If you conduct a google search for the phrase “university twit,” what pops up is a photo of me in a T-shirt and mortarboard. It’s a long story involving a fellow Knox County commissioner and the day he called me a university twit, but the incident gives me some “street cred” to write about the difficult task of using one’s intelligence without being dismissed as a wonk (Michael Dukakis), nerd (Al Gore), or elitist (John Kerry).

Thanks to the mythologies built up around Ronald Reagan, Republicans get a pass on these things. All they have to do is munch on some pork rinds, don a cowboy hat, or raise a beer and the matter is settled. If your first reaction is a retort about their prep schools, Ivy League legacy admissions, wealthy contributors, or millionaire-coddling policies, you’ve disqualified yourself from this debate.

More after the break.

The meeting is stumbling along at the moment setting up the order of the agenda. First will be resolutions honoring various groups. The future of South Knox High also will be early in the agenda. There always can be a surprise flare up on any number of concerns: honoring Charlton Heston, paying the superintendent (automatic by court decree), progress on old News Sentinel Building, unfunded mandates resolution (I think there's a question of federalism here, and I'll explain in the meeting).

Just as I started typing Commissioner Pinkston went into the item of superintendent. He seems to be suggesting the Supreme Court cannot rule on the interpretation of the state constitution, but perhaps I am misunderstanding the claim.

--Mark Harmon

Congratulations to the Knoxville Ice Bears, champions of the Southern Professional Hockey League. I attended tonight's game as the Ice Bears beat the Jacksonville Barracudas 4-2, completing a three-game sweep of the championship series. --Mark Harmon

For those wanting to be considered for the interim appointments (8 commission seats plus four countywide offices), please send to the commission office a resume indicating the position sought. Please do so by the close of business on February 8th, as in Friday (tomorrow). One may contact the commission office by fax 215-2038 or by e-mail, commission@knoxcounty.org

Cordially yours, Mark Harmon

The first of three or four controversial zonings is in progress. I'll keep this site posted as best I can.
1st item, NW side Gleason Drive, postponed 30 days.
2nd item, Victor Jernigan in S. Knox, amends to 1-5 units/acre instead of 12.
Other developers not present, items postponed to next meeting.
--Mark Harmon

Tomorrow's County Commission meeting is chock full of controversial or potentially controversial items. Here is a quick rundown so viewers can keep track of them.

Zonings (4pm):

10-D-07-SP and 10-Q-07 RZ: Southwest Sector Plan Amendment, an attempt to switch from Low- to Medium Density on Northeast side of Canton Hollow Road. MPC recommended deny, plus lots of neighborhood opposition. MPC let slide a switch to 5 units per acre Planned Residential; neighbors want scaled back to 3 units.

10-E-07-SP and 10-T-07RZ: South Sector Plan Amendment. Significant neighborhood opposition to Victor Jernigan plan for high-density apartments on south side of W. Gov. John Sevier Hwy, east of Winkle Lane, north of Tipton Station.

( I have questions on a couple other zoning items as well. )

Commission Regular Meeting (5pm or after zonings):

R-07-12-906: Tax Increment Finance package for Willow Creek Shopping Center in Halls, the proposed tax break is 20 years and $4 million.

R-07-12-909: Invoke subpoena powers of commission.

R-07-12-914: Changes regarding Code of Ethics that include defining certain things as not "items of value" and also defining nepotism.

R-07-916: Revisiting the vacancy appointments question.

R-07-917: Resolution urging all citizens to proclaim to every level of government its responsibility to recognize God as foundation of national heritage, the "God Resolution."

R-07-919: Specifying Tyler Harber incidents as part of subpoena powers, and starting investigation.

O-07-12-101 Stormwater Ordinance. Deal with city. Lumpy amendments gone, types of pipe specified in three specific instances. County gets larger size plots exempted from plans. Lingering serious questions whether other provisions are adequate or sufficient regarding EPA and environment.

O-07-12-102 Ordinance Amendments related to Animal Control, dangerous dogs.

O-07-11-103 Recall Amendment

--Mark Harmon

Just a quick progress report. I talked today to Dr. Linda Byrd-Johnson regarding the failure to renew UT's TRIO funding for the McNair Scholars program. She reports being flooded with Tennessee e-mails, but still refuses to see her job more broadly and to exercise reason and good sense (to save the program).

She reported that both her superiors, Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings and Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Auer Jones, so far refuse to act. So I hope you kept a copy of the initial note (if not, a version below) and will send a note to Jones at diane.jones@ed.gov.

Many thanks to those on this site who acted. I encourage you to keep up the pressure. I'm about to unleash a second wave of various methods to reverse this bad decision.

----
UT's McNair Scholars program is a superb resource. It takes kids from disadvantaged backgrounds who have made it to college and helps them prepare for graduate education. It is one of the most successful McNair programs in the country, and each year it also does a regional conference of other similar programs.

Now the program may lose its federal money (called the TRIO program) because its 2008 application was three minutes late. UT's Office of Research Administration blames a slow link in the grants.gov site. Sadly, so far all attempts to correct have fallen on deaf ears.

I recommend politeness but persistence, and spreading the word to other internet sites so we can magnify the message so it will not be ignored. --Mark Harmon

Your help is needed to create an internet howl of protest sufficient to reverse a decision that will be a blow to UT and a setback for a quality education.

UT's McNair Scholars program is a superb resource. It takes kids from disadvantaged backgrounds who have made it to college and helps them prepare for graduate education. It is one of the most successful McNair programs in the country, and each year it also does a regional conference of other similar programs. I have volunteered as a McNair mentor to a young scholar five times, and found it to be a phenomenal program.

Now the program may lose its federal money (called the TRIO program) because its 2008 application was three minutes late. UT's Office of Research Administration blames a slow link in the grants.gov site. Sadly, so far all attempts to correct have fallen on deaf ears.

Today I visited the local offices of Congressman Duncan, and Senators Alexander and Corker. All shake their heads, but seem resigned to accept the pronouncements of low-level employees who merely cite procedure, or who claim the money is already distributed (when they really mean they don't want to change their allocation formula).

You can call these offices, too. However, I recommend the direct approach, making an appeal for reason and human judgment. You can make that appeal to the program administrator, Dr. Linda Byrd-Johnson (Linda.byrd-johnson@ed.gov, phone 202-502-7729). I recommend politeness but persistence, and spreading the word to other internet sites so we can magnify the message so it will not be ignored. --Mark Harmon

Knox County Commission joint Intergovernmental and Finance Committee meeting is about to start. How to fill vacancies will be the star issue, but I predict the following also may get attention: revisiting stormwater ordinance, changes to ethics policy, recall amendment, and appointment of Scott Davis to Public Building Authority.

Updates as possible. --Mark Harmon

John Owings has brought back the ugly spectre of rolling appointments.
Scott Moore has added a wheel tax repeal to discussion section.
I need to speak up so one motion related to Open Meetings Act does not become a poison pill to improvements or an inducement to weakening.

Lumpy just exploded in an outburst of false statements about the past forum at Whittle Springs.

My past posts on this are here.

DTV, Democratic Television, is live tonight from 9:30 to 10:30 on Comcast cable channel 12, and also on Charter's access channel. The scheduled guests: mayoral candidate Isa Infante and Jamie Row, longtime advocate for a strong stormwater ordinance. Calls welcome. --Mark Harmon

Commissioner Tony Noman just finished making an impassioned plea for a strong Stormwater Ordinance. His amendment would enhance enforcement. Mine would align Knox County's rules more closely with Knoxville's. Commissioner Lambert's amendment would weaken the ordinance in several key areas.

The commissioners as well as the noted reporters received their subpoenas in the Open Meetings lawsuit.

--Mark Harmon

I went to tonight's session at West High School presenting a summary of the Baker Center report, and seeking comments from attendees.

I thought it might be useful to seek comments from the web-savvy users of KnoxViews regarding county government websites. Knox County's site is here (Link...).

The "cohort" counties frequently used for comparison in the Baker Center report are as follows:

Anne Arundel County, Maryland (Link...)

Baltimore County, Maryland (Link...)

Chesterfield County, Virginia (Link...)

Cobb County, Georgia (Link...)

East Baton Rouge Parish, La. (Link...)

Fayette/Lexington, Kentucky (Link...)

Polk County, Florida (Link...)

Richland County, South Carolina (Link...)

Sarasota County, Florida (Link...)

--Mark Harmon

Chancellor Fansler will rule on Knox County's motion for summary judgment on Tuesday, August 14th, at 9:30 a.m. in the Jack McElroy open meetings lawsuit. As you may know, the Law Director and the commission majority argue that no violation can occur in the absence of group large enough to constitute a quorum, and further that the subsequent votes make moot the suit. I disagree.

--Mark Harmon

I hope Knoxviews readers and many others heard the fascinating discussion of impeachment last night on Bill Moyers' Journal. The discussion was preceded by the results of a public opinion poll from the American Research Group; 45 percent of Americans favor impeachment hearings for President Bush and more than half -54 percent — favor putting Vice President Cheney in the dock.

The interviewees were Constitutional Scholar Bruce Fein and associate editor of Capitol Times John Nichols.

Fein certainly will avoid the labels and personal attacks often heaped on liberals by the radical right. He served in the Justice Department during the Reagan administration and as general counsel of the Federal Communications Commission. Bruce Fein has been affiliated with conservative think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute and the Heritage Foundation and now writes a weekly column for THE WASHINGTON TIMES and Politico.com.

John Nichols is Washington correspondent for THE NATION. His latest book is THE GENIUS OF IMPEACHMENT: THE FOUNDERS' CURE FOR ROYALISM.

Transcript here

I'll put a couple quotes after the break.

Some notes on today's County Commission meeting:

Tax Increment Financing for the Devon Group's plan for a mixed-use tower on the old News Sentinel site passed easily. The three no votes were Craig and Frank Leuthold and me. The Leutholds argued the TIF was too long (20 years) and too generous. I agreed and laid out additional reasons (precedent and corporate welfare), noted in recent articles in Planning magazine, the journal of the American Planning Association.

Chairman Scott Moore withdrew his suggested changes to the ethics policy.

I sent out an irony alert, drawing attention to an ordinance (1st reading) from Law Director John Owings and Moore. It, in effect, is a giant but quiet oops, noting that the charter and other ordinances set out travel rules for several officers, ie. fee offices and others. Namely, each gets a vehicle or $300 a month. I got Owings to admit that sometimes some people well exceeded that amount, relying instead on some budgeted amount. The ordinance not only would allow reliance on a budgeted amount but would backdate such a policy to 1990. After all the proper criticism of the county mayor over travel, one has to wonder what kind of travel payments by whom are covered by this blanket backdating. The ordinance passed 1st reading with my solo dissent. Second reading and passage looms next month.

A group of more than a dozen 8th district residents uniformly opposed to a zoning change (Babelay Road east of Harris) walked away in disbelief and disillusionment as the commission majority ignored them and sided with a classic sprawl development. Both district commissioners, Huddleston and Ballard, opposed the rezoning from Agricultural to Planned Residential (similar to a plan rejected just a few years ago). Ballard's impassioned plea was eloquent. I argued we respect our own urban growth boundary and these neighbors. The vote was 10 for re-zoning, 7 against, 2 (Ivan Harmon and Charles Bolus) not present.

One rezoning actually did not go the developer's way. An attempt to amend the sector plan along Middlebrook Pike (changing a site northwest of Albany Road from "Mixed Use Limited to Offices" to Commercial) fell just shy, 9 votes for (ten needed). Another zoning appeal (MPC unanimous for denial, neighbors uniformly opposed, and documented flooding problems) was postponed 30 days.

BankEast in the Development Corridor asked TTCDA for a waiver to a sign height rule. The rule was six feet. Bank East wanted twelve. The TTCDA staff looked at the elevation and compromised, saying eight feet was sufficient. Bank East's attorney asked us on commission to toss out the compromise and let it have the full 12 feet. Commission did; I was the sole no vote.

--Mark Harmon

At four p.m. today Knox County's school board and county commission had a joint gathering to discuss the budget. The mayor generally was upbeat about school performance. Interim Supt. Mullins a few others answered questions.

In response to one of my questions, Mullins found figures that Knox County is spending $7259 per pupil, $210 below the state average. These figures include federal Child Nutrition spending and other items not directly under state or local control.

I also asked about the effect of a significant cut in the county health department's school health budget. No one seemed sure, but several speculated that may be immunization visits. I'll have to ask the health department more about that.

One surprise: School Board's Cindy Buttry and I are veterans of the NFL. That is, National Forensic League. We're talking speech and debate, not cadavers. It is a club activity. Thomas Deakins and I talked briefly after the meeting about the advantages of it having a stronger presence in our schools.

Dan Murphy stressed that we shouldn't be so happy we've been able to meet our minimum needs and maybe a little extra for things that don't sound like extras, eg. some improved security. Our sights should be higher.

Tomorrow (Thursday June 7) at 5 p.m. is the public input session regarding the budget. I'm hoping for a good turnout with folks raising specific concerns.

--Mark Harmon

Knox County's Intergovernmental and Finance Committees did not adjourn at the end of their Monday meetings, but instead recessed until 8 a.m., Thursday the 24th, in the Main Assembly Room. It is scheduled to run until noon. Community Television (Ch. 12 on Comcast) will cover it. It is a busy agenda.

First, each of the Departments will have up to ten minutes to discuss its individual budget (clerk, judge, law director, register of deeds, property assessor, sheriff, trustee, etc.).

Then, consideration of Non-Profit Agencies and Community Grant Funds.

Then a Public Forum.

Then, consideration of the various budget, taxes, and borrowing resolutions.

--Mark Harmon

I have continued my review of the proposed Knox County Budget, and hope to raise additional questions at tomorrow's meeting of the Intergovernmental Committee, 8:30 a.m. Here are some more observations.

SRF200-235pdf file, p. 55. Highway/Bridge Maintenance. A zero to $50,000 jump in "other professional services." What are we buying?

SRF pp. 50, 47, 43. We go from zero to $100,000, $120,000 and $3000 respectively for the Employee Benefits Engineering and Public Works Fund, the Highway Fundwide, and Drug Control Fundwide. What are these?

SRF p. 40. Why $50,000 more than requested in Transfers under Tourism?

SRF p. 22. Why $300,000 more than requested in Convenience Centers Building and Grounds Maintenance and $289,000 more than requested in Service Contracts?

SRF p. 21. Is the $19,000 budgeted for Workers Compensation Charges realistic? Past years have been twice that or more.

SRF p. 11. What is the $50,000 for the State General Library?

Writing of libraries, if any of the above items prove unjustified or unwise, some funds clearly needed to be shifted to schools and libraries. Library book/media acquisition budget is more than $48,000 below last year: $141,000 below two years ago.

The stormwater ordinance in our packet for tomorrow's meeting also has none of the dozen-plus suggestions I presented to make it as rigorous as that of the city. All the best, Mark Harmon

It appears Randy and I both are reviewing the budget. I am working line-by-line and this is a something of a midway report on the things that I must question further. By the way, it looks like I'll be one of the guests on this weekend's news analysis program on WATE.

The full budget files may be found at Link...

Sec. C, p. 26. Why spend $130,200 on sheriff dept. auto allowance? None allocated in last budget. Sec. A, p. 41 has a $20,000 allowance for Mayor's office. Can we delete both and save $150,000?

Sec. C, p. 26. Why the ten-fold increase in fringe benefits?

Sec. B, p. 7. Why the increase in payment to the Tennessee Valley Fair, from $2000 to $16,000?

Sec. B, p. 6. Why $400,000 to the ChamberPartnership? Can't this be cut some or entirely? These guys could be weaned off some govt. dollars.

Sec. A. p. 50. Why the $2,385,000 increase in cost of the mayor's education summit?

Sec. A, p. 15. There's a jump in the county clerk office service contracts from just less than $400,000 to nearly $600,000. What justifies this?

I'm not ready to propose amendments, but will continue to explore, seeking answers to oddities. --Mark Harmon

Knox County Cable Committee met April 4, 2007, 8:30-9:30 am in Room 640 of the City County Bldg. Chair Mike Hammond was present. I was there, I'm vice chair. Also present: Commissioners R. Larry Smith, Josh Jordan, and Lee Tramel. The group discussed and unanimously passed my resolution below:

Read more after the jump...

I understand WBIR's Inside Tennessee got quite heated this morning with a couple County Commissioners squaring off with interviewers on questions of commission behavior. I missed it, but called WBIR's newsroom. The program log of the 10 News 2 channel (21 on Comcast) indicates a replay at 5:30 pm. The Comcast digital guide gives different times that so far have yielded only infomercials, so I'm hopeful the station program log is correct.

--Mark Harmon

Here is the item I have added to the agenda today for Knox County Commission

Knox County Commission agrees to the following
proposal for the County Law Director to present to
Jack McElroy (Knoxville News Sentinel) and his
attorneys:

1) This agreement takes the form of a consent
agreement where Knox County Commission admits no
violation of Tennessee Open Meetings law, but in the
interests of public confidence, quick resolution of
disputes, and reduced legal costs agrees to a voiding
of the appointments that took place on January 31,
2007.
2) The appointees chosen for office that day will be
considered de facto office holders, just as those who
had to replaced pursuant to the Tennessee Supreme
Court decision were considered part of a de facto
government. Their official acts will be respected
under that de facto status.
3) To avoid the great difficulties associated with
commissioner voting privileges under this agreement,
Knox County Commission will interpret the Charter
passage "by the remaining commissioners" to mean that
neither those eight commissioners who had to be
replaced pursuant to the Tennessee Supreme Court
ruling nor the replacements selected January 31st,
2007, will be eligible to vote in this second
appointment process. Thus, only the remaining eleven
commissioners may vote in this second appointment
process.
4) This second appointment process will begin with the
successful completion of the law director's
negotiations with McElroy and his attorneys. No
sooner than two weeks after the law director informs
commission that these terms have been agreed upon, and
no later than four weeks after such notification, a
special called meeting of the commission will occur to
make the needed appointments.
5) The meeting to make the appointments will include
the following steps:
a. prior to the meeting, the voluntary submission
to the Knox County Commission office of resumes and
other deocuments by those seeking appointment to the
positions; this may take the form of candidates for
these positions simply indicating their desire that
previously submitted items should be considered.
b. The appointments meeting will begin with a
candidate statement period where persons seeking
appointments will have no more than three minutes to
make statements in support of their candidacies.
c. The candidate statement period will be followed
by a workshop-style discussion where the voting
commissioners will be free to discuss individual
candidacies or what combination of appointees would
best serve the overall interests of the county and/or
individual districts.
d. The workshop-style meeting will be followed by
votes on the countywide offices (sheriff, trustee,
register of deeds, and county clerk), then the
individual commission districts.
e. This agreement further recognizes the reality
that a voting group of eleven commissioners with a
majority set at ten quite likely could lead to several
deadlocked votes. These deadlocked appointments then
will be moved to the end of the agenda. Then by
unanimous consent, and only by unanimous consent, will
commissioners be able to vote on compromise slates of
candidates comprising two or more of the positions for
which a majority of ten could not be reached.
f. All these steps (candidate documents, candidate
statements, workshop-style discussions, and all votes)
shall be open, public, and in full compliance with
Tennessee's Open Meetings law.
6) The Commission further pledges in all future
business to be faithful to the spirit and letter of
Tennessee's Open Meetings Act.

The Feb. 26th meeting of Knox County Commission just got even more interesting. Chair Scott Moore has just requested (by hand-delivered letter, copies faxed to the commissioners, mayor and law director) a request for representatives of the sheriff's office to be there to present the evidence in the Tyler Harber investigation and to be prepared to answer questions about said items. --Mark Harmon

Here's a likely timeline of upcoming topics and activities, Knox County Commission:

Tuesday Feb. 20th, 8 a.m. Special Called Meeting: assign the newly appointed to committees, vote on proposed ethics committee, likely vote on proposed special election. This is followed at approximately 8:30 a.m. by the regular monthly Intergovernmental Committee meeting and 10 a.m. by regularly monthly Finance Committee meeting.

Monday, Feb. 26th, 2 p.m. Monthly County Commission Meeting. Likely big item: vote on funding the defined pension plan (sheriff and deputies) permitted by the recent referendum. Another likely big item: vote on stormwater ordinance. I'm still researching the details on this one. The initial reaction has been along the lines of "better than nothing, better than past plans, but not as good as the city ordinance."

Let me remind folks of two ways to express reactions to County Commission decisions. Our e-mail is commission@knoxcounty.org. Those get forwarded to all commissioners. There also is a Public Statements portion at the regular monthly meeting. Anyone can sign up and speak at the meeting. Further, if you indicate your interest the Wednesday before the meeting (215-2534), you name will appear on the agenda.

--Mark Harmon

I have been overwhelmed with kind words and expressions of support since Monday’s forum and Wednesday’s county commission meeting. Please let me take this opportunity to thank all of those persons for being active citizens and demanding better government, one that is accountable and responsible, as well as open and honest. We all may come up short on some occasions, but it is nice to be recognized for trying to move in the proper direction.

The hundreds of posts on the commission’s actions, expressed in several threads, almost always have been informed and polite. I have learned from them and thank the authors, though I do want to address certain points:

1) The Forum. I called all eight candidates for the second district position. Seven showed up, and all did well. Regrettably, the commission chose the one candidate who did not show or participate in much public process. Charles Bolus was co-treasurer of Chairman Scott Moore’s campaign and has a rather thin resume beyond his assistant principal duties at Gresham Middle.

2) Operation of the Forum. The thirteen commissioners who attended were invited to sit on the stage and take notes. Several did. Some chose to remain in the audience or the back of the room. I followed the same procedure for all contests, one I announced in advance on several listserves and this blog: three-minute speeches from candidates followed by audience questions. For the second district and county-wide seats we went in alphabetical order. When I called the other districts to the stage, they sorted themselves out as to who went first, etc. The timekeeper was a volunteer with the League of Women Voters. Generally candidates kept to the time; I recall only three incidents when I asked them to wrap up—and in each case the Stop card had been up and swinging. Two volunteers from the mayor’s office helped me identify raised hands during the early Q&A periods. This became unnecessary as the forum progressed. The questions were few, but generally direct and revealing. We shortened the time to minute-and-a-half speeches for the other districts, and still just barely kept the forum under three hours in length.

3) The Preference Poll at the Forum. No one had advance notice of my intent to do this. The only clue to anyone was my very open advocacy for a non-binding referendum as a way to squeeze greater public input into commission’s process. A commission secretary helped me photocopy it, sometime between 3:30 and 3:45 the day of the forum. I still wasn’t certain I’d use it, but when the forum began it looked like I had just enough volunteers to distribute it so I decided to do so. Two volunteers with LWV tallied the results at the end of the forum. I sent those results to this blog, several listservs, and news organizations—all with stated cautions about the reliability and value of the measure, and noting that other factors such as candidate qualifications and quality of responses should play a role in decision making. Most respondents were from the second district and most followed the directions to indicate a preference only in their own district and the county-wide offices. Some did mark in more than one commission district, accounting for an overall number that initially seems larger than the attendance (if one were to add all votes cast for commission candidates together, as one sharp-eyed blogger apparently did).

4) The Votes on Wednesday. I followed a pattern of nominating and sticking with the candidate of my choice until that candidate was eliminated. Then I’d go to my highest-rated choice left in the field. In the clash in the Fourth District, my choice was Elaine Davis, but the options narrowed down to a less-than-appealing choice between developer Scott Davis and sheriff-envoy Lee Tramel. I opted for Scott Davis only because of his public vow only to serve the interim period until the election. The 9-9 deadlock on this set off waves of re-votes and recesses. I thought of passing because I did not like the choices, but could not in good conscience switch one candidate to the other. During one break I met Bolus for the first time and was underwhelmed. Our district’s reward for the noble behavior of not dealing to swing another district (also see the newspaper article on Jonathan Wimmer’s refusal to deal) was the Bolus ascendance--which succeeded after likely arm-twisting and the selective swearing-in plan later used. It should be noted that my first choice, Amy Broyles, was still on the table when the pressured switches to Bolus began. Even if I’d abandoned past practice and cast a vote for Wimmer (and somehow Schmid’s vote followed me) that would not have gotten him to ten; and by then both those choices were verboten because they didn’t advance the apparent “you’re in, but you must be sworn in early and break the tie in our favor” plan.

5) The Days to Come. The past few days have seen many more disturbing revelations about some of the commission’s choices and practices. I hope we can keep the conversations focused not on personal attacks on the people, but the repugnant procedures and poor policy choices made. I encourage people to contact the County Commission office (commission@knoxcounty.org, 215-2534), to sign up for the public comments section, and to show up at the next meeting (Feb. 26th, 2pm). Find and support good candidates. Point out when commission violates the spirit and possibly the letter of any law or our newly approved ethics code.

Sorry for the long post, but there was a lot to cover. –Mark Harmon

County Commission's actions certainly will get some TV attention this weekend.

DTV tonight will be a live show. I will be hosting as usual. The program is from 9:30 to 10:30 pm. Sharon Cawood is confirmed as a guest; others are possible. Call-in questions welcome, 215-2288.

WBIR's Inside Tennessee (the station's website indicates it airs at 9:30 a.m. Sunday with likely replays on the Ten News 2 channel). It taped Thursday night. First segment: Commissioners Greg Lambert and R. Larry Smith and former commissioner John Greiss. Second segment: Randy Tyree and Me, as you might expect I blast the process followed by the commission. Third Segment: Sharon Cawood, Sherry Witt.

WATE's Tennessee This Week. The station website indicates Noon airing, and streaming video likely earlier on the station website. Guests include: Commissioners R. Larry Smith and Greg Lambert, as well as Amy Broyles.

--Mark Harmon

Our five-minute break is dragging on in the battle of the Fourth District. I'm trying to support good candidates and avoid all the less-reputable activities. The intrigues will make a great book, tentative title. Crashing the Commission. --Mark Harmon

The Tuesday evening candidate forum at Whittle Springs Middle School was a great success, attracting most of those seeking appointment to the open positions in Knox County government. They had a chance to speak before 13 of the 19 county commissioners, and answer questions from an audience of around 200 people.
Volunteers from the League of Women Voters helped me conduct a preference poll of those attending. Those numbers are presented below, but one should stress that these are but one measure that likely will guide county commissioners in their decisions on Wednesday. Other important factors will be the qualifications of the applicants and their answers to the varied questions (storm water, land development, taxes, school support, etc.) raised by the audience.
Most of the attendees were from the Second District, and most (but not all) appeared to follow the instruction to vote only in their own district and the countywide offices, Thus, with all the precautions about a preference poll ballot, these numbers were tallied at the end by two LWV volunteers:

More after the jump...

Dear Friends and Neighbors,
A quick note that the candidate forum scheduled for Monday at 6pm is still on, but the location has moved to Whittle Springs Middle School's auditorium, 2700 White Oak Lane (the corner of Whittle Springs and White Oak).
Great thanks to Whittle Springs Principal Benny Perry who responded quickly and favorably to house the event when Fulton High officials forgot to include the academic banquet on the auditorium calendar and did not notice the conflict until this morning.
The schedule of events will be:
6pm to approx 7 pm, County Commission, District Two, all candidates seeking appointment asked to give a three-minute statement, followed by audience questions.

Approximately 7pm to 8pm, county-wide candidates (sheriff, county clerk, trustee, register of deeds) same format.

Approximately 8pm to 8:30pm, any candidates from other districts, same format.

Mark Harmon, County Commissioner, District Two

I have arranged a candidate forum for those who seek appointments to vacant positions in Knox County, especially the commission seat in District Two. Commissioner Billy Tindell is cooperating in this and plans to attend. The event is set for Monday, January 29th, starting at 6pm in the Fulton High School Auditorium. Public, candidates, commissioners, and all interested parties are invited.

The schedule will work as follows:
6 pm Brief Welcome and Introduction
6:05 to approximately 6:50pm, Brief statements by those seeking appointment to the District Two Commission seat (3-4 minutes each) followed by questions from the audience.

6:50 to approx. 7:30, Brief statements by those seeking appointment to any of the countywide offices (sheriff, register of deeds, trustee, county clerk) followed by questions from the audience.

7:30 to close, Brief statements by those seeking other commission seats followed by questions from the audience.

I hope to wrap up by about 8pm; it could go longer or shorter based on the number of candidates who show up, and the number of questions.

--Mark Harmon