UPDATE: The KCEC beginning tomorrow will have a three day early voting center at a Tim Graham owned property. The Expo Center located at the corner of Merchants Drive and Clinton Highway. Tim Graham is the benefactor of this City of Knoxville land grab and one man, one vote ballot question. Hmmmmmm..

BREAKING NEWS: This just in. It appears that Citizens for Home Rule has caught the Knox County Election Commission in a compromising position. This issue needs a district attorney at a minimum or a grand jury investigation immediately. Here is the letter to Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale from Citizens for Home Rule. Read more after the jump... Dear Mayor Ragsdale:

Another greedy sales tax grab by the City of Knoxville is looming, this time aided and abetted by shady dealings at the Knox County Election Commission. Here are the known facts at present.

1. The City pays Tim Graham $2 million to agree to annexation of the new Lowe's on Chapman Hwy south of John Sevier Hwy. This is OUTSIDE the urban growth boundary. The only authority cities have to annex outside their UGB is by referendum.

2. Greg Mackay and/or Pam Reeves have authorized a ONE VOTER "referendum" without authorization of the Knox County Election Commission itself. It is my understanding that this single voter is an employee of Tim Graham who took up residence quite recently, just long enough to register to vote there. This situation has led Commissioner Paul Pinkston to wonder whether it constitutes bribery.

3. The City Council's attorney, Charles Swanson - husband of Pam Reeves - assured the Council that the payment to Graham and the referendum are legal. Reeves caught her husband and herself in a grotesque conflict-of-interest by bypassing the Election Commission and ignoring election law.

4. There is NO sample ballot for this single-voter-referendum which is a violation of election law. TCA 2-5-211 (a) says, "The county election commission SHALL provide two (2) sample ballots for each polling place. . .".

5. The notice of the "referendum" was placed in the News-Sentinel on Oct. 18 the day early voting started. This violates election law 2.5-211 (b): "The county election commission SHALL, at least five (5) days before the beginning of an early voting period and at least five (5) days before an election, publish a sample ballot in a newspaper of general circulation."

6. The description of the area subject to the annexation "referendum" in the Oct. 18 notice is gibberish. It refers to two separate Exhibits (one of them a map), neither of which was published.

All of this points to a hasty, error-plagued, conflict-of-interest ridden, illegal scheme for the City to raise lots of tax revenue without a tax increase. Under the color of "democracy" the City is using a referendum - which was engineered to deliver a known result - as a smoke screen to transfer wealth to an already wealthy developer who was constructing the development anyway. It is morally bankrupt to tax average working people for the benefit of well-connected, well-heeled investors. It also robs Knox County coffers for the benefit of the City, thereby transferring a greater part of the burden of government to County residents. When the City picks the pockets of County taxpayers it cannot be said that they are being a good neighbor or a partner. Partners don't steal from each other. I hope you will order the Knox County Law Director to challenge this election and preserve the Knox County tax base. If you fail to act I fear this will be the first of many such annexation "referenda."

Regards,

John A. Emison
President, Citizens for Home Rule, Inc.