Memphis City Council appointment stalemate to continue into next week
The Memphis City Council stalemate over a District 1 appointment will last through the weekend, extending an already weeks-long deadlock over who should serve out the remainder of former District 1 councilman Bill Morrison’s term.
Council Chairman Berlin Boyd, who was appointed to the council himself, said he has a message for the candidates vying for one of the council’s three current vacancies: Be knowledgeable about city business and issues.
“When I was seeking this position, if you asked me how many police officers we had, if you asked me how much our city budget was, guess what? I could answer it,” Boyd said Friday. “If you asked me about the various budgets, what’s on our MLGW bill, where do those various funds go, guess what? I could answer it. If you ask any of these candidates that applied for any of these positions thus far anything about city government thus far, they can’t answer it. But they expect us to support them.”
Boyd set another meeting for 10 a.m. Tuesday, after the council was left without a quorum four days in a row and unable to vote on the Memphis Light, Gas and Water budget, grant funds for police equipment and zoning cases, among other things. Boyd voiced confidence on Friday that the council will be able to move forward with city business on Tuesday
“I will tell you this, where there’s a will, there’s a way,” Boyd said, when asked what will happen if a quorum of members is not present, as there wasn’t in four consecutive attempts this week. “Stay tuned.” “We’re doing research at this moment,” Boyd added. A Nov. 20 City Council meeting featured more than 100 votes on the issue and dragged into the early morning hours of the following day, with no candidate able to draw the necessary seven votes. Lonnie Treadaway and Rhonda Logan emerged as the front-runners in a candidate pool of six that night.
The discord intensified this week, when the four candidates who support Logan walked out of Tuesday’s regular city council meeting after yet another District 1 appointment vote. Their departure left the 13member council, which now has three vacancies, without a quorum and unable to vote on the appointment or any of the other nearly 60 items on its agenda.
Boyd on Friday backed away from suggestions earlier this week about filing a lawsuit in Chancery Court, in an effort to “compel” the absent members to attend meetings.
“I’m hoping we can figure this out without having to go that far,” Boyd said. “That’s my goal.”
Treadaway dropped out of the running on Wednesday, but that didn’t necessarily cut a clear path for Logan to the seat. Some council members have called for a “consensus candidate,” that a larger number of sitting council members would support.
The four council members who are supporting Logan, all of whom are African-Americans, have raised “proportionate representation” on the council, for the city with a population that’s nearly 65 percent black.
An attempt on Thursday to achieve a quorum and work through the untouched Tuesday agenda fell far short of the needed seven members. Boyd said there have been efforts to reach out to the four council members who walked out on Tuesday, including through City Council Attorney Allan Wade.
“We have been communicating in various ways to try to find out if they’re willing to come back and find out exactly the status of how long this will continue,” Boyd said.
The council’s final regular meeting of the year is scheduled for Dec. 18, where it is also slated to choose successors for Edmund Ford Jr. and Janis Fullilove, who were elected to Shelby County posts in August and resigned their City Council seats last month.
“I think that our process has not failed us at this moment,” Boyd said. “I hope there’s isn’t a divide on the appointments of these next two positions we have. I hope we can find a candidate that can come up and serve and that has knowledge about what we’re doing.”
Jamie Munks covers Memphis city government and politics for The Commercial Appeal. She can be reached at jamie.munks@commercialappeal.com or 901-529-2536. Follow her on Twitter @journo_jamie_.