Enclave

• Positive crime news for the North End

  Metro Nashville Police reported at a Salemtown Neighbors association meeting earlier tonight that the Central Precinct is leading with a 16% rise in crime reduction followed by East and North Precincts at around 11%. [...]
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  Posted: November 30, 2009, 11:54pm EST
  

• Obama's roost

  Paul Krugman sees bleak times coming with years of terrible job markets and political paralysis. The tide will turn most grimly against the Democrats, whose losses
  will be worse because Obama, by pursuing a uniformly pro-banker policy without even a gesture to popular anger over the bailouts, has ceded [...]
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  Posted: November 30, 2009, 11:15pm EST
  

• Blue-faced, lying and misleading

  Blogging CM Emily Evans is more charitable toward mainstream columnist Gail Kerr's Sunday Tennessean piece than I was while she still challenges Kerr's assumptions about mayoral budget options:
  Missing from Gail's analysis is the outcome of the convention center debate. If the convention center is approved, it very [...]
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  Posted: November 30, 2009, 11:31am EST
  

• Detroit Freep features Nashville's "grassroots" movement to preserve Union Station

  After the Detroit city council voted to demolish the city's historic train depot, a local movement sprang up to engage the debate on whether to keep it. A Detroit Free Press reporter covers the debate and looks to Nashville's Union Station as a chance for Michigan preservationists:
  
  

  Nashville [...]

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  Posted: November 29, 2009, 11:53pm EST
  

• Detroit Freep features Nashville's "grassroots" movement to preserve Union Station

  After the Detroit city council voted to demolish the city's historic train depot, a local movement sprang up to engage the debate on whether to keep it. A Detroit Free Press reporter covers the debate and looks to Nashville's Union Station as a chance for Michigan preservationists:
  
  

  Nashville [...]

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  Posted: November 29, 2009, 11:53pm EST
  

• Posing the handicapper but effectively sandbagging on the Mayor's next budget

  If Gail Kerr didn't have a writing history of uncritically pandering to this Mayor's Office, we might be able to accept her Sunday column describing how hard it will be for Karl Dean next year as sober realism. However--after being coached to write on behalf of the Mayor's convention' [...]
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  Posted: November 29, 2009, 11:19pm EST
  

• Posing the handicapper but effectively sandbagging on the Mayor's next budget

  If Gail Kerr didn't have a writing history of uncritically pandering to this Mayor's Office, we might be able to accept her Sunday column describing how hard it will be for Karl Dean next year as sober realism. However--after being coached to write on behalf of the Mayor's convention' [...]
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  Posted: November 29, 2009, 11:19pm EST
  

• Neighborhood meeting for proposed West Nashville Rec Center

  From the Nashville Neighborhoods e-list:
  
  NEIGHBORHOOD MEETING

  Monday, November 30, 2009

  6:00 to 7:30 p.m.

  Metro Parks Boardroom

  2565 Park Plaza

  Subject:

  Proposed Recreation Center

  3138 Parthenon Avenue

  BZA Case #2009-080

  
  

  The purpose of this meeting is to allow local residents and property owners to learn of plans for a proposed building [...]

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  Posted: November 29, 2009, 11:03pm EST
  

• Stupid human tricks

  Antioch CM Sam Coleman is bound and determined to follow through on his intention to allow guns in rural parks not because they have especially high crime rates but only because they are rural. He is due to make an appearance at the Parks Board on Tuesday to press [...]
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  Posted: November 29, 2009, 10:36pm EST
  

• Dethroned journos

  Timothy B. Lee considers the results for news dissemination of the Internet removing journalists from the paternalistic, privileged gatekeeping positions:
  

  The reality is that a great many people still read newspapers, so it shouldn’t surprise us that the local metro daily is still one of the most prominent soapboxes [...]

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  Posted: November 29, 2009, 10:19pm EST
  

• The Mayor's Saturday neighborhood stroll through Germantown, Salemtown

  According to the Salemtown e-list the Mayor will be here on Saturday at 11:00 to make his 2nd neighborhood walk.
  
  
  
  Too bad he didn't extend the Salemtown leg for another block to 7th, he would have a great view of Werthan Lofts and' [...]
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  Posted: November 25, 2009, 8:50am EST
  

• Reader watchdogs City Paper local coverage, unacknowledged re-writes online

  West Nashville community advocate Mina Johnson followed the debate of the West Police Precinct with great interest. She also noticed substantial changes in the evolution of a SouthComm reporter's copy. She alerted me to the changes in a November 17 piece by Joey Garrison:
  [Original title] Council approves spending $14M [...]
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  Posted: November 25, 2009, 8:06am EST
  

• Final throes of ATL sprawl

  AJC blogger Jay Bookman recites last rites over the final days of Atlanta's suburban boom:
  Even before the recession hit, the sprawl model of growth was showing serious strains in metro Atlanta. Admittedly, it was hard to see at the time. The U.S. Census Bureau, for example, reported that [...]
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  Posted: November 25, 2009, 12:53am EST
  

• Urban leaders ask Metro Pubic Works to maintain federal investments in their neighborhoods

  Several neighborhoods are concerned to learn that despite MDHA utilizing HUD funds to install quality of life streetscape elements, Public Works refuses to help them maintain those elements after vandals strike. So, they asked for a meeting with Public Works and other officials yesterday to seek resolution. Via the Salemtown [...]
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  Posted: November 25, 2009, 12:00am EST
  

• In case there is anyone still left who still wonders what bloggers do

  Dave Winer and Jay Rosen discuss:
  The natural born blogger (Dave says) is “someone whose nature is to do stuff without waiting for permission. To explain things, knowing they could easily be wrong. To go first. To err on the side of saying too much.” ....
  
  Jay: ... [...]
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  Posted: November 24, 2009, 10:15am EST
  

• Exactly the kind of difference council members should make on behalf of Nashvillians

  In stark contrast to CM Ronnie Steine, whom I referenced yesterday as the Mayor's unquestioning go-with guy on spending Metro revenues, I refer you to CM Emily Evans:
  Similar to Riebeling, who previously worked at Fifth Third Securities and Morgan Keegan Co., Evans also has a background in [...]
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  Posted: November 24, 2009, 12:10am EST
  

• Council memo sets dates for consideration of finance package for the Mayor's convention center

  Some very important dates set by CMs Ronnie Steine and Erik Cole and communicated to Metro Council for consideration of the largest capital project in Nashville ever (click on image to enlarge):
  
  
  
  
  HT: Carol McCullough [...]
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  Posted: November 23, 2009, 11:46pm EST
  

• SouthComm celebrity makers spin neighborhood leaders as "berating" Finance Director

  I would be interested to hear the responses of concerned West Nashvillians to SouthComm reporter Joey Garrison's spin on their community meetings with Finance Director Rich Riebeling:
  One minute he’s berated by neighborhood association leaders at a community meeting in west Nashville. The next day he’s with state officials [...]
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  Posted: November 23, 2009, 7:44am EST
  

• 34 Council Members were unswayed by Hillwood association President's reasoned letter

  In the last post, I referred to the Metro Council's failure last Tuesday to slow the process of acquiring and building a new West Precinct police station in the face of serious, unanswered questions coming from the West Nashville community. The Hillwood neighborhood association president, Kathy Baker, was kind [...]
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  Posted: November 22, 2009, 11:15pm EST
  

• Lopsided Council vote on West Precinct MNPD station belied community opposition and the appearance of unethical patronage

  For the last couple of weeks the Nashville neighborhoods e-list was lit up with a discussion by West Nashville leaders opposed to the ramrod style that Police Chief Ronal Serpas and Finance Director Rich Riebeling have pushed through the purchase of an old auto dealership for assignment as the new [...]
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  Posted: November 22, 2009, 11:00pm EST
  

• Uncritical Faith?

  CM Ronnie Steine can't come up with a single reason to question Mayor Karl Dean on the convention center:
  Councilman Ronnie Steine, chairman of the Budget and Finance Committee, said the council would "owe it to the mayor" to hear his rationale if he submits the hotel financing at' [...]
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  Posted: November 22, 2009, 9:55pm EST
  

• The Hollin Effect (or "The difference 2 votes can make")

  According to a report received from the Cleveland Park neighborhood e-list, Public Works has been in District 5 every day this week "cleaning up alleys and hauling off the junk". Reportedly, people have not witnessed Public Works tending Cleveland Park in these ways in the past. One resident checked with [...]
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  Posted: November 20, 2009, 12:36am EST
  

• Won't be accused of putting the "social" in "social media"

  This teachable moment brought to you by local-to-Nashville social media big-shot, Rex Hammock, who is seemingly tired of people finding fault with a new Twitter function unless they can actually alter that Twitter function with brawn and their bare hands:
  
  
  
  If you [...]
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  Posted: November 18, 2009, 7:20pm EST
  

• Anger blows back on local press "assassins"

  A number of elected leaders have expressed their anger over the unpleasant lashing out at Metro Parks and Roy Wilson by courthouse and columnist. Among those is typically mild-mannered Mike Jameson, who spoke truth to the power of the press:
  Councilman Mike Jameson, who called Wilson “top-notch” in responding [...]
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  Posted: November 18, 2009, 12:10am EST
  

• BREAKING: Roy Wilson's resignation letter to Metro Parks Board

  Via Karen Y. Johnson (click on image to enlarge):
  
  [...]
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  Posted: November 17, 2009, 6:18pm EST
  

• Dead CM walking

  District 5 is in a kind of limbo this week with a newly certified new council member and with former council member Pam Murray considering a legal challenge. But Ms. Murray is back to her half-baked hyperbole in response to Monday's certification at the Election Commission:
  to agree with [...]
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  Posted: November 17, 2009, 9:01am EST
  

• Metro Finance talking points against Parks derailed

  The attempts at the courthouse and in the mainstream media to make Metro Parks and Recreation a pariah, in spite of the fact that budget overages occur in other Metro departments, look like they are coming apart at the seams. One does not have to be a fan of the [...]
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  Posted: November 17, 2009, 7:32am EST
  

• Sheriff Daron Hall once again embroiled in charges of cavorting with prejudice

  Aunt B has deeply-held concerns about the company the Sheriff's Office is seeking to keep with news of his latest anti-immigration faux pas concerning the controversial Center for Immigration Studies:
  This marks the second time that Hall was scheduled to speak to white supremacist groups (the first being his [...]
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  Posted: November 16, 2009, 11:17pm EST
  

• You knew somebody from the Mayor's staff would wear the white hat and save the day for beleaguered Parks staff

  Here Rich Riebeling comes to save the day:
  The board approved a plan that will layoff off five Parks workers, while also asking Metro Council for an emergency appropriation of $850,000. More workers could face layoffs in the near future, as the Board will decide in the coming weeks [...]
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  Posted: November 16, 2009, 10:39pm EST
  

• Mayor's Office takes near north Nashville out of TDZ

  Originally the state and Metro Council approved a Tourist Development Zone to capture extra sales taxes for the proposed convention center with a northern boundary of Jefferson Street, like so:
  
  
  
  This made no sense to me, since convention goers wouldn't be likely' [...]
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  Posted: November 15, 2009, 11:00pm EST
  

• Seattle news site gives up advertising for non-profit journalism

  Inevitable in many discussions I have about local journalism are quizzical responses to my suggestion that an untried model for sustaining good reporting pioneered at a few places elsewhere is 501-c-3. Last month Seattle's local news site Crosscut.com announced its conversion to non-profit status and enumerated the benefits:[...]
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  Posted: November 15, 2009, 3:21am EST
  

• Private investors won't assume the risk of the new convention center, so why should Metro government when it doesn't directly serve Nashvillians?

  Blogging CM Emily Evans cuts through the finance jargon and gets down to economic brass tacks on the undue risk Nashvillians will have to assume with a new convention center:
  Goldman Sachs preliminary financing structures clearly articulate how much risk professional investors are willing to take. They seem to [...]
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  Posted: November 13, 2009, 9:42am EST
  

• 3 votes ahead and tweeting like its 300

  Council District 5 challenger Jamie Hollin finished last night unofficially 3 votes ahead of Pam Murray (542-539), but he responded to the news that there are still 4 provisional votes remaining to be counted today with some misplaced swagger:
  
  
  
  As unethical and presumptuous [...]
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  Posted: November 13, 2009, 7:42am EST
  

• NewsChannel5 rushes to judgment on District 5 race?

  NewsChannel5 seems guilty of declaring the District 5 race when only 3 votes separate Jamie Hollin and Pam Murray with possible provisional ballots left to count. Just throwing "unofficial" in the headline doesn't change the misleading message that CM Murray has "lost her seat," when she's 4 provisional votes, [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 10:26pm EST
  

• CP tweaks rush-to-judgment headline with 3 votes determining District 5 unofficial results

  SouthComm reporter Joey Garrison appeared to be the first reporter to call the District 5 results even though only 3 votes separate challenger Jamie Hollin from recalled incumbent CM Pam Murray. I called the Metro Election Commission around 8:40 p.m. and asked them if the unofficial results (542-539, Hollin) broadcast [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 9:57pm EST
  

• Why blog about council members anonymously?

  The polls closed in the Nashville's first recall election several minutes ago, and we're waiting to see the results of the challenge to Pam Murray's tenure on Metro Council. In the meantime, consider the Districtfive blog, which is dedicated to addressing Murray's foibles and vices. The latest post answers [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 8:04pm EST
  

• Beaman Park: Gateway to Danger

  Betsy Phillips does what neither the mainstream press nor CM Sam Coleman seems willing to do: look at the crime statistics at a park where Mr. Coleman says guns need to be permitted as deterrents to hypothetical crimes. Not only does she find little to substantiate CM Coleman's incitement' [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 6:00pm EST
  

• Compare & Contrast: Rich Riebeling vs. David Manning on Planning Capital Projects

  Why is Dean Finance Director Rich Riebeling prone to spend Metro money before planning for new Metro facilities, given the previous Finance Director's common sense explanation in 2007 that thoughtful planning should always precede spending capital revenues on big ticket items?
  
  
  
  Now consider this dispatch from a' [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 1:15pm EST
  

• Tiny Cat Pants determined not to lose park services to Metro Council budget cuts

  Aunt B. is furious over this season's Metro war on Parks & Recreation:
  I knew that there had been some ridiculous overages in the Parks department, because it was oh, so important to have golf all winter long.
  
  But until today, I didn’t get that the people who' [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 7:49am EST
  

• Well at least they seem to like each other, for whatever that's worth

  I received word from a reliable source this afternoon that perhaps I was not getting attention from Mayor's Office of Neighborhoods Director Brady Banks for a vexing Salemtown concern because Mr. Banks had left the post of MOON Director. I tweeted a query to see if anyone else' [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 12:30am EST
  

• Deja vu: Metro Public Works drags feet again on Salemtown streetscape at nearly the same time they did in 2008

  Remember I reported a while back that one of the most frustrating delays in 2008 to the federally-funded community-development streetscape project in Salemtown was due to Metro Public Works literally misplacing MDHA's application for improvements from October to December? Well, it looks like Metro Public Works is reprising their' [...]
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  Posted: November 11, 2009, 9:51am EST
  

• Hyper-local blogger reports that Pam Murray's campaign accepts money from absentee landlords with checkered police histories

  The anonymous Districtfive blog digs into CM Pam Murray's latest campaign donor report--which was allegedly filed late at the Election Commission--and reports some troubling information about the company Ms. Murray keeps at election time:
  It turns out, many of her supporters are owners of businesses that have a less' [...]
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  Posted: November 11, 2009, 9:36am EST
  

• The list of smacks of shame

  Betsy Phillips takes Antioch CM Sam Coleman to the woodshed for effectively black-listing rural parks and the good rural communities that dwell around them:
  in a climate where the Parks budget faces a severe shortfall and people are losing their jobs, the insinuation that rural parks are so dangerous [...]
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  Posted: November 10, 2009, 11:30pm EST
  

• Cutting off Parks' nose to spite its face

  Via the Salemtown Neighbors e-list, Liberadio's Freddie O'Connell conveys his disappointment to courthouse leaders at hearing that Parks & Recreation center and program hours are on the chopping block without so much as a second thought:
  I have been following closely the situation that has arisen with the Metro Parks [...]
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  Posted: November 10, 2009, 11:18pm EST
  

• West Nashville communities hold meeting with questions on Rich Riebeling's decision to purchase car dealership building for police station

  I intended to post this earlier today, but got sidetracked. Via a member of the Nashville Neighborhoods e-list, the meeting of concerned citizens was held Belle Meade Methodist Church earlier this evening and it was planned to touch on several controversial notes about Metro Finance:
  [Tuesday night there was] a [...]
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  Posted: November 10, 2009, 11:04pm EST
  

• Metro Council only cares about Parks when it comes to permitting guns or not

  This council debate on guns-in-parks just won't die. CM Sam Coleman is bound and determined to permit park-goers to holster up somewhere in the county on public property (but not the Council chambers!). So, he's asked Metro Parks to provide him with a list of rural or isolated parks [...]
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  Posted: November 09, 2009, 11:27pm EST
  

• But is the unstated purpose of raising Saturday parking fees to pay for a new convention center and hotel?

  The knowledge now that Goldman Sachs has recommended that non-tax fees and fines that go into the General Fund be used to pay for future convention center/hotel construction debt has me casting a skeptical gaze now whenever I hear that Metro fees and fines are increasing, even when Metro officials [...]
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  Posted: November 09, 2009, 11:00pm EST
  

• And a child shall lead them, if by "child" you mean WKRN's Jamey Tucker

  More than either of the other two local news television stations, News 2 has tended to have a culture war edge to it, especially in the reporting of Jamey Tucker. And we can perennially bet that Tucker will ramp up the theo-con angles (or is than "angels"?) on his [...]
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  Posted: November 09, 2009, 10:24am EST
  

• Metro's General Fund as proposed safety net for the new convention center

  Blogging CM Emily Evans explains how Metro funds are likely to be used when convention center construction goes over budget:
  Since state law prohibits the direct use of property taxes and the administration has promised not to use sales taxes, the part of the general fund being targeted [by [...]
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  Posted: November 09, 2009, 12:32am EST
  

• Where life imitates art, except for the part where department heads engage in the timeless art of dysfunctional seduction at lunch

  The Tennessean's Michael Cass finds remarkable parallels between his courthouse beat and last week's episode of NBC's Parks and Recreation:
  Here in Metro government, the parks department got $664,000 less than it wanted for 2007-08 when the council decided to give that money to the Nashville Public Library so' [...]
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  Posted: November 08, 2009, 10:48pm EST
  

• Employing workers directly through federal public works programs would be cheaper than shunting tax money to private business

  I give you the wisdom of Paul Krugman:
  You can make a pretty good case that just employing a lot of people directly would be a lot more cost-effective; the WPA and CCC cost surprisingly little given the number of people put to work. Think of it [...]
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  Posted: November 06, 2009, 11:11am EST
  

• Creditworthy? Bredesen has Tennessee buying now to pay later

  According to this morning's Tennessean, the state continues to give money away to corporations while hoping for future returns via TNInvestco:
  A stretched state budget won't upset those plans because there are no up-front costs to issuing tax credits ... and the state won't have to forego those revenues' [...]
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  Posted: November 06, 2009, 7:30am EST
  

• Al Gore on Colbert

  The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30cFormidable Opponent - Global Warming With Al Gorewww.colbertnation.comColbert Report Full EpisodesPolitical HumorU.S. Speedskating [...]
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  Posted: November 05, 2009, 9:22am EST
  

• Deconstructing Woody

  Larry Woody may not grasp that the same criticism he levels at neighborhoods (they knew what they were getting into by staying next to the fairgrounds) can be applied to the fairgrounds overseers (they knew what they were getting into staying on public property in a growing city).
  Disclaimer: [...]
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  Posted: November 05, 2009, 9:06am EST
  

• Is "Web 2.0" a replication of "Web 1.0" services?

  Tim Berners-Lee rejects any talk of the sociality of "Web 2.0" as a misunderstanding of the web itself:
  Web 1.0 was all about connecting people. It was an interactive space, and I think Web 2.0 is, of course, a piece of jargon, nobody even knows what it means. If [...]
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  Posted: November 05, 2009, 12:31am EST
  

• Even though Metro budget overages seem to be multiple, they're back to singling out Parks

  Once again the Tennessean is heeling to the Metro Finance Director's latest criticism of Metro Parks' budget overages. A few days ago it was made clear that Parks was not the only department to overspend their budget, but that their transgression was failing to notify pit boss Rich Riebeling' [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 8:01am EST
  

• Metro Nashville Public Schools not doing much to help security

  I took a picture this morning of the key pad into which my 5-year-old daughter will be expected to enter a PIN to access lunch money that we have prepaid. I hope that the photo makes evident that there is very little security at the "point-of-sale" itself. Keying in the [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 10:55pm EST
  

• Sticking it to Belmont

  Universities that seek to expand into neighborhoods take note of the substantial costs to Belmont University of picking on the wrong sports writer (via writer/blogger Jan Duke):
  I don't think any one case created more turmoil than that of the local sports writer Margaret Lindsley Warden. Ms. Warden was' [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 10:35pm EST
  

• Hillsboro-West End shows us how win-win SP zoning is supposed to be done

  CM Kristine LaLonde's SP rezoning ordinance sailed through Metro Council public hearing tonight with no protest or debate, even though SP proposals have come to be lightning rods for some communities. In her comments CM LaLonde thanked the Hillsboro-West End neighborhood association and the developer [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 10:21pm EST
  

• Public Housing in the North End was once relief from slums

  A 2001 Scene article by Bill Carey provides some interesting historical context for Cheatham Place, which sits near Werthan Lofts and Salemtown:
  In 1937, Congress passed a national housing act, authorizing millions of federal dollars for public housing projects across the country. Within a year, the Public Works Administration [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 9:57pm EST
  

• There is some poetic justice in this

  Kindred spirits, you know.
  The Tennessee Titans front office is allowed to raid Metro Water Services each year for millions to pay for team expenses. New convention center bosses will eventually raid other Metro services to cover their debts.
  It's a match made on the Cumberland. [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 7:09pm EST
  

• Deep Thought

  If there is absolutely one thing that MNPS food services has to get right is it implementing time-efficient business models for food delivery or is it insuring that little kids get healthy and balanced meals when they are at school? [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 8:27am EST
  

• Who are the wizards in Metro Nashville Public Schools food service department who came up with this one?

  Today our Kindergartener brings home a note from her school with her new "personal identification number" to obtain her lunch, which we have already prepaid. And here are the instructions that I am to somehow translate for her while helping her memorize her PIN before they go live on Wednesday:The [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 12:34am EST
  

• Why journos be hatin'

  Now we can see why blogging and the Net matter so greatly in political journalism. In the age of mass media, the press was able to define the sphere of legitimate debate with relative ease because the people on the receiving end were atomized— meaning they were connected “up” to [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 12:17am EST
  

• Obama's Recovery Act continues to sell off public services to private companies

  Some researchers matched the Recovery.gov list of contractors to the membership list of the Professional Services Council, the trade association for the federal outsourcing industry, to see if the Obama administration continues to promote past tendencies toward privatization. While they didn't find Bush-preferred private contractors Kellogg, Brown, & Root' [...]
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  Posted: November 02, 2009, 11:58pm EST
  

• Knoxville Codes Division intends to be "proactive" with neighborhood sweeps

  R. Neal reports that local government is planning its first big neighborhood codes violation sweep for Wednesday:
  The City of Knoxville launching a Neighborhood Sweep Program involving "intensive single day problem-solving" operations in neighborhoods across the city. The purpose is to identify code violations and assist owners with solutions. City [...]
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  Posted: November 02, 2009, 11:40pm EST
  

• Not so fast, Michael Cass

  The Tennessean's long-time Metro beat reporter Michael Cass veered overboard today describing the connection between a church's will-to-commerce and Charlie Tygard's will-to-power. Here's how Cass retells the history of the LED signage controversy:
  The issue has pitted commercial interests and some community organizations against neighborhood groups for more than [...]
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  Posted: November 02, 2009, 11:19pm EST
  

• Voter irregularity allegations against Pam Murray's campaign in District 5 special council election

  The anonymous hyper-local blog started to watchdog CM Pam Murray and her campaign in the November 12 recall election states that a church bus is being used by the campaign for get-out-the-vote efforts during early voting. Reportedly, GOTV seems to dictate using that bus to ship in non-constituents [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 11:37pm EST
  

• "Huge bullies" like Lamar Advertising

  Southern Beale is not pleased with the appearance of a LED billboard in her Green Hills community:
  when it first appeared (in place of an old-fashioned non-electronic kind) it raised a huge outcry among neighborhood folks who don’t like the increasing prevalence of these electronic thingamajigs. They are quite [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 11:28pm EST
  

• No correction of Tennessean reporter's erroneous coverage of Metro Parks controversy

  Ten days ago City Paper expatriate Nate Rau reported from his new post at the Tennessean that the Metro Parks department was unique from every other Metro office in one unflattering way, and he reported it as fact:
  In a year when nearly every department in Metro faced budget [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 10:33pm EST
  

• Knoxville neighborhoods take aim at vacant, blighted properties

  According to Knoxviews, two nationally know experts will be in Knoxville on Thursday evening to speak with community leaders about dealing with vacant buildings and blight:
  Their visit to Knoxville is part of a joint city-county-neighborhood effort to identify the scope of vacant, blighted properties in the city and [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 8:25pm EST
  

• The farce that is affordable housing

  Sounds simple, doesn't it? In spurring real estate development in downtown Nashville, Metro has a public interest in stimulating an economically diverse rather than exclusively wealthy community. So, the Metropolitan Development and Housing Authority provides developers tax breaks to build units for residents who must prove that they make 80%' [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 3:25pm EST