Background:   The Fourth District Council seat covers the northeast quadrant of our City.  It runs from the Holson River in the south to the Black Oak Ridge in Fountain City in the north, and includes a portion of Holston Hills, Alice Bell, Spring Hill, North Hills, Fourth & Gill, Old North Knoxville, Shannondale and Fountain City, as well as other neighborhoods along the way.

   Over the course of this campaign, I have knocked on hundreds of doors in the 4th district and attended a number of forums and gatherings, where I have spoken to many Knoxville residents.  While each person is different, there are some common questions, concerns and themes.  I address several of them here, recognizing that specific facts and circumstances  --  the context of a particular issue -- as well as the public input and debate will affect the ultimate position taken on a specific issue.

Healthy Neighborhoods:  One thing we all agree on is that strong, healthy neighborhoods are the backbone of our City.  We live here. That is where our family and friends reside, work and play.  Knoxvillians and visitors enjoy the area's natural beauty and appreciate its friendly people.  Our government is there to protect the sanctity of our homes, our neighborhoods, and our natural environment.  City planning and administrative action should preserve and protect those important values and resources.  But we must also do our part to preserve what is precious.
    

Fiscal Responsibility:       Government needs to be efficient, effective, and affordable. It provides basic services using our money. It's obligation is to spend our money wisely and to live within the budget. 

City residents need and expect competent police and fire protection, road repair and improvements, property codes enforcement, sidewalk, park, greenway, and bus service, and rational growth that fosters new jobs without damaging our community.  Sound government must be mindful that every dollar that it spends is one less that you and I have in our pockets to provide for our family's needs. Government needs to be frugal.  Your City Council representative needs to make sure our money is spent well.  We need to encourage efficiency and reward productivity.

Council needs to provide oversight and a separate check against inappropriate action by the administration or the City's some 1600 employees.  We expect bang for our buck.   (See budget page for more details).

Rational Growth:  We need to foster business growth and expansion, and help create and maintain good paying jobs.  Promoting a business-friendly environment is important, because having a decent paying job provides individuals and families with the financial freedom to enjoy life, and revenue to run our City's essential services.  But  along with smart business recruiting and location decisions, prudent precautions are needed: to be sure we don't damage the liveability of our City.  We cannot simply chase dollars.  We are laying the foundation for our future.  Rational, sustainable growth is needed. 

Housing for the Chronically Homeless:  This is controversial.  The effort was begun with good intentions: to help others in need.  We must not let our heart-led mission override our concern for preserving healthy neighborhoods and a healthy city for our taxpayers to live in and our visitors, who bring business and jobs to our community, to visit and safely enjoy.  A review of this program is needed to assure that the proper focus is maintained.

There are unanswered questions.  For example, the current budget has a million dollars earmarked to tear down an old dormitory at Lakeshore.  Why aren't those moneys being used instead to rehab that facility to house and care for the chronically homeless?  The rationale -- our prior "contract with the state requires that" -- should be revisited and the contract renegotiated to achieve a greater good.  Also, how can we afford to pay $120,000 per unit to rehab a building for the homeless, when the average house in Knoxville is appraised at $79,000?  Is that fair to our taxpayers? Does the possibility of federal funding negate fiscal responsibility?  Care is needed.  Let's not incentivize or reward other counties for shirking their responsibility to care for their own residents in need. 

We have to understand the root causes of the problem: the chronically homeless are, by definition, people with drug addictions and mental illnesses that require attention and medication.  They have repeatedly failed to normalize their life. They need to be placed where ample caseworker and medical oversight can be provided to restore them to health. There are also budget concerns related to our efforts.

Sprawl:  Is further urban sprawl necessary? desirable?  Only change is inevitable.  As the ancient philosopher Heraclitus reminds us: "you cannot step into the same river twice." The key is to be flexible ... to ask questions and reset goals.
 
For example: Why not find a way to incentivize renewal of our old center city neighborhoods, instead of walking away from them and converting the next outlying farm to a subdivision?  Many of these homes are within walking or biking distance of downtown.  Let's facilitate these alternate means of getting around, through trails and sidewalks. Let's find a way to "encourage" builders to go in and rehab these older homes, restore and update their functionality while preserving their historic beauty.  Incentivize building infill housing on empty lots that are in keeping with the historic styles nearby.  These neighborhoods can be showcases of our past and a tribute to the families that live there. Change your eyeglasses: these are not blight but flower buds about to open.

Multi-faceted review: To fully accomplish renewal, we will need to talk about great schools for each area of our city.  That involves a dialogue with the county (we help fund those schools with transfers of our city tax`dollars, as well as our separately paid county taxes).  We may also need better community watch cooperation with police to solve individual crime issues. A liveable city starts here. Let's roll up our sleeves and begin.

Police Protection, Codes Enforcement:   We all care about the safety and wholesomeness of our community and neighborhoods. How do keep that without unduly burdening you, the taxpayers, is the key question.

Dirty lots and run down buildings are a problem in some areas. I believe we could use more codes enforcement officers (we currently have only 8 of the 10 field officer positions filled) as well as some additional assistance from the city law department to take violaters to court. When violaters know they will be fined, they'll get moving or lose their property.  Realistically, any such initiative is partly a function of budget and corresponding revenue from taxes.
 
Public safety. Police staffing of sworn officers has not yet reached the full authorization level of 416 positions due to attrition of existing forces and the year-long recruiting/ specialty training cycle through our police academy and post-graduation field training program Knoxville has.  Our officer training exceeds state minimal standards and is one that is widely admired. I've been attending the 12-week Citizen's Police Academy since August, and I can report that I am impressed with our professional and dedicated officers. 

My opponent glibly talks of increasing the police force by 20%.  But how? It's just talk. Without consulting the chief of police on feasibility or the budget office on funding, he presumes to single-handedly change our police force and spend upwards of $8 to 10 million of your hard earned tax dollars!  Sounds like more political pie in the sky. 

Realistically, a significant portion of our tax-based funding comes from sales taxes (both the local option percentage and transfers from the state’s sales tax receipts) and those revenues are down, and are expected to remain so during much of the next year due to the nationwide business downturn.  As a practical matter, we may be faced with paring of budgets and services -- at least tightening of belts -- to balance our city’s budget rather than expanding services over the next year — at least until a recovery increases this form of tax revenue or substitute sources are found.  Unlike the federal government, the city cannot print money; it must balance its budget.  The long-term fiscal health of our city is an important goal as well, and will dictate our bond ratings and cost of money.

Let's find ways to make our police and codes departments more effective by pitching in, by neighborhood watches (both formal groups and informal attentiveness) -- by serving as the citizen eyes and ears of our trained professionals. You just can't throw money at problems. Besides, it's your money, not the politician's.  

Public Transportation:  Interviewers like to ask about using public transportion as a tool to transform our city. Here's where it stands. Our KAT system does a good job of providing public transportation to downtowm, the university and the malls, and will do an even better job when the $30 million downtown transit center under construction near the Civic Coliseum is completed in 2010. Its new comfort and convenience will help energize KAT. Right now, our bus service is not frequent enough to make it truly convenient as a substitute for automobile travel, especially for people on a tight schedule or who must make multiple stops -- that probably requires bus availability every 15 minutes, rather than every 30 minutes as now provided. That upgrade would expensive, however.

We must recognize that KAT’s $17 million budget is highly subsidized – to the tune of $8 million from the city, $2 million from the state, plus $3 million in special transportation monies presently funded by the federal government.  There is a limit to how much expansion can reasonably be done under the present revenue scheme.

There have also been discussions and studies about creating a light rail system to ease the burden of automobile traffic and commuting — this doubtless will be part of our future. Such projects are interesting but their implementation is likely a ways off.  Rail will require hundreds of millions of dollars and substantial time to acquire land for right of way and to build-out the needed rail and terminals. Our current population may also be a bit too dispersed to make a rail line profitable (the ideal service opportunity has been described as "barbell shaped," with large numbers of people moving back and forth between each end of the travel connecting line). Rail is part of the new green wave, as we work towards an energy saving future.  Stay tuned to innovations, as entrepreneurs and creative minds ponder options.