Weekly Update

Friends,

Happy New Year! Here’s hoping your 2017 is off to a great start -- and that you’re warm and safe today.

Even though it happened on New Year’s Eve, our year had a great start with a prayer breakfast at the beautiful Guest House at Graceland. I invited former Mayor Willie Herenton to speak, and he and I both said that Memphis needs to get involved.

Not that we’re shirking our responsibility at City Hall -- far from it. We’re continuing the work we’re doing to reduce crime and poverty, and to make life better for every single Memphian, every single day. But as I’ve told you before, city government does not have the resources, or the power, to fight our challenges alone. That’s where you come in.

As you consider how to use your gifts of time and talent in 2017, I hope you’ll consider one -- or all -- of the three opportunities in my Call to Action:

Mentor a young person. Studies show positive outcomes for young people when they have the influence of an older person in their lives. We’re asking for just one hour a week, too.

Read to a second-grader. Third grade is often the make-or-break year for our children; their reading ability can determine whether they start out on the right or the wrong path. And just as above, we’re asking for one hour a week to help out.

Adopt a block to clean up our city. It’s a small thing with a big result. If we all adopted a block or two and committed to keeping it clean, the multiplying effect would quickly clean up our city.

Want to get involved? Visit memphistn.gov/calltoaction to learn how. 

We are all called to service. I hope you answer that call for the betterment of Memphis.

Working on winter weather: Public Works crews have been out in full force today treating streets as we deal with the snow that came this morning. We did suspend garbage collection due to the weather; you can find details about collection here.

I thank all of the City of Memphis employees who are hard at work today.

Off to D.C.: I was thrilled to be in Washington this week when my longtime friend, David Kustoff, was sworn in to represent the 8th District in Congress. I look forward to working with him.

The same goes for our 9th District representative, Steve Cohen, and our two U.S. senators, Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker. I’ve enjoyed building relationships in Washington -- and Nashville -- to help address the challenges we face in Memphis.

Are you following?: Be sure you’re following our office on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. And we encourage you to be on Nextdoor, too. We share plenty of information on these channels that helps shed more light on what we’re doing at City Hall -- such as timely news today on the weather.

Yours,