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Knox County’s problems with salesmanship

by Frank Cagle

Knox County’s rulers are embattled. The peasants are sharpening their pitchforks and they’re coming, all 25,000 of them. No doubt Tyler Harber will soon send out an e-mail suggesting they eat cake.

If a public official decides to raise taxes the reasons have to be universal: police protection, road paving, education, parks. Each taxpayer has to feel that he or she will get something from the tax increase, even if they don’t appreciate having to pay for it.

Former Mayor Victor Ashe proposed a sales tax increase in Knoxville during his first term. He waged a campaign for it, promised more police, more road paving and more parks. It passed a referendum easily. And over his next three terms Knoxville got more police, over 600 miles of roads paved and parks in every part of town.

The problem with Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale’s wheel tax increase is that he forgot to argue universal benefits. The tax got intertwined with the proposal to build a new downtown library. Even though there were other things in the proposed county budget, the library was the big-ticket item of the future. In the universe of Knox County taxpayers the subset of people that feel they will directly benefit from a downtown library is in single digits. The library was a convenient (and huge) target to rally ‘round and petition for a wheel tax repeal. Ragsdale didn’t think he had to sell the public, he had 16 county commission votes.

The new proposal that cuts the library cost and includes a West Knox County High School is by no means a slam dunk to save the wheel tax. To save it, if it goes to referendum, the case has to be made in Halls, in Knoxville and in South Knox County that they should care about school overcrowding in Farragut. Most communities think their school is overcrowded.

For anyone that loves and supports downtown and wants to continue the momentum of the past three years it is a worrisome time.

The referendum over a downtown convention center hotel stirred up a protest vote against the convention center itself. The library project has also set off referendum fever. We run the risk of a backlash that threatens all downtown projects.

The proposed downtown Cineplex is essential to drive traffic and generate sales tax. The parking deck next to Market Square is essential to the businesses coming on line on the Square and on Gay Street. Tax abatements and other incentives have created loft apartments. These are hot items and the loft apartment boom and the interest of UT students can provide the customer base from which a thriving downtown Knoxville can grow. Given time.

Putting people into the empty TVA tower will put more people into Market Square at lunch time, providing needed support for restaurants and shops. Getting a major tenant for the unused TVA space should be a top city priority.

These are things that are essential to keeping momentum on downtown development.

A new library is a nice idea and combined with a children’s Discovery Center it could be a wonderful project. But its launch has been badly bungled. It is New Coke. You can get mad at me for telling you, but your anger might better be directed at the guy that screwed the pooch.

It is true that Ragsdale has recognized that Knoxville residents are Knox County taxpayers as well. But little thought has been given to the other side of the coin. It is one thing for the city of Knoxville to spend money on downtown development. But when you start funding downtown projects from the county budget you have to get the support of people in Mascot, Corryton, Halls, Powell, Karns and Kodak to pay for it. Since most of these people haven’t been downtown in 25 years it’s a hard sell. County government involvement in downtown projects invites opposition. The virulent reaction that generated 25,000 signatures to force a wheel tax vote is a warning that should be heeded.

We need to be careful to distinguish between what we absolutely need to keep downtown growing (parking, movies, new businesses, more jobs, new housing units) and the things that would be nice to have.

It will take a year or two for the city to get the federal funds and build the bus transfer center on State Street. Even getting those funds is not a sure thing. It is premature to be talking about building a library on top of it. Things can change dramatically in a year or two (ask Ragsdale).

The hornets are stirred up. They are out of the nest. Put down the stick and sit quietly. Or the indiscriminate stinging will kill everything.

Frank Cagle is a political analyst and the host of Sound Off on WIVK FM107.7, WNOX AM990, FM99.1 and FM99.3 each Sunday 8-9:30 a.m.

August 19, 2004 • Vol. 14, No. 34 © 2004 Metro Pulse