Shelby waives school rules
Out-of-county employees OK
Out-of-county employees with Memphis City Schools will not have to move once the merger of MCS and Shelby County schools is finalized.
The Shelby County Commission, in an 8-5 vote Monday, approved an ordinance on third and final reading that waives the county’s residency requirements for the more than 1,400 MCS employees who do not live in the county.
The waiver applies only to those employees. New hires and current employees who live inside the county now must comply with the residency rule.
However, an ordinance that would have placed on the 2014 ballot a referendum to amend the county charter and remove the residency requirement failed to gain the nine votes needed for passage.
“We’re extremely thankful that the government process played out in a common-sense manner,” said Brian Davis, a teacher at Whitehaven High School and a resident of DeSoto County. “I love where I’m at.”
City schools did not have residency rules, and 1,413 of its nearly 17,000 employees live outside of the county. Voters in Shelby County approved a residency requirement for county government workers in 1984 that went into effect on Sept. 1, 1986.
Until the ordinance’s third reading on March 18, commissioners had supported a compromise that provided five years to comply with the charter.
However, Commissioner Steve Basar, a resident of East Memphis, switched his position and amended the ordinance so that the rules were waived, pushing the final vote to Monday.
Commissioner Terry Roland, the original ordinance sponsor, withdrew on Monday, saying it had been “turned around.”
“This board is saying, ‘I’m going to let certain people be exempt and make other employees fall under another policy,’ ” Roland said. “To me, that’s hypocritical.”
Voting in favor of the waived residency rules were commissioners Basar, Henri Brooks, Melvin Burgess, Sidney Chism, Justin Ford, James Harvey, Steve Mulroy and Mike Ritz.
Voting no were commissioners Walter Bailey, Wyatt Bunker, Chris Thomas, Heidi Shafer and Roland.
Roland promised that allies in the Tennessee Legislature would get a statewide ban on residency requirements passed.