Who will speakers address, if anyone?

How will speakers sign up?

How will the meeting be recorded?

How speakers' time be limited?

Two hour meeting. Citizens will assemble in a large room first after signing in and getting assignment to a small group. Joe Johnson will give overview. Alan Lowe will describe Baker Center role. Lynne Fugate will describe comment recording rules. Citizens will go to small group meetings - no more than 10 per group. First person will present an idea. The idea will be recorded using the exact words. If too long original speaker will have to condense words. Recorder will not comment, clarify or answer questions. Then second person presents idea and that is recorded. This proceeds until no new ideas are suggested or if time runs out. Then small group picks their top 3 ideas by secret ballot. All small groups report their top ideas to the large group. All ideas will be recorded and made available to the public when all the public meetings are over. See the website at (link...) for more information.

Pundits, politicians, political junkies and bloggers who say this is just another metro group are either uninformed, unimaginative or deliberately trying to mislead the public.

Tom: If you think this process will generate anything other than a strong mayor (few elected officials) form of government proposal (or metro), then you ain't from around here.

There is ONE WAY to change Knox County government. Run for office, get elected. -- s.

Oh, yeah. The "batter up" header is for the Halls Red Devils regional baseball game at 6:30 p.m. at Halls High School tonight. That's where I'll be ... The way it works is... A crowd of guys sit in a dugout ... They get up in groups of three and try to knock the ball over the fence. Each pitch is carefully recorded. The winner will advance toward the state championship, while the loser goes home.

It's sort of like politics. -- s.

...That is a mouth full

Sandra,
I am glad you have such a great outlook on your community! It just makes me want to call Knoxville home. Don’t knock the process until you come to a meeting and give your input…, then say what you want.

is not her role. Ftn. City HAPPY you are beginning to see the rest of the story.

Hi, folks. Got a bit snarky this afternoon.

After the baseball game (Halls got smashed) I drifted by the high school cafeteria for the One Question meeting. Enjoyed asking John Schmid, Joe Sullivan, others from the West Side whether they needed directions upon leaving.

Seriously, there were about 100 or so folks there -- about half from Halls, Corryton, Fountain City or Powell and the balance from downtown or the West Side.

Two commissioners were the only elected officials I saw -- Larry Smith and Mark Harmon. Former commissioner Larry Stephens was there -- good to see him.

Most of the groups reported back for unified government.

Becky Longmire facilitated one small group -- she was her usual fiery self -- advocating for equal school facilities, course offerings, etc.

A few folks from the Halls Republican Club attended -- Wally Welch, Lee Johnson, Winona and Hilton Tunnell. It would have been interesting to have polled the fans at the baseball game. -- s.

While there have been some "outcomes" reported from the Halls High School meeting in the news, you need to have been there to get a feel for the broad scope of comments.

My brainstorming group had 8 citizens and one leader. The leader did not contribute to the ideas. I participated tonight because I will be a small group facilitator at 3 of the other meetings.

Ideas covered the school board, staggered election cycles, commission redistricting, civil service protection for county workers, prohibitions and restrictions on county workers and their families working for the county, the wheel tax, school taxes and yes...unified government (not metro, but I'm not sure what the difference is). The other small discussion groups also seemed to cover a broad range of topics but I haven't seen the full list of ideas from all the meetings.

If you are interested in what's going on with this process, attend one of the meetings. Sandra estimated about 100 and the News Sentinel reported about 80 attended. I haven't seen the sign-in sheets to get a real head count. Some arrived with long lists of ideas. Others used the government snapshot published in the News Sentinel for ideas. It was fun and interesting.

The 'One Question' steering committee will publish all the comments from all the meetings on the (link...) website after the Fulton High meeting on the 22nd.

1.Unified/metro government.

2.Non partisan winner take all elections.Held per constitution.

3.All elections held in the same year as the sheriffs election.

4.The mayor is the adminstrative officer.
get rid of the so called fee offices.

5. The sheriff is the top cop.

6. Judges elected per term;non partisan.

7. Nine districts;nine commissioners.

8. Mayor appoints fire chief with commission approval.

9. Term limits for Mayor,Sheriff & Commission.

10. School Board & superintendent as is per BEP.

I'd recommend this group going out into the public; neighborhoods and whatnot. Old fashioned door knocking campaign...

Those are the voters that need to be sold on these issues. Holding workshops will only attract a certain percentage, and fairly or not, those folks will look like busybodies or the 'elites' that Bill Lyons wrote about.

"I'd recommend this group going out into the public; neighborhoods and whatnot. Old fashioned door knocking campaign"

I would not be knocking on anyones door, Did you see the story about Diane Jordan... And she knew the owner. Click Here

I have only been a "political player" for a short time and for my own reasons. The most important lesson I have learned is that what gets the voters to the polls is they have to be passionate about an issue or candidate. If there is no passion, people will generally not be interested in the outcome therefore do not feel the need to vote.

The same is true here, but I am not sure what comes first. The public forums are to invite everyone but will draw only those that are interested and care about being a part of the process. Do we then boil that down to the essential points and take that to the streets to get the disinterested involved?

In the past few months I have noticed more of an interest coming from the non-voters because of Black Wednesday and the school rezoning. Overly scheduled parents are beginning to see what their lack of involvement in local politics can affect their way of life. I really hope this interest stays alive till the elections for the School Board, County Commission, and fee offices. And to also spark an interest in the Knox County One Question process.

As noted on another thread, on the national level the republicans use fear as their passionate issue to incite the public. Perhaps fear of another Black Wednesday or of being zoned to the "wrong" school will draw people to involvement in local government. My fear has been that it would just disinfranchise the voter even more, with the "why bother, they are all corrupt" mentality.

So fear of increased taxes or fear of loosing one's ability to vote for fee offices, what will be the passionate issue(s) in this process? Is a desire for a decrease in duplication of services (between city and county) or insuring term limits too mundane? Not sexy enough to get people riled up?

Just wondering...