Comment on this story Seven Days Wednesday, Aug. 18 •A blackout afflicts portions of the University of Tennessee campus, including the Andy Holt Tower where the college administration is housed. Students say the power outage didn’t make much difference since UT administrators are in the dark most of the time anyway. Thursday, Aug. 19 •UT officials say they are “happy” to hear that the university is ranked among the top 50 best public universities. The UT brass would be even happier if there were any merch bucks to be had from selling orange T-shirts that read “We’re #42!” Friday, Aug. 20 •Federal education officials deem it unreasonable that Knox County has given parents of children at under-performing local schools only three days to consider a transfer for the coming year. They stress that recent federal “No Child Left Behind” legislation should not be taken as license to say, “Hurry the @#$% up!” Saturday, Aug. 21 •The News Sentinel reports that Blount County law officers arrested two men in possession of four pounds of marijuana in the parking lot of a business in Maryville. The report doesn’t say the name of the place where the pair was arrested, but the smart money is on Taco Bell. Sunday, Aug. 22 •The Sentinel reports that county commissioners will try to save the new county wheel tax from defeat in a referendum by shelving a downtown library plan, setting aside money for a new high school, and reducing the wheel tax increase from $30 to $27. That clicking noise you hear, followed by long moments of stony silence, is the sound of county voters watching a shell game, unimpressed. Monday, Aug. 23 •County commissioners vote on the aforementioned proposal (minus the tax reduction). That splattering, oozing noise you hear is the sound of a downtown library plan as it hits the killing floor. Tuesday, Aug. 24 •The Sentinel reports that UT reproductive biologist Lannett Edwards delivers a speech on cloning methodology at 6 p.m. in Oak Ridge. In other news, a press release tells us that UT biologist Lannett Edwards will give a speech on cloning at 6 p.m. in Lexington, Ky. Waitaminnit... Knoxville Found 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: According to David Atkins, “This week’s picture is the clock tower, a UT senior class gift, on the corner of Andy Holt and Volunteer on the UT campus. You can see the clock tower from the windows of one of the best departments in of the best institutions on campus: Interlibrary Services of the UT Libraries.” However, because David is a recent Knoxville Found winner, we must default this week’s prize to Kevin G. Smith, whose response was shorter but no less accurate. We’re pleased to present Kevin with a copy of A Tiger in the Bedroom: Lessons from Mother Nature’s Sex Shop. Come an’ get it... between the hours of 9:30 a.m. and 5 p.m.

Salesmanship
Looking back on the summer that the main-library project died

As affirmed in the Knox County Commission meeting on Monday, the most conspicuous casualty of the petition calling for a referendum on the wheel tax was the projected new main library.

As summer began, the planned main library was hardly even controversial. Librarians have been talking about the need for a new main library for many years, sometimes in these pages, without obvious opposition. Lawson McGhee Library’s rather impressive space problems have been blamed for shuffling some 20,000 volumes into deep storage, cramping staffers, curtailing computer classes, and, during peak hours, forcing patrons to sit on the floor. It has long been assumed that it was only a matter of time before county government would step in and build a new one.

The original estimate for a new library—$45 million—was, in per-capita expense, similar to other county libraries built in Tennessee from Nashville to Maryville. (When a proposal to combine it with the federal transit center promised to cut the price by half, making the new main library project an unusually inexpensive one for a county of Knox’s size, it seemed an even better deal.)

This past spring, those who spoke up at public meetings at the Knox County Commission concerning a new main library were overwhelmingly in favor. A public survey in January and February suggested that 84 percent of Knox Countians supported a new main library downtown. Later, a pro-library petition—not promoted, but left at various businesses—collected about 2,000 signatures. Civic organizations, from Friends of Literacy to Club LeConte, offered their approval.

And, most importantly of all—or so it seemed at the time—Knox County Commission, encouraged by heavy pro-library turnouts at commission meetings in May and June, was sold on the idea.

In June, it seemed like a done deal. But the library spent the summer disintegrating. Now, for the foreseeable future, it’s dead. The commission meeting on Monday closed its coffin.

The surprising reversal has left erstwhile library supporters wondering about the county mayor’s leadership—or “salesmanship,” as some call it—in the library issue. Some library supporters admit they’re frustrated with the Ragsdale administration, and the fact that it didn’t use its public-relations resources—the springtime pro-library petition, multiple personal and institutional endorsements, and statistics about the state of the current library—to sell the electorate directly on the concept. (The voter, reachable mainly in sound bites on the 6 o’clock news, can be a much tougher customer than even the canniest politician.)

Moxley Carmichael, the public-relations firm working with the architectural firm of Bullock Smith and the county mayor’s office to explore and promote the library project, confirms that they didn’t get any assignments to publicize and promote the library project after June, when the anti-library movement was still in its infancy.

“We made an error in that we focused on Commission,” admits Ragsdale spokesman Mike Cohen of the mayor’s attempts to point out the advantages of a new library. “The referendum took it to the voters.”

The main library was to be only a small part of the wheel tax, Cohen says. “When the issue’s higher taxes, everybody has questions about that,” he adds. “It’s a lightning rod. When one item is a bigger ticket than the others, it’s the lightning rod.

“I wouldn’t suppose we’ve done the best job,” Cohen admits. “Considering the project is now dead, I won’t say I did the best job.”

He admits he underestimated the power of petition. “We saw the library’s best chance for support was as it developed,” Cohen says, referencing Nashville’s famous main library. Former mayor, now governor, Phil Bredesen told county officials that public support for Nashville’s library was originally less than 20 percent. Now, he says, the architecturally impressive marble building enjoys support throughout Davidson County.

Knox County’s was different because here the library turned out to be linked to a petition-vulnerable new tax. Some were opposed to the library because it was linked to a new wheel tax; some were opposed to the new wheel tax because it was linked to a new main library. In the end, the anti-library movement seemed to be an alliance between mostly rural county residents who are skeptical about downtown in general and opposed to new taxes on principle, and West Knox public-school advocates. Given the timing of the library proposal at a time of acute need for a new high school in suburban West Knox County, they resented a significant expenditure on anything else.

The wheel tax may have a better chance of passing in November, just because it’s now more securely linked to school construction and no longer linked to the library project. However, pro-library advocates, who think of themselves as very large group—though admittedly a much quieter group than the anti-taxers—won’t have as strong a reason to vote for the new tax.

Knox County won’t get a new main library this year or next year. Observers doubt that Ragsdale’s administration will ever bring it up again. But the petitions and subsequent reapportionments haven’t alleviated the need for one.

—Jack Neely

Boomsday Stays Dry
Sponsor attempts to boost event’s viability

The Aug. 17 Knoxville City Council/beer board sessions saw the Journal Broadcasting Group denied a beer permit for this year’s Star 102.1 Boomsday downtown fireworks display, of which they are the primary sponsor. But Journal officials say the denial won’t deter their efforts to make the annual event more profitable for JBC, as well as livelier for those who attend it.

“I think [the Boomsday event] is ready for a look-over,” said Chris Protzman, vice-president of Journal’s Knoxville operations. “We’re ready to sit down and try to build a better mousetrap.”

JBC had proposed cordoning off a 9,000-square-foot “beer garden” this year on the westbound lane of Neyland Drive, which will be closed for the evening of the festivities. Their proposal provided for employing the same security outfit responsible for policing Knoxville’s Sundown in the City outdoor concert series, and called for careful ID checks as well as restrictions of two beer tickets per person.

Protzman was politic about the council’s decision to deny a beer permit: “We have a great partnership with the city, and I certainly respect their decision,” he said. Others were less kind in assessing the council’s actions.

In a separate vote, council granted Calhoun’s on the River permission to sell beer in an outside “patio zone” extended specifically for Boomsday (The Journal request was defeated 8 to 1, while the Calhoun’s extension was approved 6 to 3.) Councilman Joe Bailey, who voted against both proposals, said the decision to grant Calhoun’s a de facto monopoly on beer sales that evening was hypocritical.

According to Councilman Rob Frost, the Knoxville Police Department’s “level of comfort” with the respective proposals was the factor that moved him to vote for one and not the other. Frost introduced KPD Capt. Gale Catlett at the beer board meeting, who expressed objections to several elements of Journal’s plan.

“KPD said they would have a hard time managing a beer garden of that size,” Frost said. “They’re the ones who have to respond when there’s any kind of problem. I can’t substitute my own judgment for their professional judgment.”

KPD spokesman Darrel DeBusk reiterated later that the department was uneasy about the size and location of the proposed JBC beer garden, but much less so with regard to the smaller Calhoun’s extension. JBC had sold beer on two prior Boomsdays in 1999 and 2002, allegedly without incident, but DeBusk said he didn’t have any KPD statistics pertaining to those instances.

Protzman said he met with KPD representatives on several occasions leading up to the beer board vote in hopes of gaining approval for the JBC beer garden and submitted a final plan drastically reduced in scope over his original proposal.

“They said it was a better plan, an improved plan, but they didn’t go so far as to endorse it,” Protzman said. “KPD has been consistent in saying they oppose any alcohol at these events, and we have to respect their judgment.”

What’s important to Journal Broadcasting now, said Protzman, is finding a way to make the one-night fireworks festival they’ve sponsored for 17 years running more financially viable. Protzman said the cost of putting on Star 102.1 Boomsday with its massive pyrotechnic exhibition is “well into six figures,” adding that Journal has lost money on the event on several occasions.

“I think the [failure of the beer permit] was partially our fault because we didn’t do a good job of showing the cost of this, and how much of that cost is borne primarily by Journal,” Protzman said. “We have underwritten Star 102.1 Boomsday at a loss for a few of those years, and this will probably be one of them.”

To keep Boomsday both vital and viable, Protzman hopes to bring in additional sponsors, and possibly introduce new elements to the Labor Day celebration, including the possibility of extending the festivities throughout the weekend. And don’t be surprised if the question of beer sales arises again next year.

“Never say never,” Protzman says. “I think our logic and our plan [for having beer sales] were pretty sound. It’s something we’d still like to talk about further.”

—Mike Gibson

August 26, 2004 • Vol. 14, No. 35 © 2004 Metro Pulse