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Seven Days

Wednesday, June 6
A convicted drug dealer who was once a security officer at a Knox County middle school was sentenced to—besides a prison term—tell middle school students about his experience. Don't believe we'd have done that, judge.

Thursday, June 7
Forty-five years after authorizing liquor-by-the-drink in Maryville restaurants, the city's voters narrowly approved the establishment of package liquor stores there, finally concluding it might be safer—or more discreet—to drink at home than on the road.

Friday, June 8
Knox County commissioners opposed to spending money on a downtown Knoxville planetarium/museum complex toy with the Cas Walker-like idea of putting the question to a referendum requiring a three-fourths majority. They seem to know that you couldn't get 75 percent of voters to approve relocating Heaven itself to Gay Street.

Monday, June 11
County Commission holds a hearing on a proposed curfew for kids under 18. Only a few attend, and those are mostly people who want to know if the city really has had a midnight curfew for more than 30 years.
The UT baseball Vols whack Georgia to remain in contention in the College World Series, proving that UT can beat Georgia at something, somewhere when the chips are down. The other good news is that Vol hitters cranked out 32 runs in the first two series games. The bad news is the pitchers (and fielders) allowed 33 runs in those games.

Tuesday, June 12
Park rangers snuff two bears rounded up after a camper is bitten in the Great Smokies. They kill both because they couldn't tell which did the biting. Death penalty advocates approve and consider legislation to make the practice applicable to humans.

Knoxville Found

(Click photo for larger image)

What is this? Every week in "Knoxville Found," we'll print the photo of a local curiosity. If you're the first person to correctly identify this oddity, you'll win a special prize plucked from the desk of the editor (keep in mind that the editor hasn't cleaned his desk in five years). E-mail your guesses, or send 'em to "Knoxville Found" c/o Metro Pulse, 505 Market St., Suite 300, Knoxville, TN 37902.

Last Week's Photo:
Around and around and around it goes, and where it stops...well, where it stops is not all that far from where it starts, but it's the journey that counts. As a whole bunch of astute, spiritual readers noted, this sign welcomes visitors to the recently constructed meditative labyrinth at St. John's Episcopal Cathedral on Cumberland Avenue downtown. It's modeled on one found on the floor of the Chartres Cathedral. The idea is that as you walk the pattern, you free up your mind for less worldly work. Like, say, thinking of "Knoxville Found" puzzlers for newspaper readers. The first right answer came from the monkish Brent Minchey, downtown resident and KnoxRecall partisan. For his devoted reading and walking, he wins an official burgee of the city of Knoxville for one of his many boats (a "burgee," for those not in the know, is one of those little triangular pennants you see decorating a bow staff). It has a dogwood flower on it!

Meet Your City
A calendar of upcoming public meetings you should attend

METROPOLITAN PLANNING COMMISSION
Thursday, June 14
1:30 p.m.
City County Building
400 Main St.
MPC will vote to change the zoning on Market Square from commercial to the H-1 historic preservation designation.

METROPOLITAN PLANNING COMMISSION
Thursday, June 14
6:30 p.m.
South-Doyle High School
2020 Tipton Rd.
MPC will hold a public meeting for input on the South Knox County Sector Plan.

KNOXVILLE CITY COUNCIL
Thursday, June 14
3:30 p.m.
Emporium Building
106 S. Gay St.
Council will consider a proposal from Mayor Victor Ashe to create two new redevelopment areas—one on Market Square and another for the block to the west of the Square—for redevelopment through KCDC, plus a new Alternative Building Code for historic buildings downtown.

KNOX COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION
Tuesday, June 19
5 p.m.
Andrew Johnson Building
912 S. Gay St.
Work session.

Hills to The Hill:

Back off on lights and sounds along the river

Although the first salvos have yet to be fired, the battle lines are being drawn on both sides of the Tennessee River between the tony homes of Sequoyah Hills and the bucolic pastures of the University of Tennessee's Cherokee Farm agricultural station.

The issue pitting the clout-ridden neighborhood against the equally heavy-hitting university is the draft of UT's campus "master plan" that went public in April, showing a proposal for 20 full-fledged athletic fields stretched along the river's south bank on the marginally useful flood plain downstream from the Buck Karnes Bridge.

The fields would be lighted and used primarily for intramural sports, including softball, football and soccer, with an actual intercollegiate soccer stadium at the bridge end of the property.

Lights, noise and other student tomfoolery would replace the herd of UT dairy cattle idly and silently grazing on the property directly across from Sequoyah for decades.

About a half-dozen grim-faced Sequoyah poo-bahs attended an April 2 public presentation of the draft plan. Their leader, Jim Bletner, president of the Sequoyah Hills Homeowners Association, who is also administrator of concessions for the UT Athletic Department, stated their case against the athletics complex. He also reminded the UT master plan group, headed by Marleen K. Davis, the dean of the College of Architecture & Design, and Phil Scheurer, the UT vice president for operations, that the homeowners were aware of deed restrictions that limited the property's use to agricultural purposes. The implication was clear that if UT proceeded to defile the pastoral vista thus, the possibility of litigation would arise.

Enter Joe Huie, the attorney who is researching the land title trail for the homeowners. Huie says he is not done yet. What he first found were the 1916 deed restrictions, imposed when Knox County acquired and deeded the 500-plus acres to UT. The restrictions do appear to limit the land's use to either "agricultural" or "agricultural, experimental and educational" purposes, depending on which section you read. Then Huie says he came upon a quitclaim, which would have effectively released the university from those restrictions, filed in 1942. He thought the game was over. But he says he stumbled upon records of the then-governing County Court from 1944 that indicate the court did not intend to lift the restrictions and did so by mistake. So, Huie says, the question may still be open.

Scheurer, who had one meeting last week with the homeowners' Cherokee Problem committee chairman, Scripps executive Jim Hart, says, "We've agreed to meet further" and "We absolutely want to work with the homeowners to mitigate their concerns." He also says, "I'm no lawyer, but...[UT's general counsel] tells us what we are proposing is well within the [deed's] provisions."

Contacted about their meeting, Hart said he had nothing to say about the issue. Pressed, Hart said, "Nothing means nothing." He did, however, go on to say that he expects further consultation among homeowners and the university, although no dates are set. "There are a lot of opinions here," he says, explaining that he's not a spokesperson.

One opinion is that of George Rothery, whose Sequoyah Hills home overlooks the river. "First, one fears the noise, and the mile, literally, of ballfield lights. It would be pretty intrusive in a quiet, residential neighborhood. And second, there are the property values. Real estate people tell us they would be adversely affected," Rothery says.

Perhaps representative of the homeowners in opposition, Rothery also points to the master plan's stated objective to make the campus more pedestrian-friendly and less reliant on autos. Moving intramurals across the river would require driving or shuttle-busing to and from those new fields. "A walking campus is not on the same page," he says.

He says the homeowners would likely not object to the proposed research center atop the Cherokee Farm hill or some of the other suggested uses for the property, such as married student housing. "Of course the joke is then we'd have to listen to all that bickering," he says.

The draft of the plan and accompanying report and comments are not expected to reach the UT Board of Trustees until its fall meeting. If the athletic complex is still part of the riverbank proposal and is approved, all of Knoxville and probably the county's court system can expect to hear the wailing from Sequoyans night and day until it's removed.

—Barry Henderson

New Rock Rules

Should WUTK be a training ground for or an alternative to commercial radio?

In August, Maestro will arrive at WUTK, the student-run radio station at the University of Tennessee.

The software program is used at commercial stations all over the country, but it's state-of-the-art technology at the 1,000-watt college station, New Rock 90.3 FM.

Maestro will allow WUTK's program director to completely control which songs are played when, says New Rock's operations manager Chad Harriss, a graduate assistant who is in charge of the station.

The arrival of Maestro means far fewer of the 20 to 30 wide-ranging specialty shows the station is known for. And it reignites a debate over what exactly college radio should be.

Harriss says Maestro will allow the station to be more like its commercial counterparts, and thus better train students for broadcasting jobs. "What we are is a laboratory. Our primary goal is to train broadcast students in a realistic environment," he says.

However, according the Federal Communications Commission, college stations aren't licensed to be training grounds for commercial radio —they're licensed to provide educational and alternative programming for the communities they broadcast in.

"[Training DJs] can be done by any commercial station," says Allen Meyers, a communications analyst with the FCC. "That's not to say it isn't an important function, but it cannot be something you hang your hat on as a non-profit educational station."

The FCC does not regulate or determine what educational content should be, Meyers adds.

College radio has long been a refuge for those seeking something beyond the narrow genres of commercial stations.

Fans of college radio fear that by modeling itself after corporate broadcasting, New Rock will become as homogenized and bland as its for-profit counterparts.

One of the first specialty shows to get the ax on WUTK was "It's Just Knoxville," which was dedicated to local music and featured live interviews and performances. In all, three shows were canceled, says Harriss. (A Friday night hip-hop show was not canned, as reported last week. Its host is out of town for the summer.)

Harriss says more people will probably be upset about the changes this fall when competition for 10 slots will be intense. Under the new format, there will be two specialty shows each weeknight, between 6 p.m. and midnight, with none on the weekends, except for two that might be given to executive staff members.

Broadcast students will man the microphones at other times, but they will not select the music they play or when it is played.

"Most of the DJs—outside of 10 specialty shows—won't decide what they get to play. Most DJs in the real world don't either," Harriss says.

Songs put in rotation will be based heavily on what's on the CMJ charts, Harriss says. New Rock will continue giving attention to local artists—songs by Jodi Manross and Gran Torino are now in rotation, and others will be added.

The specialty shows are also being cut for security reasons, Harriss says. Although there have been no major thefts at the station, the equipment has been tampered with in the past, he says.

Ralph Carmode, dean of the Department of Communications at Jacksonville State University in Alabama, did his doctoral thesis on public radio and has overseen a couple of college radio stations. Public radio stations shouldn't be training grounds, he says, as so much of it is "amateur trash" and the training can be done off the air. "I think they ought to be doing something distinctly different than the commercial stations," he says.

Former program director and DJ Brian Sherry left New Rock about a year and half ago when he saw the direction the station was headed, and it didn't jibe with his ideals.

"My ideal is that there's this frequency in the community that broadcasts local interests with sort of a democratic discussion board," Sherry says. "I think what UT thinks of the station is signified in the new [WUTK] bumper sticker, which is shaped like a football."

—Joe Tarr

Ivory Tower Pulpit

One of the country's most outspoken theologians returns to UT

The graduate seminar in philosophy that Stanley Hauerwas is teaching at the University of Tennessee this semester doesn't seem, at first glance, much different from any other philosophy course. A dozen or so students, ranging from their early 20s to middle-age, are grouped around a large conference table in the old Hoskins Library, eagerly discussing the legacy of early 20th-century philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein and grappling with the meaning of anti-foundationalist epistemology.

Then, all of a sudden, Hauerwas, a short, bald man with a thin, neatly trimmed beard and a high-pitched voice with a North Carolina accent, interjects a surprising personal note to the discussion: his conviction that God reconciled himself to the world through Jesus Christ.

Hauerwas' revelation doesn't produce shocked gasps from his students, but it does provoke spirited conversation about what we know, how well we really know it, and how we can be sure that we know it.

For the last 30 years, Hauerwas has been one of the most prominent—and controversial—Protestant theologians in the U.S. He's been an outspoken critic of mainstream American Christianity, a vocal pacifist, and a frank speaker whose penchant for four-letter words makes most seminary administrators nervous. But it's his honest declarations of his own Christian faith—he's Methodist, and strongly influenced by the Quaker and Mennonite traditions—that have attracted the most attention, at least in academic circles.

In his books (The Peaceable Kingdom, After Christendom) and lectures, Hauerwas defends a Christian tradition that's far different from what most American churches preach. "I don't want to be different to be different," he says. "But Christianity in America is a long way from the kind of Christianity that, for example, produced Martin Luther."

Hauerwas, who now teaches at Duke University's Divinity School, says that American Christianity has been diluted by commercialism and a strain of individualism that ignores the communal nature of the church.

Hauerwas' seminar this summer will conclude with two sessions, morning and afternoon, on June 18 and 19, then a final visit on June 25 and 26. (The morning sessions, a reprise of the Gifford Lectures Hauerwas delivered at the University of St. Andrew's in Scotland this spring, will be open to the public.)

This isn't the first time that Hauerwas has been to UT; in fact, Dr. Charles Reynolds, head of the university's religious studies department, told students this week that a 1973 campus debate between Hauerwas and William Franken, then a leading ethicist, was the moment "when Stanley kind of arrived."

—Matthew T. Everett
 

June 14, 2001 * Vol. 11, No. 24
© 2001 Metro Pulse