Cities of Service is a bipartisan coalition of mayors from across the country, representing more than 38 million Americans in 80 cities, dedicated to engaging more Americans in service and channeling volunteers toward each city’s most pressing challenges.

Each of the winners displayed a strong commitment to service and outlined thoughtful, thorough, and creative approaches to expanding local opportunities for volunteers to make an impact in their city. Of the ten grant recipients, five are founding members of the Cities of Service coalition, including Nashville.

“I first learned of this funding opportunity when I joined Mayor Bloomberg in New York in September for the formation of Cities of Service. These are tight times for city budgets. This grant will allow us to have dedicated staff for developing service opportunities, something we wouldn’t have been able to do otherwise. I look forward to engaging our citizens to in our cities greatest needs and priorities, especially education,” Nashville Mayor Karl Dean said.

Have questions about Cities of Service – or maybe there’s something else on your mind? Mayor Dean will be available today at 1 p.m. at the art service project at the Nashville Rescue Mission.

Mayor Karl Dean on Liberadio(!), Monday, 5/18/09:
Download audio file (karl-dean-on-metro-general.mp3)

In March of this year, Reverend Henry Blaze of Progressive Baptist Church, Reverend Judi Hoffman of Edgehill United Methodist Church, Bishop Jerry Maynard of Cathedral of Praise, Rev. Jay Vorhees of Antioch United Methodist, and Councilman Rev. Jerry Maynard (along with the support of more than 50 other Nashville clergy) gathered at Watson Grove Baptist Church to address the looming financial crisis that threatens the hospital. Below are their remarks.

Bishop Jerry Maynard, pastor of Cathedral of Praise, on the moral implications of not supporting Metro General:
Download audio file (bishop-jerry-maynard-metro-general.mp3)

Councilman Rev. Jerry Maynard on the moral and spiritual obligation we have as a city to offer the services provided by Metro General:
Download audio file (councilman-jerry-maynard-metro-general.mp3)

Rev. Judi Hoffman, pastor of Edgehill United Methodist Church, on the importance of Metro General to Meharry Medical College:
Download audio file (rev-judi-hoffman-metro-general.mp3)

Rev. Jay Vorhees, pastor of the Antioch United Methodist Church, relates Metro General to the English Only fight and the hospitality of the city:
Download audio file (rev-jay-vorhees-metro-general.mp3)

Today’s rally for Metro General begins at 4:30 PM, immediately before the budget hearings begin, on the steps of the Metro Courthouse. The purpose is to show support for the hospital by speaking out against cuts to services, speaking for debt forgiveness, and to “help our lawmakers see that this is an issue of importance for all Nashvillians.”

Just Say 'Nyerhe!' to Bill Hobbs.

World Wildlife Fund is asking individuals, businesses, governments and organizations around the world to turn off their lights for one hour – Earth Hour – on Saturday, March 28, 8:30 PM, to make a global statement of concern about climate change and to demonstrate commitment to finding solutions.

When we had Lee Poston, Director of Conservation and Science Communications at WWF, on the show on Monday, we asked him how he dealt with the people who would rather poke fun at the idea of Earth Hour, i.e. the “We’re gonna re-light the Christmas lights and turn up the oven full blast after running the dishwasher empty” crowd. Lee, who is fond of taking the high-road, said he sees it as an opportunity to have a conversation. (We say, just slap a corset on it!)

Download audio file (liberadio20090323part6leeposton.mp3)

This year, Nashville is a key Earth Hour city and Mayor Karl Dean, along with other community leaders, businesses, music industry professionals, and schools, are banding together us to turn off our lights for one hour and have that conversation.

So, tomorrow night, Mayor Dean will be joined by World Wildlife Fund officials, Nashville Earth Hour 2009 celebrity spokeswoman and award-winning, multi-platinum recording artist Jo Dee Messina, and other Nashville leaders to officially turn off the lights in Nashville!

What: Mayor Dean’s lights-out event, including live performance by Jo Dee Messina (Free and open to the public)

When: Saturday, March 28
7:30 p.m. – Lights-out event begins
8:29 p.m. – Mayor Dean and Jo Dee Messina count down to Earth Hour
8:30 p.m. – Official “switch-off”

Where: Sommet Center Plaza, corner of Broadway and Fifth Avenue North

Plenty o’ other stuff happening tomorrow as well.

Some of the city’s most recognizable structures and businesses will go dark, including The Parthenon, Schermerhorn Symphony Center, Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, AT&T Building, L&C Tower, State Capitol, Union Station Hotel, All Ingram companies (U.S., Canada, and the U.K.), Metro Courthouse, The CMT billboard at the West End/Broadway split, Caterpillar Financial Center, Nashville Songwriters Association International, CMT, Loveless Café, LP Field, Bluebird Café, Adventure Science Center, Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge.

It’ll also be lights out on historic Lower Broadway and Second Avenue for both the honky and the tonky: Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, Wildhorse Saloon, Hard Rock Café, The Stage on Broadway, Jack’s Bar-B-Que, Legends Corner, Robert’s Western World, Ernest Tubb Record Shop, Layla’s Bluegrass Inn.

Universities, schools and churches across will also flip the switch: Vanderbilt University, Belmont University, Lipscomb University, Nashville State Community College, Nossi College of Art, Croft Middle Design Center, Bellevue Middle School, Inglewood Elementary School, J.T. Moore Middle School, The Harpeth Hall School, Montgomery Bell Academy, University School of Nashville, First Baptist Nashville, Holy Trinity Community Church, Cathedral of the Incarnation.

Follow Earth Hour US on the Twitter.

See you somewhere in the dark…BOO!

Last Saturday, a public meeting was called to discuss what everyone except the Mayor’s office believed to be a done deal – the redevelopment of Nashville’s waterfront. 48-hours before the meeting, Councilman Mike Jameson (The Fightin’ 6th!) received what MDHA and the Mayor’s office called “Plan B” for riverfront development. The new plan included everything in Phase 1 of the original plan except for the adventure park. Construction was to start on the east bank, as was originally scheduled, before shovels broke any ground on the downtown side.

But the “Plan B” presented at last Saturday’s meeting wasn’t the original “Plan B.” The original “Plan B” was given to Councilman Jameson by Ed Owens, MDHA’s riverfront development director, and Phil Ryan, MDHA’s Executive Director, on January 30 at a Nashville coffee house. This new plan did away with everything in Phase 1 that was most important to the East Nashville community – including the adventure park and the urban forest – and instead included every project for the downtown side. In other words, the downtown side of the re-development became the priority in Phase 1, with ground breaking there first. What remained in the plan for the east side were two lesser projects – call them callous afterthoughts or insufficient appeasement.

During the Jameson, Owens, Ryan coffee klatch, the Councilman was asked to keep the original “Plan B” to himself. His push back was palpable – an open process is an open process with time for review of any and all new plans in addition to appropriately scheduled public meetings.

More than one month and one false start later (the original public meeting was to be held on 2/19 at 5:30 PM at the Civic Design Center downtown), MDHA called the public meeting that was held last Saturday. Missing from the meeting? The original “Plan B,” which had been replaced a mere 48-hours earlier with “Plan C Disguised as Plan B.”

So it’s no big whoop, right? “Plan C Disguised as Plan B” simply moves adventure park and urban forest to the end of the list. But is is a big whoop, according to Councilman Mike Jameson, who was quoted on the Protect the Riverfront Plan blog:

Just 48 hours before the meeting, I received a new plan (the third version received in just 4 weeks) from MDHA. In a nutshell, in order to convince us NOT to ask for the Adventure Park & Pilot Urban Forest anymore, MDHA was now offering to construct every OTHER project on the East bank, and to do so first. (Those other projects are a Cove, an overlook with lawn, an esplanade, and improvements to the Woodland bridge). In the second year, MDHA would construct downtown-side projects. And then in the third year, curiously, MDHA claimed they would proceed with the Adventure Park & Pilot Urban Forest.

Protect the Riverfront Plan has more detail on the “blazing problems “and non-vialibity of the sequence of “Plan C Disguised as Plan B”:

1. The New Plan (let’s call it, “The Bright Shiny Plan” or BS Plan for short) promises to build all the East Bank projects except the Adventure Park and Pilot Urban Forest first. “See?” MDHA seems to be saying, “We’re building on the east side!” But NONE of those projects can be built, at least not the way they’re designed, WITHOUT the Adventure Park and Urban Forest. For example, the cove and esplanade must follow construction of the urban forest because the irrigation drip, water run-off, and foliage have to be coordinated. So, unless you’re not planning to ever do the Adventure Park, you better do it first or you’re going to have to undo all those other projects when you build it.

2. The BS Plan promises to build the Adventure Park in Year 3. “See?” MDHA seems to be saying, “It’s no big deal. You’ll get the Adventure Park. Just three years from now.” But NONE of the other projects that they’ve proposed to build first can be done without approval and permitting from the Corps of Engineers. The other folks who spoke on Saturday discussed four year long waits for those permits. Remember, the design firm prioritized the Adventure Park in part because we could build it while Metro was getting the permits for the other projects. And, when they are building over there [on the downtown side]…we’ll lose a public venue for exactly those downtown activities unless we already have the alternate staging area of the Adventure Park. In other words, have your downtown events at Riverfront while you build the Adventure Park. Have your downtown events at the Adventure Park while you rebuild Riverfront Park. OR, as MHDA recommends, have no events at all while you’re rebuilding Riverfront Park. Again, unless you’re not planning to ever do the Adventure Park, it makes no sense to delay the entire development and decrease the usability of downtown by not doing it first.

3. The BS Plan counters the recommendations of the Green Ribbon Committee and flies in the face of the Mayor’s repeated goal of making Nashville the “greenest city” in the South. There is one site – ONLY ONE – that would restore green space to land that is currently contaminated brown field. If we’re serious about addressing the contaminated areas of the riverfront (as the urgency of our storm-water plan and repeated pressers from the Mayor’s office suggest that we are), we need to address the brownfield.

4. Oh, wait, it’s about the money, right? Apparently not. The cost for the Adventure Park is comparable to the cost MDHA is perfectly happy to spend on other parts of the development. If it’s really about the economy, shouldn’t we start with the feature most likely to bring money downtown? Guess what? That’s one more reason the design firm prioritized the Adventure Park. It brings new visitors (with new money) into town. It gives tourists something to do with their families downtown. It gives (ahem) conventioneers someplace for their children to hang out while they’re at conventions. You start with the project that’s going to bring people to the development. You don’t put it on the backburner, unless you don’t intend to build it at all.

And speaking of money, although MDHA can promise all day long that they’re going to eventually install the features of the original plan, there is no money guaranteed after year two. Which means putting a project into Year Three is the same as putting it on the shelf for.ev.er….The only way this sequence makes sense is if the Mayor doesn’t intend to ever put in the Adventure Park. And given that he’s referring to the sequence designed over 16 months with the input of a thousand Nashvillians and a half-million of our tax dollars as “a kiddie park,” that’s exactly what his intent seems to be.

So, it’s not the economy. It’s not the environment. It’s not the tourism industry. It’s not the funding. It’s not the public will. What is driving this alternative plan?

Good questions all. And here’s another – where are the consultants?

Consultants are paid a lot of money – in the case of this riverfront redevelopment plan, upwards of $450,000 – to come up with innovative ideas on improving vastly underutilized and/or contaminated public lands. Hargreaves Associates, the company hired to develop Nashville’s riverfront redevelopment project, was charged with the task of establishing a plan that included a well-thought out sequencing of projects. A project sequence cannot solely be based on what a city might want to build first. Instead, it must take into consideration other specifics like cost and environmental impact. And when changes to a plan are considered, a consultant is usually the first person called to reevaluate the sequence, keeping in mind both the environmental impact and the potential for an increase in expense.

So it is surprising that, according to Councilman Jameson, Hargreaves’ Gavin McMillan, the lead project designer, has still not heard from anyone in the Mayor’s office or MDHA with a request to go back and look at the re-sequenced projects in either “Plan B” or “Plan C Disguised as Plan B,” to re-evaluate both the cost and the environmental impact. Contacting your consultant to reevaluate would seem particularly prudent if you are concerned with a budget and costs spiraling out during the construction process.

Both the “Plan A” and “Plan C Disguised as Plan B” can be found at Nashville.gov.

Also at Nashville.gov is an online Downtown Waterfront Redevelopment Feedback form. Or call MDHA at (615) 252-8400 or the Mayor’s office at (615) 862-6000.

Today, African-American leaders, community organizers, and public officials including Rep. Brenda Gilmore, Councillady Erica Gilmore, and Councilman at large Jerry Maynard, held a press conference in front of the Howard School to encourage votes of “Against/Against.” The coalition standing with them included representatives from the Nashville branch of the NAACP; the Urban EpiCenter; the Urban League of Middle Tennessee; the Interdenominational Ministers Fellowship (IMF); the Tennessee Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC); the Nashville Movement; the Tennessee Alliance for Progress (TAP); Jobs with Justice (JwJ); and the National Organization for Women (NOW).

The remarks focused on the social, economic, spiritual and moral impact of the referendum as well as the myth that most African-Americans were for the referendum. Although no statistics were cited, Councilman Maynard did explain that a lingering resentment over a lack of coalition building in response to school rezoning, the operation of Metro General Hospital, and juvenile crime statistics could be responsible for fueling pro-English Only sentiment in the African-American community. Maynard’s answer to such resentment is to cite the potential negative impact of the English Only referendum on the city and offer the tried and true adage of “two wrongs don’t make a right.”

The Mayor, the Governor, respected community leaders of all kinds. The coalition against the referendum is impressive. The list on the NashvilleForAllofUs.org website even includes the strange bedfellows of the Chamber of Commerce and the ACLU.

And who’s for the referendum? Well, there’s no list of Nashville-based groups or community leaders on the English Only website so one would have to assume that their coalition consists of Councilman Crafton, Svengali Jon Crisp, ProEnglish (the Virginia-based group helping to fund Crafton’s referendum that was designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center because of it’s affiliation with John Tanton’s U.S. Inc.), and one not-so-friendly neighborhood truth-stretching talk radio host who, despite knowing that not all non-citizens who come to this country are sources of cheap labor (they are students, executives of international corporations, scientists, etc.) nor are they all seeking citizenship, wrote in the Tennessean last week:

It’s an undisputed fact that people who don’t have a working knowledge of English are either non-citizens or are illegal immigrants. How do I know? Because you are required by law to speak, write and understand English to become a U.S. citizen. Opposition to this measure, disguised as a pro-diversity coalition, is all about one thing: keeping a steady flow of cheap, illegal labor streaming into Nashville.

Oh, Teddy Roosevelt is with them too. Happy New Year 1919!

*No, she doesn’t.

• Part 1 – It’s the day before April Fool’s and we’re just getting warmed up, apparently. China’s just getting warmed up too. Do you think they going to outsource the manufacture of Zawa t-shirts, pencil sharpeners, and key chains? Plus, John McCain takes over The Onion’s Weekly Radio Address. Good cheese.
• Part 2 – Interview with Nashville Mayor Karl Dean to discuss the budget, public schools, public transportation, Nashville’s homeless population, and, despite Freddie’s protestations, who he voted for in the presidential primary. We’ll get to the Red Sox next interview.
• Part 3 – Oh my god! They did boo President Bush at the brand new LEED-certified Nationals Park! If we were there, we wouldn’t have booed. Or would we….? BWA…ha…ha…Haaaah!
• Part 4 – Our very own Congressman Cooper (D-The Fightin’ 5th!) signs on to a promise to change Congress from within. You go, Coop! (He lets us call him that. OK, no he doesn’t).
• Part 5 – Interview with Dodd Galbreath, Executive Director of Lipscomb University’s Institute for Sustainable Practice. What would Jesus Pollute? Not much, Dodd will tell you. Not much at all.
• Part 6 – We give an Elbert Ventura-less Media Matters Smackdown to Chris Matthews, Brian Williams, and Charlie Gibson (We miss you, Elbert!) – and our callers jump right in. Plus our Danish FOL*, Caspar, wonders what the heck we’re doing over here about climate change.

*Friend of Liberadio(!)

(For the record, I have no editorial role at SouthComm Communications, owners and publishers of NashvillePost.com.)

Update: A Friend of Liberadio(!) asks: Is he nudging Bredesen?

Update, Part Deux: Another FoL(!) suggests that maybe Dean isn’t as political as all that, and he might’ve been answering just as Joe Voter, which would be a refreshing amount of citizen candor to have witnessed for this particular political junkie.

Update the Third: Honestly, I’m glad he told us. I figured it would be a somewhat big deal, and it’s an indicator of judgment, but I think being comfortable speaking publicly about your political ideas and ideology is important. I prefer politicians who don’t try to hide everything behind doublespeak and hedging. And, as an Obama supporter, I’m pleased.

Interview with Mayor Karl Dean – The One Where He Tells us Who He Voted For