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Seven Days

Wednesday, June 27
House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh urges his colleagues to do the right thing and support a state income tax, even if it means not getting re-elected. Hey, look—it's a politician standing up for principles, just like in the movies! Does this mean aliens are about to attack?
UT trustees meet and decide that, absent legislative action to raise revenues, the only way to get more money is to keep raising tuition. Makes us hope that those anti-tax yahoos honking their horns outside the Capitol all have kids in college.

Thursday, June 28
Gov. Don Sundquist appoints himself to lead the search committee for a new UT president. One person he won't be consulting: Bill Sansom, who led the last search as a member of the UT Board of Trustees. Sundquist declined to reappoint Sansom to the board. Nothing personal, of course.

Friday, June 29
For want of anything else, the state Legislature passes a band-aid budget to keep the government operating while lawmakers continue their tax fight. It is the first interim budget in state history. Well, at least they can say they're breaking new ground...

Saturday, June 30
Chet Atkins dies. Guitars gently weep.

Monday, July 2
U.S. District Judge Leon Jarvis reiterates his ruling that Knox County Sheriff Department canine Falco is not a reliable drug dog. And also declares that he's named for a particularly silly '80s singer.

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:
Well, there's nothing like walking under something for four straight years to imprint it in your memory. At least, that's assuming most of the many many right responses we got this week are from UT students and/or alumni. As they all noted, this is one of a series of elegant light fixtures that adorn the side of the old Alumni Gym on campus. The gym is currently undergoing an extensive overhaul. The fixtures, we hope, will stay. First right answer came from Michael Lowe of Knoxville, to whom we are happy to award something no past or present college student should be without: a copy of Margaret Ann Rose's 1985 classic Rush: A Girl's Guide to Sorority Success. With vital charts like "Popular Sorority Beverages" (beer: Miller Lite and Moosehead, but not Schlitz or Bud) and an invaluable "Sorority Glossary," it's a timeless tome to pass on from one generation to the next.

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

METROPOLITAN PLANNING COMMISSION
Tuesday, July 10
6:30 p.m.
O'Connor Senior Center
611 Winona St.
MPC is to hold a public meeting to discuss the updating of the East City Sector Plan.

KNOXVILLE CITY COUNCIL
Tuesday, July 10
7 p.m.
City County Bldg., Large Assembly Room
400 Main St.
Regularly scheduled meeting.

They Want the Airwaves

First Amendment Radio wants to reclaim broadcasting for the public

First Amendment Radio hopes to begin broadcasting by the end of the summer, with aspirations of giving Knoxville a true community station.

The station will go on the air with or without FCC approval, but its organizers don't consider it a pirate radio station.

"We're not pirates," says Chris Irwin, one of the organizers. "We have a right to the airwaves because they belong to us, the community. Really the pirates are the corporations who are trying to squash our rights."

The station will have a variety of shows playing music that isn't currently being aired by other stations. There will be a lot of hip hop, local music and other genres, Irwin says. Informational programming, including news, gardening, and car maintenance shows, will also be featured. Some DJs from WUTK 90.3 FM—who recently lost their shows as the college station purges its staff in an attempt to be like commercial radio (for more on the controversy surrounding WUTK see this week's "Eye On the Scene," page 22)—are looking to take their shows to First Amendment Radio, Irwin says.

The effort is being organized with the help of Katuah Earth First!, the environmental group that had hoped to get one of the new low-watt community FM frequencies.

After losing in court to a number of low-power pirate radio stations it tried to shut down, the Federal Communications Commission in 1999 created a new license classification to allow low-power community radio stations. The original proposal would have allowed 10 to 100 watt community radio stations between 89.1 and 89.9 FM, provided the stations were two bandwidths from any existing station.

However, late last year, after intensive lobbying by National Public Radio and the National Association of Broadcasters, Congress weakened the proposal. Community stations must be three bandwidths from any existing station. The move cut the number of low-watt stations available in half and effectively made it impossible to get a license in urban areas, where the airwaves are more crowded. "The point of it wasn't protecting bands, it was squashing community radio, which was making NPR really nervous," Irwin says.

The group is tentatively planning to broadcast at 88.9 FM. "That seems to be a good part of the band that is not occupied. We're going to try to be as far away as we can from other stations," he says.

Irwin says the station will broadcast 24 hours a day, although early on that may mean rebroadcasting shows to fill up the time.

First Amendment Radio already has a site to broadcast from. They're now raising the $1,000 to $3,000 it'll take to buy a decent transmitter, which won't bleed onto other frequencies. A spaghetti dinner held last month raised $800.

Another resident who has been involved, David Welch, says most of the people he's talked to are all supportive, seeing a need for an alternative. "I haven't found anyone who disagrees with it," Welch says.

Anyone interested in starting a show or supporting First Amendment Radio can attend one of the Katuah Earth First! meetings every Tuesday night at 7 at Laurel High School, 1539 Laurel Avenue.

—Joe Tarr

A Lot to Gain

History Center bailed out by County Commission

Last year, a phalanx of dignitaries including former Sen. Howard Baker stood at the vacant lot at the corner of Gay and Clinch on an April day and announced a campaign to greatly expand the long-crowded facilities of the East Tennessee History Center—which comprises the Museum of East Tennessee History, the offices of the East Tennessee Historical Society, the voluminous Knox County Archives, and the historical library known as the Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection. As proposed by architects Barber and McMurry, the building would be an in-character expansion of the handsome, three-story circa-1872 Custom House.

It all sounded great for everybody, including advocates of downtown revitalization. All aspects of the project promise to attract more visitors to downtown, as much of the center already does. The well-appointed but cramped museum is a favorite of school field trips, and the McClung Collection, a specialized library of local history, attracts hundreds of genealogical researchers from across the country. But when the state budget logjam made the anticipated state funding unlikely, some wondered if the history center's high hopes of early 2000 were already history.

By late spring of this year, however, County Commission had appropriated a total of $17.5 million, the total necessary to finish the project. "The county stepped up in a remarkable way," says grateful ETHS director Kent Whitworth. The funding now in place should take care of both the renovation of the Victorian post-office/courthouse building as well as the expansion. Whitworth says about $2 million of the county's investment will be reimbursed through city and private funding.

It's not just a charity, of course. "It'll be a Knox County facility, managed by the library," Whitworth says. It will be run by the county's library system, an extension of the same arrangement under which the facility operates now. The ETHS and other occupants are, in fact, tenants.

The groundbreaking date, once planned for July, is still obscure, but Whitworth says it's "safe to say" it will be in late summer or early fall. The first job of the three-year project will be to dig a very deep hole at the corner of Gay and Clinch; the building will stretch two stories underground, largely for the McClung Collection's massive archives. Johnson and Galyon will do the work, supervised by the Public Building Authority.

A historical society's work is never done, though. Whitworth says the ETHS is still working on another campaign to raise $4.2 million for exhibits and other programs that are to occupy the grand new building.

—Jack Neely

No More Nick to Love On

A pet's pet, he rambled Fort Sanders at will

Just about everybody around Fort Sanders and downtown knew Nick. Although technically not allowed to cross 11th Street, Nick would wander far enough down the street to be out-of-sight of his owners at the 11th Street Expresso House. Then he'd cross and make rounds to his various friends.

"We'd get all these calls from people. Someone would say, 'I just saw Nick over here on 15th Street.' Then I'd get another call, 'He's over here on 12th and White,'" says Loretta Roscoe, owner of the coffeeshop.

"I could trust him. I can't just do that with any dog. I knew Nick so well. I knew what he was capable of. I knew he would never bite someone unless it was an act of protection. He never even attacked a squirrel."

Because of his good demeanor and wandering ways, Nick will be missed by a lot of people. The 10-year-old Sheltie dog died last month of cancer.

Born on Christmas day, Nick was named after St. Nicholas. Len Granath bought him from a breeder in Jefferson City. He proved exceptionally bright. Granath used to live across the river in South Knoxville, behind the Kerbela Temple. Granath tried to train Nick to stay in that neighborhood. After being out one day, he returned and Nick was gone. On his answering machine, there were reports that the dog had been to a friend's house at 14th and Clinch and then the old Java Coffeeshop in the Old City, where Granath worked at the time. "He was going to all the places I might be," he says.

Nick endeared himself to many of the 11th Street's customers and neighbors. Guys would borrow him to go cruising. "They took him for rides because they used him as a chick magnet," Roscoe says. "Girls would say, 'Oh, is that Nick from the coffee house?' They knew who he was."

He was also fond of visiting Fort Kid Playground (against Roscoe's wishes). She'd find him sitting on the bench with children who were happy to share their lunch or cake with the dog.

Not everyone was fond of Nick. "He knew the command, 'Health Inspector'—he'd go hide," Roscoe jokes.

The day before his last, Roscoe and Granath took Nick to all his favorite spots—Sequoyah Hills Park, the old UT law library, and finally the coffee shop. They bought him a hamburger, and though he could hardly eat any of it, the steamy meat must have smelled good to him.

But the night was a rough one and Granath and Roscoe put Nick to sleep the next day. The coffeeshop has been a little lonely ever since, and many people have sent condolences, including the tellers at the downtown SunTrust where Roscoe, with Nick in tow, did her banking.

"I didn't know how many lives Nick touched until he was gone," Roscoe says. "There were people who were kind of crushed. They came here to see Nick. There were people who maybe didn't have a lot of contact with other people. They'd come here and knew they could love on Nick and he'd love on them."

—Joe Tarr