Tagged: Knoxville

Op-Ed

Living in a Third-World Country — In Knoxville

 [This is a longer version of a letter I sent to the Knoxville News Sentinel on 28 December 2022, which they did not publish. I don’t have a restriction to 300 words in my posts so here is the original unpruned version. By the way, my post on how I got kicked out of the Oak Ridge Community Band appears two posts down.]

My husband has taken to saying that we now live in a third-world country. Consider the evidence.

Our Lenoir City Utility Board electricity goes out with dismaying frequency with no cloud in the sky. Our local Kroger is constantly out of stuff, so we have to travel to a more distant but better-supplied Kroger. We joke that ours is the have-not store.

We used to get mail at 11:00 am, then at 4:00 pm. Then it would arrive as late as 9:00 pm and often sat in the box all night. Occasionally we would get no mail at all even when people elsewhere do, e.g., yesterday. Per the post office, our longtime carrier was moved to another route; we weren’t scheduled to get a new one until January 2023, so the carriers had to double up on routes. An Oak Ridge friend said that her neighborhood did not get mail for an entire week. When it restarted, her carrier explained that the post office had not hired anybody to replace him while he was on vacation.

The News Sentinel now skips publication on holidays. But sometimes we don’t get a newspaper even on a scheduled day. With no redelivery, there is supposed to be a credit by extension of the subscription. But my husband kept track: there was no extension at renewal time. So basically you just pay and hope you get a paper most days. A male friend opines that the News Sentinel has devolved into what is essentially a sports magazine with a little news thrown in. The public’s attention seems to be very drawn to the circus/gladiator aspect of watching sports, especially football, and this is reflected in the news media’s reference to “our Tennessee Vols”, as if everybody living in Tennessee was automatically a fervent fan.

There seem to be a great many practices based on superstition, particularly in the area of medical care – attitudes toward vaccination, for example, with some ivermectin voodoo thrown in.

We now vote by paper ballot, filling in tiny boxes to indicate our choices – just like those 1960’s-era standardized tests. The Knoxville police chief was hired by a secret process and the mayor thinks that’s just fine. Developers seem to receive all sorts of waivers and variances upon request and little effort seems to be made by reporters to follow the money; in fact, the TV reporters seem to flack for development, notably the baseball stadium. It’s hard to think of all that as representative, responsive government, bolstered by a strong fourth estate.

As I said, third-world living.

Op-Ed

Knoxville Baseball Stadium Is a Done Deal

[This is yet another letter not published by the Knoxville News Sentinel. It was sent to them on 11 May 2021. As I note below, the News Sentinel and other local media outlets seem to be heavily flacking the stadium project and so of course they are presenting little or nothing in the way of opposition opinion.]

Of course the baseball stadium is a done deal. In 2016, Mr. Boyd denied that he was planning to move the Smokies, but developments since then show that the publicly funded building of a stadium for him was in the works all along.

Jason Zachary implied this recently, saying that Boyd had worked with community leaders for years to “relocate the team to Knoxville as a tenant of a new sports and entertainment complex” at a Boyd-owned site. Zachary said that Knox County and Knoxville city officials were in favor. Now we hear that the support of community activist groups is being solicited, with promises of favorable considerations in the associated privately funded development.

Zachary asserted that the stadium would not lead to higher taxes for taxpayers. Well, due to (1) the realization that the tax base of the stadium complex district would not generate enough taxes to pay for the stadium and (2) the reluctance of state officials to create an even bigger tax district, the state decided to goose the project along by giving the new sports authority upfront “the same amount of money the expanded tax district was projected to generate over 30 years”, some $13.5 million dollars. Either that money was drawn from other, possibly worthier programs or Tennessee taxpayers are in fact paying more tax. Also, since that is state rather than local money, the state is disfavoring Sevier County taxpayers and favoring Knox County taxpayers.

State, county, and local officials, local TV stations, and the News Sentinel are flacking the stadium, claiming that it will be a community events center where, e.g., soccer games, concerts, and “sleepovers” could be held. But there seem to be plenty of existing venues for these activities. So the stadium is really a solution in search of a problem.

Op-Ed

Questions About Handicapped Access at the Proposed Smokies Stadium in Knoxville

[Update: When the Knoxville News Sentinel did not publish my letter below, I posted it here on April 7, 2021. However, they did publish it on April 14,  2021, i.e., more than a month after I sent it to them by E-mail. Usually if they are going to publish a letter they double-check with the author. They did not do that with this letter, so I had no idea they were going to publish it until it actually appeared in the newspaper]

[This is the text of a letter I sent to the Knoxville News Sentinel on March 10, 2021. They did not publish it, I suspect because they are boosters of the proposed taxpayer-funded baseball stadium. There seems to be substantial opposition to the proposal that the State of Tennessee, Knox County, and/or the city of Knoxville fund this stadium to the tune of $65 million plus $20 million for infrastructure improvements such as road modifications; however, it also seems to be a done deal since ground has been broken on the site of the stadium and the local television stations, city council, county board, etc., seem to be 100% in favor of building the stadium and the local news media speak of it as if the completion of the stadium were only a matter of time. Funding would be via a tax-increment funding scheme. The team is the minor-league Smokies baseball team, owned by University of Tennessee president and business owner Randy Boyd. Since the University of Tennessee has prominent football, basketball (male and females), and baseball and softball teams and since East Tennesseeans are most strongly interested in football, it would appear that there would not be a great interest in minor-league baseball. But Mr. Boyd, who has strong connections to state government from his former work as a commissioner, chairman of Tennessee Promise, etc., has clearly sold the powers that be on the feasibility of this venture. ]

Before Knoxville and Knox County accede to Mr. Boyd’s request that they build him a baseball stadium, more information should be provided. For example, we are told that there will be no public parking at the stadium and that no new parking garages or lots will be built. Patrons will have to park half a mile away or more in existing parking areas. There may be a shuttle to get them to the stadium and back, but it will undoubtedly cost extra.

Is it really expected that handicapped people will walk or roll for half a mile to the stadium? If there is a shuttle, will it be equipped with a wheelchair lift and other easy-access features? Otherwise, is it expected that a handicapped person will be dropped off at the stadium by his or her driver, wait for the driver to return on foot or by shuttle, and then wait again after the event for the driver to go fetch the car and return? If so, will there be a convenient dropoff/loading point (i.e., not competing with the able-bodied for space in the dropoff lane)?

Will there be convenient access at all entrances, or will handicapped people have to use a special entrance? Will there be an elevator to allow them to sit in the upper levels?

A modest proposal: if it turns out to be impractical for a handicapped person to attend a baseball game or other event at the new stadium, he or she should be given a refund on that part of his or her taxes (direct or indirect) that went toward the stadium, in view of the fact that this public facility would not be potentially usable by every member of the public – unlike, say, a library or a jail.

Op-Ed

Frank Cagle and David Hunter: An Appreciation

Frank Cagle and David Hunter died within four days of each other in February 2021. They were best known to East Tennessee residents as columnists for the Knoxville News Sentinel, but in terms of substance they were writers of significance.

Frank Cagle worked his way up from proofreader and copy editor to managing editor of the News Sentinel. His most frequent subject was local and state politics. Although he was a conservative of a somewhat libertarian bent, you most often could not tell this from his columns: he was a critic of all sorts of chicanery and backroom dealing, besides being a careful explainer of various points of view. He was not partisan in the least; he called them the way he saw them. His objectivity was what drew me in and eventually made me a fan of his. I also admired his writing in technical terms: his grammar and his choice of words were exceptional. He stopped writing for the News Sentinel when the management decided on “a different direction on the editorial page”. I noticed the different direction (I didn’t like it either) but did not realize that it had cost us subscribers his writing. The News Sentinel has had many capable columnists, but to me Frank Cagle stood above the rest, nearer to Olympus.  He was 72.

William “David” Hunter had some other job for years in his adult life, but always felt drawn to police work. Eventually he gave in to the urge and joined the Knox County Sheriff’s Department. He wrote op-ed columns for the News Sentinel for almost 30 years. He wrote on many subjects, but one that was very popular was dogs. He wrote about his German Shepherds Maxie, Greta, Angel, and Lady, in a way that spoke to all dog lovers and he was never trite about it. Sometimes he reminisced about his relatives, again in a way that, one felt, made you know what they were really like. But perhaps his best writing was on the subject of police work and what he had learned from it: the procedural aspects, the stress of having to be ready for anything, and, always, the human stories of the victims and perps. He also wrote many books and was nominated for an Edgar award. He was 73.

When I think about dying, I always imagine myself on my deathbed reviewing my life; I hope that if that happens, I will feel satisfied about the whole thing overall. Will I have my self-respect, will I feel disappointed, will I think that I sold out or settled for less than I could have been? I don’t know if Frank Cagle and David Hunter got to do that – the New Sentinel reported that Cagle died in the car as his wife drove him to the hospital – but if they did, I hope that they felt that they did make a difference and that they did show “the content of their character” to the world and the world said that it was good.