Chairman's Recap - January 9, 2024

Greetings, Memphis. I am humbled to hold the position of the Chairman of the Memphis City Council. I am fully dedicated to collaborating with you, the elected Councilmembers, and other stakeholders in the community to diminish criminal activities and enhance the prospects and possibilities within our beloved city.  

First things first - To truly effectuate change, we must ensure that the right people are leading our city, so the Council spent the first session of this year hearing presentations from Mayor Paul Young’s nominees for City Administration leadership roles. We wanted to learn more about and understand their expertise, their vision to make Memphis better, and their plans for achieving these goals. Councilmembers asked the hard questions seeking transparency, accountability, and innovation from each nominee. The Council is committed to holding all leaders to the highest standard because this is the only way to make Memphis a safer and a better place to live.  

Personnel & Government Affairs Committee– The Council heard presentations from the mayoral nominees this week in the Personnel & Government Affairs Committee. Among them was Melvin Jamerson, a 23-year municipal employee who has been nominated to serve as the Interim Director of General Services. He cited one of his accomplishments as being able to form a creative alliance with William R. Moore College of Technology to train HVAC certified technicians to fill open positions in the workforce. If appointed, his vision is to form a Sustainability Taskforce to help bring about forward-thinking ideas for completing tasks for the City of Memphis in the most environmentally-friendly manner. Ty Coleman, the current Interim Director of Memphis Animal Services, highlighted one of his accomplishments during his time as the first-ever free drive-thru vaccination clinic, where 492 dogs and cats were microchipped and received vaccinations in a single day. He stated that his vision is to provide the community with as many resources as possible and to be more responsive to constituent needs.  Manny Belen, professional engineer, and nominee for the City Engineer has served the City of Memphis for 17 years in a variety of roles. He stated that his visions are to work to create more ADA-accessible walkways in the city, as well as support the Fiber Infrastructure and engage with the local workforce to introduce young people to STEM fields.  

Director of Housing and Community Development nominee Ashley Cash is up for reappointment following a two-year tenure in the position. She cited updating the Down Payment Assistance Program to reflect increased housing costs as one of her successes. She indicated a desire to address homelessness, increase the number of affordable housing initiatives, and a plan to help with construction gap funding. Director of Libraries Keenon McCloy is up for reappointment. She listed some of her achievements since taking on the position, including the creation of the Connect Crew, which offers library cards on the spot, and the installation of a professionally operated recording studio as part of Cloud901 at the Ben Hooks Central Library, which attracts young people from all over the city. She also mentioned how Memphis Public Libraries has won numerous additional honors and been named "The Most Innovative Library in the Country" by the Smithsonian under her direction. In June 2024, she is excited for the opening of the Frayser Library and the Orange Mound Public Library, which will include a genealogy center. John Zeanah, the director of the Division of Planning and Development, is up for reappointment after serving in the position for the past six years. He listed some of his successes, such as creating a more expedient permitting procedure that consists of an online permit application that is more customer-focused and allows applicants to receive a 10-day plan review and an inspection within 24 to 48 hours of their request.  He stated that one of his objectives, if appointed, would be to update the zoning code, continue consistent implementation of Memphis 3.0, fix zoning maps, and introduce more green projects in sectors such as transportation and energy.  

Council will vote on the appointments of these nominees at the next Council meeting on Tuesday, January 23, 2024.  

Executive Session – The Executive Session was comprised of a continuation of presentations from Mayoral nominees. These presentations included Interim Chief Operating Officer Antonio Adams, Sr.'s discussion of his vision to ensure that all Memphians grow and prosper by improving service delivery, centering the voice of the public, and providing streamlined and practical solutions. Chief Communications Officer nominee Penelope Huston shared her vision to create a connected and integrated communications team by creating integrated divisional marketing and outreach.  She hopes to create a stronger overall Memphis narrative by engaging youth especially to help tell the story.  

Interim Chief Financial Officer nominee Walter Person shared that his vision reflects the opportunities to increase transparency which will be accomplished by creating an online budget tracking system among other things that will be accessible by everyone. Chief Human Resources Officer nominee, Fonda Fouché who has been employed with the City of Memphis for 27 years shared her vision to attract and retain top talent, creating talent pipelines through the career pathways pipeline, and improving employee retention. Director of Police Services nominee Cerelyn "CJ" Davis shared that in her tenure that MPD hired a historic record-breaking 477 new police recruits in the past two years to address the employment gap in the force and the establishment of the Traffic Stop Dashboard that will launch in January 2024. Her vision is to create a robust violent crime reduction plan by January 2024 that will identify the top 300 offenders for immediate intervention as an innovative way to address the increase in crimes with the hopes that the Department will begin to see a consistent 5% decrease in crime. She wants the MPD best practices to align with those nationally tried and true best practices to move our city forward. The vote for Chief Davis to be approved failed in committee with a vote of 6-7 with the final vote to be determined at the next Council meeting.  

These Mayoral nominee appointments will be confirmed by final vote at the next Council meeting on Tuesday, January 23, 2024.  

Three Mayoral nominees were approved for appointment effective immediately. Each candidate comes highly recommended with extensive successes in their respective fields.  

Director of Fire Services nominee Chief Gina Sweat's track record as Fire Chief proceeds her. She shared that during her tenure she has led the department's Public Protection Classification from a Class 2 to a Class 1 among other things. Her vision is the enhance and diversify Emergency Medical Services capabilities by identifying innovative solutions. Under her direction, the Memphis Fire Department has consistently been recognized as one of top Fire Departments in respect to response times, customer satisfaction, and proven results.  

Chief Legal Officer Attorney Tannera Gibson brings a wealth of experience and has served as outside council for the City of Memphis. Attorney Gibson earned the position as the first black female partner at prestigious law firm Burch, Porter, and Johnson, PLLC and has been named in the Best Lawyers in America since 2020. Her vision is to proactively work to protect the City's interest by tracking legislation and ensuring compliance with local, state, and federal laws, ordinances, and regulations. She hopes to attract more legal talent by offering competitive incentives to retain the best talent possible in the City's Legal Division.  

Director of Information Services nominee Eric Keane is an IT guru bringing experience from FedEx Logistics in Belgium, Italy, and the Netherlands to name a few. His vision it to create an Architecture team and drive Memphis to become a public sector technology leader in areas such as the Internet of Thing (IoT), cybersecurity, emerging technologies, and process automation.  

We look forward to the work that these individuals will accomplish as leaders at the City of Memphis to make our communities better and safer to live.  

Broadband Internet Access – Today, we continued discussions on the implications Fiber might have for the City of Memphis.  City Council Attorney Allan Wade discussed the High-Speed Fiber Ordinance which is an ordinance introduced by Mayor Jim Strickland to develop infrastructure in Memphis, with fiber being a top priority in areas such as jobs, equity, and education. Attorney Wade provided a thorough report and recommendations to Council on implementing deployments under the ordinance. The Council will continue to discuss this ordinance and ways to bring fiber to all Memphians.   

Fiber Is Coming to Memphis- Council unanimously passed the resolution approving Material Terms of Development Commitment of Blue Suede, Networks, LLC to design, build, operate and maintain a citywide Fiber-to-the-Premises Network in the City of Memphis pursuant to Substitute Ordinance No. 5887. With the passing of this resolution, it is our hope to start the work to close the digital divide and provide sustainable internet access to more people. 

Health Benefits for Elected Officials –Council held the Ordinance to amend Chapter 2, Article II, Section 2-19 of the Code of Ordinances of the City of Memphis, to create health benefits for Elected Officials. This Ordinance will allow health care benefits for elected officials who have completed two full terms. This ordinance will come before Council to be voted on at Council on February 6, 2024. 

The Bottom Line 

Memphis, there is much work to be done, but I have no doubt that better days are ahead. Stay tuned for future Council updates as we keep you informed regarding the activities taking place here at City Hall. As always, for an archive of meeting recordings, you may visit and view our  Council Meetings  here. 

For Memphis, 

JB Smiley, Jr.  

Memphis City Council 

Super District 8-1