Challenging Demographics Make City Budgets Harder
Demographic data can say a lot about who lives in a city. It can also be an indicator of that city’s finances. Generally speaking, if a city has a high number of residents...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Oct 13, 2016 | City of Memphis Government, Poverty
Demographic data can say a lot about who lives in a city. It can also be an indicator of that city’s finances. Generally speaking, if a city has a high number of residents...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Oct 11, 2016 | Shelby County government
It is the 30th anniversary of the Shelby County Home Rule Charter, which, for three decades, has served county government well. The charter went into effect September 1, 1986, following...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Oct 6, 2016 | Civil Rights, Criminal Justice, Poverty
If you care about the children of Memphis and Shelby County, you have to care about criminal justice reform. That’s because no one pays a heavier price for longer...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Oct 3, 2016 | Criminal Justice
The Shelby County criminal justice system is calcified and stuck in time. It’s hard to draw any other conclusion when a common sense, no risk bail bond program goes...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 29, 2016 | City of Memphis Government, Civil Rights, Shelby County government
There are many special places and experiences unique to Memphis, but at the top of our list is the National Civil Rights Museum. I was present at the...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 27, 2016 | Poverty
U.S. Census data showed decreases in the poverty rate for Memphis from 29.8% in 2013 to 26.2% in 2015, a decline of 12%. Meanwhile, the child poverty...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 22, 2016 | Poverty
The conclusion of the Blueprint for Poverty summary says: “It is possible to significantly reduce poverty in Memphis. Much can be accomplished by incremental...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 21, 2016 | Poverty
With all the talk and proposals about growing the economy in the presidential campaign, they face the reality that the U.S. is in an era of slow growth, and what’s yet to...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 19, 2016 | Civil Rights, Downtown Revitalization
It was 1986 and the betting on a proposed civil rights museum in Memphis was that it would never be built. It was caught in the snare of racial...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 15, 2016 | Economic Development, Poverty
This is the mantra: there is no economic prosperity in Memphis without poverty reduction. That was the closing sentence in our last post, which was the first part of this two-part...
Read Moreby Bill Day. Memphian Bill Day is two-time winner of the RFK Journalism Award in Cartooning. His cartoons are syndicated internationally by Cagle Cartoons. Cartoons Archive →
Since 2005, this has been Smart City Consulting’s blog with the aim of connecting the dots and providing perspective on issues and policies shaping Memphis. Editor and primary author is Tom Jones, City Journal columnist at Memphis magazine, author of two books and a museum exhibition, and consultant on public policy and strategic planning. He has written articles for MLK50, The Commercial Appeal, and USA Today. The blog was called one of the most intriguing blogs in the U.S. by the Pew Partnership for Civic Change; The (Memphis) Commercial Appeal said it “provides some of the most well-thought-out thinking about Memphis’ past, present, and future you’ll find anywhere,” and the Memphis Flyer said: “This incredibly well-written blog sets out to solve the city’s ills – from the mayor to MATA – with out-of-the-box thinking, fresh approaches to old problems, and new ideas.” If you have questions, submissions, or ideas for posts, please email Tom Jones, at tjones@smartcityconsulting.com.