Crime Rate Calls for Broader, Well-Funded Reponses
When it comes to crime prevention, we behave an awful lot like we do when it comes to economic development. It’s largely one trick pony with too little attention to solving the...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 22, 2014 | City of Memphis Government, Criminal Justice
When it comes to crime prevention, we behave an awful lot like we do when it comes to economic development. It’s largely one trick pony with too little attention to solving the...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 19, 2014 | Trends and Issues
For a couple of years, we were posting articles, columns, and studies in addition to our own posts. After getting several emails about information overload, we changed things three months ago. We began to primarily post the...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 17, 2014 | Poverty
The young man – African American, 23 years old – sat at a picnic table behind a Germantown assisted living facility with his head in his hands. He was exhausted and lost. He is working...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 15, 2014 | Trends and Issues
There’s the regularly heard comment that nobody wants to move here and the only movement is from people moving out. Like most things these days, it’s not that simple. The truth is much...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 12, 2014 | Poverty, Talent
This was previously posted as this week’s Perceptions article by The Urban Child Institute: In the wake of 20 teenagers’ attack on three people outside an East Memphis grocery store, we heard the questions we hear often...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 10, 2014 | Livability, Neighborhoods, Talent, Trends and Issues
Some of the best-known chapters in Memphis’ history are about creative young people and their seemingly improbable dreams. They include the 16-year-old who borrowed $125 from his father to buy a horse and wagon to sell homemade...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 8, 2014 | Downtown Revitalization
Photo by Carol Coletta It’s hard to improve on Memphis’s most singular photo op and the lure of its first great place: the riverfront. But Beale Street Landing does...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 4, 2014 | Economic Development, Poverty
Discussions here about the living wage sometimes are treated like a dry, abstract subject debated by economists without it being connected to real people and real economic growth....
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Sep 2, 2014 | Regionalism, Trends and Issues
Suburban conventional wisdom about Memphis is that it is full of poor people, but the times, they are a-changin’. It’s the suburbs’ poverty rates that produce headlines like, “Memphis #1...
Read MorePosted by Smart City Memphis | Aug 27, 2014 | Uncategorized
Previously posted March 8, 2012: It seems like a good time to swear off the Memphis-Detroit comparisons once and for all. They are a staple of online comments and the ultimate self-loathing putdowns. Although Memphis has always...
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 solves 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.