helping families stay in their homes, invest in their futures, and live with dignity.”
SB 0402 seeks to further alleviate the toll of medical debt as it would remove its inclusion from credit reports. Lamar called medical debt an “unfair financial harm.”
Lamar has also long been an advocate for reducing the state’s maternal health crisis. The state has historically had the worst maternal mortality rate in the country. To aid in this, Lamar filed SB 0575, which would require new mothers to receive information about postpartum warning signs from hospitals.
“There’s an education gap women are experiencing as far as resources, what to do, and how to go through this process,” Lamar said. “In an effort to ensure that women have the best pregnancy outcome possible, we want to make sure we’re providing them with more tools in their toolbox to protect themselves and their child in this process and after.”
Lamar said this bill would add an extra layer of accountability to make sure hospitals and birthing centers are doing their part to educate women. The senator said that medical deserts create a significant gap in accessing quality care even before they seek pregnancy care. She went on to say pregnancy outcomes are reliant on the mother’s lifestyle before and after the process.
“We have an unhealthy community that is deprived of access to resources and doctors,” Lamar said. “There is a financial burden of not being able to afford the healthcare they need. Healthcare is really expensive. It’s very elitist. It’s the haves and the have-nots, so if you don’t have the money to have insurance or pay out of pocket, then you don’t get healthcare. That stems down to Black women who are less likely to have the care they need, rural women in rural areas who are experiencing poverty don’t have access [to care.]”
The idea of providing equitable healthcare and rights have extended to reproductive bills such as HB 0027 sponsored by Representative Aftyn Behn (D-Nashville). The bill, which has been supported by groups such as Tennessee Advocates for Planned Parenthood, states that everyone has a “fundamental right to make decisions about their reproductive health care.” HB 1220 also protects reproductive freedom as it safeguards the right to choose whether or not a person wants to use contraceptives.
Some GOP bills, like the Medical Ethics Defense Act mentioned above, seek to curb access to care. Meanwhile, SB 0139, sponsored by Senator Adam Lowe (R-Calhoun), would mandate hospitals accepting Medicaid to collect and report citizenship status about patients, and report these demographics to the Tennessee Department of Health. The department would then submit this information to state government officials to track the impact of “uncompensated care for persons not lawfully present in the United States and other related information.” — KJ
Lawmakers in Nashville are kicking their law-making machines into high gear with committee schedules filled to the brim with everything from far-right fueled covenant marriages to hunters finding wounded deer with drones.
Here’s a few bills we’re watching:
Gender transition (SB 0676): Sen. Brent Taylor (R-Memphis) says this law ensures that if a gender clinic takes state funds to perform gender transition procedures, they’ll have to also perform “detransition procedures.”
The bill also requires a report to the state on a ton of of information about any transition procedures: the age and sex of the patient, what drugs were given, when the referral was made, what state and county the patient is from, and a complete list of ”neurological, behavioral, or mental health conditions” the patient might have had. Almost everything but the patient’s name and WhatsApp handle.
Forever chemicals (SB0880): The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is pushing this bill, and maybe not just in Tennessee.
When a rep for the organization (Mark Behrens, a representative of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Institute for Legal Reform), explained it to a Senate committee last week, he specifically mentioned PFAS (also called forever chemicals by some), which are found in non-stick cookware, firefighting foam, and more. He also broadly mentioned “microplastics” and “solvents.”
Behrens claimed these may have a PR problem but they may also be in a situation where “the science (on them) is evolving and they may not have an impact on human health, or that impact may be unclear.”
So, rather than the state banning them for just having a bad rap, any ban would have to be based on “the best available science.” For a deep dive on this, read Tennessee Lookout’s story below.
Sen. Janice Bowling (R-Tullahoma) asked if this could be used to keep fluoride out of drinking water. No, she was told.
“Medical Ethics Defense Act“ (SB0995): ”This bill prohibits a healthcare provider from being required to participate in or pay for a healthcare procedure, treatment, or service that violates the conscience of the healthcare provider.” The bill itself is scanty on details. On its face, it sure sounds aimed at the LGBTQ community.
But bill sponsor Sen. Ferrell Haile (R-Gallatin) said it was a “straightforward bill,” covering things such as assisted suicide or whether or not a pharmacist felt comfortable prescribing birth control.
Deer and drones (SB0130): This one is straightforward. It would allow hunters to use drones to find deer they shot.
WHO now? (SB0669): With this bill, Taylor, the Memphis Republican, says pandemics can only be declared by the American baseball-and-apple-pie Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), not the soccer-and-scone World Health Organization (WHO).
Cash for STI tests (SB0189): Sen. London Lamar (D-Memphis) wants to give higher-education students in Tennessee $250 for taking a voluntary test for sexually transmitted diseases.
Felonies for protestors (0672): You know how Memphis protestors like to shut down the Hernando DeSoto Bridge? Well, Taylor, that Memphis Republican, would make that a felony.
But it’s not just big roads and protestors. The bill applies to anyone obstructing “a highway, street, sidewalk, railway, waterway, elevator, aisle, hallway, or other place used for the passage of persons or vehicles.” Those would be Class E felonies.
But if the “offense was committed by intentionally obstructing a highway, street, or other place used for the passage of vehicles,” it would be a Class D felony.
What’s in a name? (SB0214): This bill would prohibit any public facility to be named for a local public official who is currently in office — and for two years after they leave office. The same prohition would also apply to anyone who has “been convicted of a felony or a crime of moral turpitude.”
Covenant marriage (SB 0737): This bill creates “covenant marriage” in Tennessee. And the most important thing the bill caption wants you to know about the law is that this kind of marriage “is entered into by one male and one female.”
Covenant marriage is, like, a mega, pinky-swear marriage. To get it, couples have to go to pre-marital counseling and their preacher or counselor or whatever has to get notarized some kind of pamphlet to be printed by the Secretary of State.
Getting out of a covenant marriage is, like, way hard. A partner would have to cheat, or die, be sentenced to death or lifelong imprisonment, leave the house for a year, or physically or sexually abuse the other partner or the couple’s children.
These types of marriages are only available now in Arizona, Arkansas, and Louisiana.
Here’s a couple of opinionpieces from The Tennessean if you want to find out more about the two sides of this issue.
Oh, and if you wonder where this is coming from, check out this video that shows Sen. Mark Pody (R-Lebanon), one of the bill’s sponsors, at church talking about “wicked” gay marriage.
The Cotton Museum could soon be purchased and managed by the state of Tennessee.
A bill filed in the Tennessee General Assembly by state Rep. Torrey Harris (D-Memphis) and state Sen. London Lamar (D-Memphis) would put the Memphis museum in state hands on July 1.
The bill’s caption reads the proposed law “requires the state to enter into good faith negotiations for the purchase of the Cotton Museum in Memphis, subject to approval by the State Building Commission.”
The full bill text says that the state would enter into negotiations to manage the museum. If approved, management would given to the Tennessee State Museum and managed by the Douglas Henry State Museum Commission in collaboration with the Tennessee Historical Commission.
The museum was founded in 2006 to “preserve the history of this worldwide marketplace and to tell the epic story of the famed cash crop and its profound influence on the city of Memphis,” according to its website.
“Our mission is to share the story of the cotton and the influences of the people that were gathered here around the industry not only with a growing international audience, but with Memphis area residents, especially our city’s youth,” the site reads.
The bill was filed earlier this month. Its first formal review is planned for Wednesday during the Senate Education Committee.
A series of information meetings and yard signs are speaking out against Memphis 3.0. (Photo: Toby Sells)
Editor’s note: Citywide planning, land use discussions, zoning, and the potential economics of it all are far too broad and dense to ever be covered in a single news story. (So are other considerations about income, race, and population loss.) Please consider this piece the beginning of our coverage on Memphis 3.0.
For this one, we’ll take you inside one of MidtownMemphis.org’s information meetings and share a Q&A rebuttal about it all from John Zeanah, director of the Memphis and Shelby County Division of Planning and Development (DPD).
Memphis 3.0 will “sell out” Midtown neighborhoods to investors and businesses looking to cash in on (but maybe never really care about) the attractive communities residents in those places have built over decades.
That’s a very basic expression of the argument voiced for months now from MidtownMemphis.org. The volunteer group is fighting the plan with a series of information meetings, an online information hub, and yard signs — sure signs that a Midtown fight has gotten real.
Passed in 2019 and devised by former Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland’s administration, Memphis 3.0 is a document guiding the growth of Memphis. It’s up for its first-ever five-year renewal. A major strategy for sustainability in the plan has been to support some of the city’s anchors like Crosstown Concourse, Overton Square, and commercial areas around Cooper Street.
However, MidtownMemphis.org argues the locations for these anchors and the planned density that could surround them aren’t fair. For example, group members say a lot of density is planned for Midtown but very little for East Memphis.
Also, adding density to certain places around Midtown means multifamily homes, the group says, instead of single-family, owner-occupied homes. They fear profit-minded landlords will use 3.0 to work around zoning laws to create duplexes or quadplexes, won’t upkeep these properties, create transient tenants, and make neighborhoods less attractive for potential buyers. They say this could slowly destabilize neighborhoods into ghosts of their current selves.
“What we’re against — and we have history on our side — is destabilizing the neighborhood to support Crosstown,” said MidtownMemphis.org volunteer Robert Gordon, who has spearheaded the battle against 3.0. “[The plan] is going to wreck Crosstown, wreck the neighborhood, and, consequently, wreck the city. And if you don’t believe me, go back to Midtown in 1969. Go back to Midtown in 1974. Go back to Midtown when it was zoned like the [Memphis 3.0] future land use planning map envisions zoning.”
All of it, they say, could lead to a showdown at Memphis City Hall next year as council members review the changes for a vote.
However, John Zeanah, director of the Memphis and Shelby County Division of Planning and Development, said the 3.0 plan won’t do what MidtownMemphis.org fears it will do.
“The goal is to make sure that our community has healthy, stable anchors that are supported by healthy, stable neighborhoods,” Zeanah said. “The suggestions that we would take extreme actions to destabilize neighborhoods is really puzzling. It doesn’t come from anything that we’re saying as a part of our meetings. It doesn’t come from anything the plan is saying.”
Nearly 60 people gathered for a MidtownMemphis.org Memphis 3.0 meeting earlier this month. (Photo: Toby Sells)
Inside a MidtownMemphis.org 3.0 meeting
A dreary, cold, wet February night was not enough to stop a crowd from sloshing through puddles to hear about how the Memphis 3.0 plan could “sell out our neighborhood,” as the signs say. Nearly 60 people gathered for a MidtownMemphis.org 3.0 meeting earlier this month at Friends For All.
MidtownMemphis.org has been holding meetings like these since September. Other info sessions — six in total — have been organized at Otherlands Coffee Bar, the Cooper-Young Community Association building, and the Benjamin L. Hooks Central Library. Gordon said it was in January that planing officials stopped working with MidtownMemphis.org on the 3.0 issue.
At the latest February meeting, Gordon took the stage before a slideshow projected on a screen behind him. He described MidtownMemphis.org as a “sort of neighborhood association for neighborhood associations,” meaning his group meets monthly with Midtown neighborhood groups from Central Gardens, Cooper-Young, and more. MidtownMemphis.org also plants trees around Midtown and oversees the community garden next to Huey’s Midtown.
Gordon told the crowd he entered public planning discussions as a NIMBY (not in my backyard), concerned that the Poplar Art Lofts plan in 2019 would push noise and exhaust onto those enjoying Overton Park. This led him to the MidtownMemphis.org organization and he’s been a volunteer with the group ever since.
Gordon described the 3.0 plan as a “city guide” and a “North Star” for Memphis-area planning efforts. The plan’s motto, he said, reverses the sprawl strategies of years past and embraces the idea to “build up, not out.” While the motto is the essence of the plan, Gordon called it “quite misleading.”
One critical foundation of the Memphis 3.0 plan is where that growth inside the city’s footprint should happen. The plan says that growth should happen around anchors. These anchors, picked with the help of residents, are usually commercial areas like Overton Square, Crosstown Concourse, Cooper-Young, and others.
To Gordon, city planners dropped a compass point on these anchors and drew a circle around them. Inside those circles is where the 3.0 plan wants to grow, he said. This is a critical foundation of MidtownMemphis.org’s argument against the 3.0 plan, with Gordon saying, “I’m not alone in thinking that’s a bad way to make plans.”
“So, you may have bought your home in a single-family neighborhood, but the future land use planning map sees in the future … a change to a more dense kind of neighborhood,” Gordon told the crowd. “One of our big issues with [3.0] is right here at the core of it: the anchors. We don’t agree that an anchor necessarily warrants this kind of density. Nor do we agree with what are called ‘anchors.’ For example, let’s just point out, Overton Park is not an anchor.”
The anchor model and the density projections that come with it are brush strokes too broad to paint the intricacies of planning something as complex as Midtown neighborhoods, Gordon said. This is seen at a macro level in the plan as the city is divvied up into 14 planing zones. In this, Midtown, the Medical Center, and Downtown are merged into one zone called “Core City.”
“I think that is a mistake because Midtown is residential housing, and Downtown and the Medical Center are not,” Gordon says. “So, let’s start by saying those should be separated.”
But Gordon easily shifts into the micro: the dense, complex, nitty-gritty of 3.0 that could allow single-family neighborhoods to legally be chopped into quadplexes, new units built where they can’t be now and, he says, destabilize Midtown neighborhoods.
The density models from anchor planning in 3.0 are the easiest way for a developer to create multifamily in a single-family zone, he said. They’ll pay “professional convincers,” basically development lobbyists at Memphis City Hall, to speak to planning boards like the Land Use Control Board or the Board of Adjustment and ask for a special zoning change on property from single family to multifamily.
“This professional convincer is going to go in there armed with information from Memphis 3.0 and say, ‘This is what the city wants,’” he said. “So, in short order, your single-family neighborhood is going to begin to show multifamily buildings. And people who are looking for houses to buy are going to go, ‘Wait a minute. I remember this as a single-family neighborhood. What’s that four-plex doing there?’”
While the process may move slowly, he said, it could be a deciding factor for potential Midtown homeowners who might not want to gamble their biggest investment “on a neighborhood that’s in flux.”
A neighborhood could get multifamily zoning even if it’s not in one of those anchor density zones, Gordon said. The Memphis 3.0 plan designates some entire streets for higher density, regardless of where they lie, he said. So, even if your neighborhood passes all the other tests, a developer could use the street designation as an argument for, say, a four-plex on a street. Later, another developer could come in wanting the same thing nearby because there’s already one across the street.
A third way Gordon told crowd members a neighborhood could get density through 3.0 is from degree of change. He joked it was the “dreaded degree of change” because it was harder to explain. The term, he said, basically means how money gets into a neighborhood. The 3.0 plan outlines three categories, he said. In it, the city works alone or with developers to fuel projects in certain neighborhoods, based on the need, and that could mean high-density housing.
“If you’re in a ‘nurture’ neighborhood, the city’s going to throw a lot of money at you,” Gordon said. “If you’re in an ‘accelerate’ neighborhood, the city’s going to throw some money at you but they’re going to try and get private investment to come in.
“If you’re in a ‘sustain’ neighborhood, then the city’s is going to say that private investors are going to take care of that.”
Memphis 3.0’s future land use planning map envisions denser neighborhoods. (Photo: Courtesy Memphis and Shelby County DPD)
A contentious question of motivation
The Q&A portion of the meeting found a raw spot in discussions around Memphis 3.0 and the density topic in general. The basic question: Are single-family housing proponents seeking to bar low-income people from their neighborhoods?
Abby Sheridan raised the point gently at the MidtownMemphis.org meeting. The reason she and her family moved close to Crosstown, she said, was to be within walking distance of the Concourse, for the density. She went to the meeting to see what the opposition to 3.0 was about, she said.
“Don’t be afraid of density,” she told the crowd. “Just because we allow for different types of housing doesn’t mean it’s an automatic guarantee.
“I’ve lived in multi-unit neighborhoods for most of my adult life. They are thriving, vibrant communities.
“If we, as Evergreen [residents], believe that diversity is our strength, y’all are really showing your colors tonight.”
The comment sucked the air from the room that was quickly filled with side chatter, sighs, and low gasps. Emily Bishop, a MidtownMemphis.org volunteer, responded, saying owner-occupied homes stabilized Cooper-Young in the late ’80s when she bought her home (once a duplex, she said) there.
“The businesses were nonexistent in Cooper-Young,” Bishop said. “There was one Indochina restaurant. [The neighborhood] was light industrial at best.
“There was no zoning change that brought density back. What makes a neighborhood thrive are owner-occupied homes with people who get involved, who do the code enforcement work, who get rid of slumlords, and who support the local businesses.”
In all, Bishop said Memphis doesn’t have a housing shortage; it has an affordable housing shortage.
“And there again,” Sheridan said, “what I’m hearing you say is … ‘not in our neighborhood.’”
Gordon jumped in to cool off the topic by saying that MidtownMemphis.org really is simply in favor of doing smaller plans for distinct neighborhoods.
Joe Ozment spoke plainly.
“I’ve been doing criminal defense in this city for 33 years and I’ve seen what’s happened in areas like Hickory Hill and Cordova when you add density,” he said. “We don’t want that in Midtown.”
Jerred Price, president of the Downtown Neighborhood Association, and his board attended the meeting to “support the neighbors.” He and the board agreed that Downtown should be a separate planning bloc from Midtown. He said the anchor-and-compass method “shouldn’t be a strategy for development.”
Dropping “one of those special, little circle-drawing thingamajiggers” at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital would mean high density for the single-family neighborhoods like Uptown, he said. But higher density could be welcomed on the other side of the interstate there because it’s in the Downtown core.
“So, even for us, those circles don’t make any sense of our communities,” Price said. “We stand with you on that.”
Asked about the timeline of the Memphis 3.0 proposal, Gordon said public meetings will continue through this year. Revised plans with that public input would then be published. Then, the Memphis City Council would vote on them, likely in 2026.
“If the future land use planning map hasn’t changed,” he said, “we will continue to marshal forces and the idea will be a showdown at city council.
“We would bring many citizens up there to protest a map that is not properly planned and does not look at what is stable in Midtown, is determined to destabilize Midtown for the benefit of commercial anchors, and is giving a free pass to other parts of town.”
Q&A with John Zeanah
John Zeanah is the director of the Memphis and Shelby County Division of Planning and Development. He said overarching city plans like Memphis 3.0 are nothing new; they’re even mandated for cities in certain states.
Among those plans, Memphis 3.0 stands out, Zeanah said. It has won awards from the American Planning Association and the Congress for the New Urbanism. Memphis 3.0 is the city’s first comprehensive plan since 1981.
We asked him to respond to the movement against the 3.0 plan, which was authored by his office. — Toby Sells
Memphis Flyer: What do you make of the arguments about 3.0 from MidtownMemphis.org? John Zeanah: Memphis 3.0 was adopted six years ago. So, when is it going to do those things [that MidtownMemphis.org argues] if it hasn’t already?
They’re saying the plan is up for a five-year review. We’re undergoing our first five-year plan update now. One of the things that we’re doing as a part of the five-year plan update … is conducting a comprehensive look at the zoning map and understanding how well our zoning works with [Memphis 3.0].
I think part of the misunderstanding is the claim that we would necessarily rezone areas, according to the plan, to the most intense use or the most intense zoning district that could be conceived. And that’s not the case.
First of all, [Memphis 3.0] is general in nature. It — and the future land use map that they are so worried about — is meant to be general, with a generalized land use map.
I think there’s some misunderstanding about whether the future land use map is calling for all these new things to happen. It’s an expression of what’s existing today. In some cases, it’s a mix of both.
Suffice to say, as we are going through the five-year plan update and we’re thinking about how zoning is a tool to implement the plan, our orientation is not to just apply the most-intense zoning district. There are changes to zoning that may not always be in residential areas. In fact, I’d say most of the zoning changes that will end up being recommended are in some of our commercial areas and commercial corridors.
The goal is to make sure that our community has healthy, stable anchors that are supported by healthy, stable neighborhoods. The suggestions that we would take extreme actions to destabilize neighborhoods are really puzzling. It doesn’t come from anything that we’re saying as a part of our meetings. It doesn’t come from anything the plan is saying.
They’ve said developers could use the future land use planning map as another arrow in their quiver. They could argue that while multi-family homes may not be allowed in a zone now, they could point to the suggestion in Memphis 3.0 and make a case for their project at city hall. One cannot simply point to a generalized land use map and say, “Well, because this area around an anchor is a mixed-use type, I should be entitled to do the most intense thing that is part of this mix.” That’s no. 1. And no. 2: The plan does not have the authority to entitle that. That’s the role of zoning.
So, if you live in a neighborhood that is predominantly single-family and your zoning is single-family detached, and it is a stable neighborhood, there is no reason for the city to propose changing the zoning for the neighborhood. You are the healthy, stable neighborhood that is helping to support the anchor nearby. That is a good thing. That’s what we want to help preserve.
Memphis Mayor Paul Young answers question on xAI, MATA, and more in an AMA. (Credit: City of Memphis)
Memphis Mayor Paul Young answered questions about wide-ranging topics in his AMA (Ask Me Anything) session in the Memphis subreddit Monday.
Memphis Redditors wanted to know his positions on Elon Musk and his xAI supercomputer, what’s happening at the Memphis Area Transit Authority, why the road from Memphis International Airport is so bad, what he thought of the Dr. Marie Feagins/Memphis Shelby-County Schools situation, drive-out tags, and more.
Young responded with (what appeared to be) pretty straight-forward answers.
On Elon Musk, for example: Young said he understood “why some people are wary of working with a billionaire who has a larger-than-life personality, but I separate the personality from the project.” He explained that city, county, and state taxes invested around $100 million in the Electrolux facility and it was sitting vacant. Now, with, xAI it’s drawn a $10 billion investment here that could mean “tens of millions of dollars annually in tax revenue.”
Below, we’ve pulled most of the answered questions from the AMA:
Hooded, masked men show no identification as they take workers from TaconGanas Monday. (Credit: TaconGanas via Facebook
The men who detained workers at TACOnganas yesterday were, indeed, federal agents, according to Memphis Mayor Paul Young.
We’ll follow details of this story. For now, this is as much as we know:
At around 5:30 p.m. Monday, TACOnganas posted this to Facebook along with a video showing the encounter:
“Earlier today, individuals entered one of our trucks and took away several of our employees. We do not know what prompted this. We were not told beforehand, and we have not been told since. We understand it may be difficult to watch, but we’re sharing a video of it.
“We have heard from the employees. They’ve been told they’re being detained by (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement – ICE). We don’t know if the men you see in the video work for ICE or for someone else. You’ll see they have no uniforms, do not show any badge or ID, and did not leave any identifying information or paperwork. If not for our security cameras, we would not even know this happened.
“We’ve contacted legal aid organizations to help the employees, and we’re gathering any information we have to share with their families. Our company complies with federal and local immigration laws, and we know everyone is dealing with situations like this. We know our community is scared. As the country navigates a new normal, we’re here to support the community and to support our workforce and people, too.”
As the video spread quickly across social media in Memphis, Young posted this statement to X at around 9:30 p.m. Monday:
“We understand the shockwaves that are reverberating through our community right now following the release of the TACOnganas video.
“Although these matters don’t fall under our jurisdiction, we reached out to federal authorities out of concern. Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) confirmed that this action was carried out by federal agents.
We have been instructed to send all media inquiries to HSI.”
Media Statement: Monday, February 10, 2025
We understand the shockwaves that are reverberating through our community right now following the release of the TACOnganas video.
Although these matters don't fall under our jurisdiction, we reached out to federal authorities out…
Republican lawmakers are coming for your cannabis products, again.
Two new bills filed for the upcoming session of the Tennessee General Assembly outright ban the sale of THCA products. One of those would remove all cannabis products from gas stations (or any store that allows those under 21) and more. However, another bill, also filed by Republicans, would outright legalize all “smoking hemp.”
The Tennessee Growers Coalition, an industry advocacy group, raised the alarm on the bills. They say the bill put “a direct target on the industry.”
“There are several bills that have been introduced this week that will directly affect the industry, and not in a good way,” reads a newsletter the group sent Friday.
A bill sponsored by state Sen. Ferrell Haile (R-Gallatin) and state Rep. Ed Butler (R-Rickman), says hemp is legal only as long as it contains the state-limited .3 percent total THC. However, it further specifies that legal hemp here would still need to meet that amount after it is heated (y’know, smoked). Further, the bill outlaws all THCP and THCA products.
Another bill, filed my House Majority Leader Rep. William Lamberth (R-Portland) and Sen. Richard Briggs (R-Knoxville) includes the THCA ban but also completely reorganizes how hemp products are sold in Tennessee. Lamberth has worked on cannabis issues for years now and is largely responsible for the market as it is now.
That market is overseen by the Tennessee Department of Agriculture. However, the new bill would move that oversight to the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission.
The new bill would remove all hemp-derived cannabis products from any store that allows customers under age 21. In those stores, hemp products must be kept behind counters or some other place “that requires assistance from a retail clerk in order to access and purchase” the products. Liquor stores, however, could keep hemp beverages (12 ounces or greater) in coolers for customers to access themselves.
Hemp products could be sold in vending machines, self-checkout systems, or online. Giving samples would be illegal.
Products can only contain a maximum of 250 milligrams of hemp in 10 equal servings. Those products would come with a list of possible allergens, ingredients, and total hemp volume. They’d also come with a “conspicuous warning statement having a minimum font size of 11-point font concerning the risk of impairment from consumption of the product, keeping the product out of the reach of children, and other warning information.”
Advertising for hemp products cannot feature “superheroes, comic book characters, video game characters, television show characters, movie characters, or unicorns or other mythical creatures.” Sorry, Bigfoot.
Hemp products could not be mixed with alcoholic beverages or used as an ingredient in beer. Retailers cannot make claims “pertaining to diagnoses, cures, or mitigation or treatment of any human disease or other condition.”
Another bill, filed by Rep. Chris Hurt (R-Halls) and Sen. Page Walley (R-Savannah) simply (but officially) adds “smoking hemp,” meaning dried cannabis flower, to state law.
Cannabis would be legal for recreational and medical uses in Tennessee next year if the Tennessee General Assembly passes either of two similar bills filed by Democrats this week.
The first is from state Rep. Larry Miller (D-Memphis) and state Sen. Jeff Yarbro (D-Nashville). The second is from state Rep. Aftyn Behn (D-Nashville) and state Sen. Heidi Campbell (D-Nashville).
Both bills allow all Tennessee adults over 21 to possess, use, and transport small amounts of cannabis for personal use. Both would allow cannabis retailers to sell all THC products. They would also allow Tennesseans to grow up to 12 cannabis plants for personal use.
Both bills would tax cannabis sales at 15 percent on the state level and allow local governments to add a 5 percent tax to local sales of cannabis. State budget experts have not yet estimated how much revenue those tax figures might bring.
A bill filed last year would have established a medical marijuana program in the state. Tennesseans would have been only eligible to buy cannabis products if they had a diagnosis from a specific list of medical conditions. That law would have made the total state marijuana tax 10 percent and a local tax up to 3 percent. State budget experts predicted that plan would have yielded tax revenues of more than $48 million annually.
The new cannabis plans differ in how revenues are spent. The broader Tennessee Cannabis Act specifies only that about 15 percent of the money go to state agencies to run the cannabis program. The rest would go into he state’s general fund and spent at the discretion of lawmakers.
The Pot for Potholes fund earmarks 75 percent of all cannabis tax revenues for the state highway fund. Most of the rest of the money would go to Tennessee’s 95 counties. A remaining 5 percent of the funds would go to state agencies to manage the program.
The bills seem the same in almost every other way. Both would:
• Regulate cannabis packaging. Products for sale would have to be sold in child-resistant packaging, carry a new, universal cannabis symbol, and show the total amount of THC in the product.
• Cap personal possession at 60 grams of marijuana, but not more than 15 grams of concentrate
• Allow private cultivation of 12 plants in a private area that is locked and not visible from a public place.
• Allow a parent or guardian to give cannabis products to their children for a medical condition, excluding smokeable products.
• Allow for the commercial grow and sale of the product.
• Allow for the possession of marijuana-related paraphernalia such as water pipes, etc. (with exceptions)
• Allow employers to prohibit the use of cannabis products in the workplace.
• Allow employers to discipline workers for cannabis use.
• Allow employers to consider cannabis use in its hiring process (with certain restrictions).
• Allow personal cannabis users and growers to buy firearms.
• Cannabis possession or use would not be grounds to deny a lease to a potential residential tenant.
• Cannabis use would not be allowed in a motor vehicle, a watercraft on public waters, or in a public place.
