Metro Pulse/Ear to the Ground

Comment
on this story

With Friends Like This

Last year, Mayor Victor Ashe appointed his longtime friend Archie Ellis to serve a three-year term on the board of directors of the newly-created Knoxville Tourism and Sports Development Corp. A year later, Ashe apparently decided to remove Ellis from the board. Why?

Sources say it was because Ellis not only supported the wrong candidate for City Council, but signed on as a sponsor for a Chris Woodhull fund raiser. Woodhull defeated the Ashe-supported Jean Teague this week.

When first contacted by email, Ashe flatly denied any intention of kicking Ellis off the board (punctuation is the mayor's own): "absolutely not...in fact I am not removing archie ellis period..."When asked about a letter from KTSC's attorney Tom Jones, dated Oct. 30, that says, in part: "...Mayor Ashe has indicated his desire to change his mind such that Archie Ellis would be removed in the middle of his three-year term to be replaced by Jeff Chapman. I am not aware of any statute, charter or ordinance authority that would allow the mayor to now do so...." Ashe backed up a bit and said Jones' letter came "...for the very simple reason the question was raised as to whether it could be done and an answer was sought from both Jones as KTSC attorney and the city law department. In the meantime I have decided not to do it whether it is permitted or not....ellis will remain until the expiration of his current term on KTSC...then Mayor Haslam will decide what to do...as for woodhull, I have many friends backing him as well as Jean..."

Attached to Jones' letter, which was addressed to city Law Director Michael Kelley, were past-due invoices from KTSC to the city. Sources say this represents the more than $300,000 Ashe ordered to be withheld from the tourism organization until Ellis was removed.

Pressed further, Ashe conceded that he "considered" kicking Ellis off the board, but has now changed his mind.

"It has not been my habit to discuss publicly why or how I mull over thoughts and then reach a different conclusion from an initial impression....and I do not plan on doing so here...I can tell you that relating this to the woodhull campaign is pure baloney....archie ellis is an able and committed citizen. He will give his all to this position in the future as he has in the past. Victor Ashe."

Connect the ID Dots

Well, the News Sentinel finally got written up again in the nationally prestigious Columbia Journalism Review. We had heard rumors the paper was getting in trouble for the infamous double-interview of Mayor-elect Bill Haslam a few months ago, but that's not mentioned. The review did mention the daily's running a letter to the editor under the headline, "Haslam Has Integrity," signed by one Alan Carmichael. As the CJR notes, "Unmentioned was the fact that Carmichael is the co-owner of Moxley Carmichael, the public-relations firm for 1.) the Bill Haslam for Mayor Campaign; 2.) the Pilot Corp., the Haslam family's oil company; and 3.) the News Sentinel itself. As the Moxley Carmichael website boasts with obvious justification, 'Our clients benefit from the strong relationships we've established with the media.'"

It's warning to all of us. Frankly, we didn't even know you could get national ridicule for dropping an ID. But the column goes on to add that Moxley Carmichael suspended its relationship with the News Sentinel after stories circulated that an unnamed assistant metro editor was transferred to the sports department's late shift because his wife was a Madeline Rogero supporter.