Mayor Purcell Unplugged

Despite his image of being a nuts-and-bolts mayor who sees leadership in the context of managing sleepy departments, Bill Purcell is reshaping Nashville as boldly and lavishly as his deal-making predecessor and current candidate for governor, Phil Bredesen. But while Bredesen focused on high-priced items such as a stadium, arena and library, Purcell is doling out tax dollars on sidewalks and parks, quietly satisfying local voters while managing to elude even the tiniest controversies.

And yet somehow the perception lingers, shared mainly by the media, political elite and Bredesen devotees, that Purcell is just a smooth-talking, do-nothing mayor.

“People don’t see a single big item, and so sometimes they are surprised at how much is being planned and how much is being funded,” says Deputy Mayor Bill Phillips.

“But when it’s all said and done, people will look and see that a lot of improvements have been made without building a single huge edifice.”

Earlier this month, Purcell introduced a $286 million capital package, to be funded mainly by general obligation bonds, that will cover $50 million in school improvements, $20.6 for sidewalks and bikeways, $27 million for parks and many more millions for many other smaller city needs. It will not require a tax increase, although it does eat away at the city’s bonding capacity.

The Metro Council deferred the capital package this week, but barring a radical change in behavior, members probably will use that well-worn rubber stamp of theirs and give the mayor exactly what he wants. And who could blame them? Purcell is virtually guaranteed a second term. He has few outspoken detractors. And the mayor’s agenda clearly resonates with an electorate concerned with quality-of-life issues above all else.

“The mayor’s theme since he first ran for office was schools and sidewalks, and I don’t think you can find too many council members who’d disagree,” says council member Craig Jenkins, the new chairman of the body’s budget and finance committee.

Fixing dilapidated schools has been the hallmark of the Purcell administration. That may not be noticeable to people who have been trained to view only larger scale monuments as byproducts of mayoral leadership, but to any parent of a Metro school student, that kind of commitment is hard to miss. Since taking over as mayor in September 1999, the mayor has allocated $168.5 million on capital spending in the school system. (Of course, it bears mentioning that such a spending level still doesn’t approach the funding Bredesen gave to schools during his tenure.)

“Education is our top priority,” Phillips says.

Actually, when it comes to Metro schools, the mayor’s office is clearly concerned with infrastructure over policy. To his credit, Purcell, who has earned a reputation as a meddler, has given schools director Pedro Garcia the leeway to reshape the curriculum, reign in the principals and set his sights on improving test scores. In other words, he’s given Garcia what he needs and has gotten out of the way. Surprisingly to some, Purcell seems more than happy to be viewed as a part of a collaborative effort to improve the chronically underperforming school system.

“I give him high grades on education,” says Harvey Sperling, the program officer for education at the philanthropic Frist Foundation. “For Nashville to progress in that area requires the support and advocacy of the school board, the director of schools and the mayor and council. It’s obvious that Nashville has that.”

As much money as the mayor has spent on schools in his three years in office, he is still seen, in some circles, as the sidewalk mayor. To some, sidewalks may seem like an odd symbol on which to hang a legacy. But to others, sidewalks are a proxy issue for neighborhood values. They encourage people to walk rather than drive, they put more eyes out on the street and their presence makes local roads seem less like I-65.

“Just for pure safety issues, sidewalks are important,” says Michael Douglas, the president of the Dickerson Road Merchants Association.

The sheer amount of money allocated to sidewalks is staggering. From 1998 to 2000, Metro spent only $4.3 million on sidewalk construction. In the last three years, the mayor has allocated $55 million, with plans to spend an additional $20 million a year for the next 10 years.

Purcell said in his September speech that Nashville has 752 miles of sidewalks, while Indianapolis, a similar-sized city, has almost quadruple that with 2,885 miles. And the mayor said Metro inspected each and every mile of its sidewalks as a part of its master plan.

Meanwhile, there are an increasing number of urban experts who say that the best way to grow a city is to make it attractive to young people. The old model, one that Bredesen seemed to follow, involved encouraging corporations to relocate to Nashville or just remain inside the county limits by giving them generous tax incentives, emphasizing tourism and building things. That works to a degree. But Purcell deviates from that model, eschewing the recent Thrillopolis proposal, for example, and casting his nose upward about the general notion of corporate subsidies.