Weekly Update

Friends,

It flew under the radar a bit, so I wanted to make sure you knew about the annual awards ceremony that the Memphis Police Department held this week.

Simply put, it was amazing.

It was an amazing reminder of the bravery that’s hard at work every single day in our city. It was an amazing reminder of the talent of the men and women who serve us through MPD.

I encourage you to join me in thanking all of the award winners by visiting the MPD on Facebook, where it posted all of the honorees. 

I also encourage you to continue to remember the sacrifice of Officer Verdell Smith, who you’ll recall passed away in the line of duty last summer. He was honored Tuesday as MPD’s TOP COP -- a proper tribute to a Memphis hero.

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As we enter the holiday weekend -- my family hopes yours has an enjoyable and meaningful Easter -- we’ll end this week's email with a handful of quick-hit items you'll want to know:

Blight, Part A: Our fight against blight, which you well know is a priority of mine, will be aided going forward thanks to a technical assistance grant we received this week from the Center for Community Progress. We’re one of just three cities in the country to receive it.

Blight, Part B: If you know someone who’s making a big difference in our community’s fight against blight, I hope you’ll nominate them here. These awards are part of next month's second annual Memphis Blight Elimination Summit, which we’re proud to co-sponsor.

Improving service: In the vein of improving our core city services, I think we all agree we’d like to improve on the 21-day time frame in which we try to pick up large piles of garbage or debris outside of the cart. I think we all also agree that we don’t want our solid waste fund to be depleted by 2020, as it is currently on course to be. So I asked Public Works to come up with some options -- and yes, some of those options could increase your fee to allow us to perform better services. They were presented to the City Council last week; no action was taken as this will be an ongoing discussion. But because we’re all about transparency, you can see the presentation we gave to the council here.

Training leaders: If you’d like to learn more about becoming a leader to spark positive change in your neighborhood, consider participating in our Certified Neighborhood Leader Training Program. Click here for more details.

No nonsense: I enjoyed this story from Channel 5's Joe Birch on Chief Operating Officer Doug McGowen's speech this week to the Memphis Rotary Club, and thought you might, too.

Memphis 3.0: The final three meetings in this round of Memphis 3.0 community gatherings are coming up -- tonight at Gaisman Community Center, Monday at Hickory Hill Community Center and Tuesday at the FedEx Event Center at Shelby Farms Park. All meetings start at 5:30 p.m. and end around 7. Learn more about why your voice is so important, identify vision statements and factors that lead to a healthy neighborhood, and review and respond to data that's been collected over the past few months. This series of meetings is the follow-up to the rallies that were conducted during the winter of 2016. And yes, refreshments will be served. 

Social media: Every so often, I like to remind you that we’re active on social media. Please follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And be sure to follow the City of Memphis on Facebook and Twitter, too.

Yours,