Metro Pulse/Ear to the Ground

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So, Would 'BB' Be Better?

Ellen Adcock, the city's director of administration, who is known to start things, really got a good one last week when she was quoted by Ear as saying she'd characterize the outgoing Deputy Mayor Gene Patterson as a "spark plug" and a "bridge builder" in the same breath. The City County Building crowd picked right up on half of it and started calling Patterson "Sparky," much to his consternation. At a party at Convention Center project honcho Dick Bigler's over the weekend, Patterson shouted right in our Ear that he'd gone nearly 50 years without a nickname, and now this! Adcock was there, too, grinning mischievously. Asked if his new crew at TV-6 knew about the nickname, he said, "No, and they'd better not." The Ear of the moment explained that the Channel 6-ers will never learn about it "unless they can read."

Read it and Reap

Whirlwind, The Butcher Banking Scandal, a 600-page encyclopedic treatment of the fall of Jake and C.H. Butcher Jr.'s house-of-cards-style banking empire after the 1982 World's Fair, is on the market.

Author Sandra Lea says the hardback book was published locally by Tennessee Valley Publishing, whose name does not appear on the flyleaves. It's been available at Books-A-Million and Book Warehouse since last Friday says Lea, a Southwest Virginia native who worked on it from an Oak Ridge office for more than a year. Jesse Barr, the banking wizard who went down with the Butchers, says he read it in about five hours and "it's about as accurate as it could be. Jake and C.H. won't like everything in it. I don't like reading everything in it. But it's the truth." It starts off with a page or two of turgid, adjective-ridden prose, then calms down and doles out interview quotes and documents and a scattering of photos. The self-assessment on the jacket says it's been described as: "a cross between Dallas and The Godfather" with "unbridled lust and greed and insatiable passions..." A quick scan, however, revealed no bodices being ripped. Review to follow.

Spin City

Those flaky flacks—they just can't stay in one place. Knox County schools spokesguy Mike Cohen (former public affairs honcho for Mayor Victor Ashe) is adding one more institution to his resume—he'll be ending his three-year stint in education and moving across Gay Street to the Public Building Authority. Cohen will be "communications and community relations" adviser to PBA head Dale Smith—a role obviously anticipated to count for a great deal in whatever form the PBA's downtown redevelopment plans ultimately take. "It's a really good opportunity," sez Cohen (who was once an honest-to-god journalist before he got used to making money). "I like Dale, and I'm excited about the things PBA's doing right now, especially the downtown stuff." Ironically, he's leaving right after Superintendent Charles Lindsey canceled the school system's contract with PBA for construction supervision, following years of brittle relations between the two agencies.

Meanwhile, the Knoxville Police Department has announced the pending departure of longtime spokesman Foster Arnett Jr., prompting sighs of relief from reporters across the city (and not a few city officials) who long ago tired of Arnett's defensiveness, uncooperativeness, and general propensity to be a pain in the butt. KPD Chief Phil Keith says Arnett will be "hard to replace." We can only hope so.

Getting Down with Jack

It's been an up and down year for GOP stalwart Jack Barnes, who helped run the Bush campaign in Knox County and was suspended for 30 days from his city job for cussing. Instead of having his annual barbecue in the city garage, Jack held the shindig at Kerbela Temple Monday, and if you were one of the 14 Knoxvillians who didn't drop by there, here's some of what you missed: Gov. Don Sundquist talking about how Jack's the guy he'd want in a foxhole with him and trying to pronounce Kwanzaa; schools superintendent Charles Lindsey flashing his large teeth at County Commissioner Wanda Moody, U.S. Rep. Jimmy Duncan shaking hands; big Jim Haslam, being the oil baron; state Sen. Ben Atchley and his wife Sue;state Sen. Tim Burchett and his mom and dad, Charlie and Joyce; former state Sen. Bud Gilbert; future county executive candidate Mike Ragsdale; County Commissioner Diane Jordan; Vice Mayor Jack Sharp and wife Doris; City Council members Larry Cox and Ed Shouse; fireman/politician Red Lowe; law student Don Wiser and, saving the best for last, wrestling immortal Ron Wright, inventor of the Warp Your Head Off hold and master of the loaded boot.

Bedwell Strikes Out—Almost

Controversial West Knoxville developer Robert Bedwell, whose voluntary annexation/rezoning deal close to Midway Road near the Sevier County line has caused more than a year's worth of city/county hostilities, lost two rezoning battles—one with the city, one with the county—in less than a week.

Bedwell, who bought property on rural Cooper Road, had it annexed and then attempted to rezone it from agricultural to commercial, had his petition denied by Metropolitan Planning Commission and appealed to City Council Dec. 12. Despite common wisdom that he had the votes, Bedwell pulled the request, and his attorney Arthur Seymour Jr. announced that he wanted to negotiate with the other side. The other side consists mostly of farmers who have lived on the land for generations and plan to stay there, and who have been fighting being involuntarily annexed as a result of Bedwell's actions. The issue comes up again in February.

On Dec. 18, Bedwell read the tea leaves and withdrew a County Commission request to rezone 34 acres of river bottom land on John Sevier Highway for a warehouse/distribution center. This request had also been denied by MPC and denounced as spot zoning. The property is across the river from the home of Dwight Van de Vate Sr., who, along with Town Hall East, was active in lobbying against the Bedwell plan.

Thanks, We Think

Rich Karlgaard, publisher of Forbes, was waxing weird when he got around to our town in his column on the dot.com downturn in the current (Dec. 25) issue of the magazine. Predicting the shakeout will keep on shaking for a couple of quarters, Karlgaard issued a bunch of survival suggestions for cyber-business owners/managers. Along with the cost-cutting and attention-grabbing tips was the notion that one can save on rent by pulling up stakes and moving out of the $100-to-$200 per square foot, per year Silicon Valley and into the soup, so to speak. He picked Cincinnati as one lower-rent digital haven, then suggested: 'Try a university town in the heartland, such as Lawrence, Kas.; or Knoxville, Tenn.; or St. Paul, Minn. Good young engineers and software writers can be had [there] for $30K, plus options. Rent goes for $5 a year. When cash is king, you can't beat it." OK, Rich, but what kind of "university town" is St. Paul, and where you getting your rent figures? Chamber types here say $5-a-foot space would be pretty raw and certainly lacking in digital infrastructure. That's not to mention that Lawrence is...well...Lawrence.

Correction

An item in "Ear to the Ground" last issue (Dec. 14) gave the wrong information for a benefit show starring the scandalous Lady Chablis. The show was at the Rainbow Club, not the Carousel. Yes, we do know the difference. And we are very sorry for the mistake.