State Senate Moves Forward With Bills Aimed at Nashville Governance

Several bills that have been flagged as attacks on Nashville passed through the Senate State and Local Government committee Wednesday. 

Adhering to a common pattern this legislative season, these bills from the Republican supermajority each take aim at different Nashville government boards, either appropriating power for the state or disbanding the bodies altogether. All are now on their way to the Senate floor. 

Senate Bill 591 would abolish community oversight boards and replace them with police advisory and review committees. Nashvillians in 2018 voted to establish a COB in Nashville, designed to respond to and investigate citizen complaints against police officers for excessive use of force. These new committees would serve a similar function to COBs but would be constituted differently. 

Nashville’s COB is currently made up of 11 members, seven of whom were community-nominated. Under the new bill, a seven-member board would be selected by the mayor and approved by the Metro Council, and would be further limited in its investigative power, primarily existing to offer recommendations. Sen. Mark Pody (R-Lebanon), the legislation’s sponsor, said during committee it will promote uniformity across the state, which he argues will make for more effective oversight. 

“It worries me to come in on top and change what has been going on in all these different places,” said Sen. Jeff Yarbro (D-Nashville) during committee. He argues that these bodies have been established through the work of citizens and local officials, and that the state should not interfere. “It gives me a great deal of pause to intervene where we already have organizations that are operational.” 

The bill models the restructured COBs after the one currently operating in Knoxville, which advocates say will allow inquiries to be streamlined without interfering with investigations by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and other entities. 

But Jill Fitcheard, executive director of Metro Nashville Community Oversight, testified that the new boards would not be as effective as the one currently in place. 

“Our department is unique from other oversight boards in the state because not only do we investigate individual complaints, we also research policy and have made 27 recommendations to [the Metro Nashville Police Department], 22 of which have been implemented,” Fitcheard said. 

The bill passed the committee 7-2. The House iteration will be heard in the Criminal Justice Subcommittee on Tuesday. 

On the same theme, Senate Bill 1335 by Sen. Paul Bailey (R-Sparta) aims to reconstitute the Metropolitan Sports Authority Board, which is responsible for overseeing facilities such as Nissan Stadium. The 13 members of the board are currently chosen by the mayor, but under this proposed legislation, seven would be chosen by the mayor and six chosen by the state — two by each chamber's speaker and two by the governor. 

“This is another evasion of the principle of home rule,” testified Bill Bradley, former budget director for the state. “There are, I believe, five of these sports authorities in the state. This one is being singled out.” 

Two lawsuits have now been filed against the state over another piece of legislation that critics say violates the Home Rule Amendment of the Tennessee Constitution, which outlaws legislation targeting a single community. That bill, which has already been signed into law, caps the Metro Council, currently composed of 40 members, at 20 members.  

Pody, whose district now includes a portion of Davidson County, joined the two Democratic members of the committee in opposition to reconstituting the sports authority. 

“I’m telling you right now, I was never even consulted about this,” he said. “I'm asking y'all to let me represent Davidson County and either put this to summer study or vote no on this.”

He also suggested that Mayor John Cooper and the Metro Council stop “picking a fight” with the state.

Bailey argued that because the state puts some funding toward Nashville’s sports facilities, it should have a say in how they are run. Similar authority boards in other cities would not be affected by this bill. 

The bill passed on a 6-3 margin. In the House, it’s on its way to the Government Operations Committee, though a hearing has not been scheduled. 

Another bill, which made headlines earlier in the session for aiming to cut the Music City Center’s funding structure, passed through the committee with an amendment. Senate Bill 648 as amended would no longer cut the funding used to pay off millions of dollars in bonds used to pay for the convention center but would instead block Metro from putting any extra revenue from those taxes into the general fund. 

The bill would appoint state officers to the Convention Center Authority, giving the state oversight in what any overflow funds are spent on. 

Again, Yarbo spoke out against the bill, calling it government overreach, but his complaints fell on deaf ears. The legislation passed 7-2 and is on its way to the Senate floor. The House version of the bill awaits assignment to the Finance, Ways and Means Subcommittee’s calendar. 

A second bill from Bailey was originally seen as an attack on Nashville but has since been expanded to cover the entire state. Senate Bill 1327 would prohibit beer boards from imposing fines or penalties on an establishment based on another agency's findings. The bill instead puts regulatory oversight in the hands of the state Alcohol and Beverage Commission. As originally filed, the legislation would have turned Metro oversight of Lower Broadway bars over to state regulators. 

Following the amendment to make the bill apply statewide, the legislation passed through the committee unanimously. It was placed behind the budget in the House, meaning the body will not consider the legislation further until an annual spending plan is passed, potentially dooming the bill for now.  

Yet another bill from Bailey would operate similarly to the bill reconstituting the sports authority board but instead focuses on the Metro Nashville Airport Authority. Under protest from Democratic members of the Davidson County delegation, Senate Bill 1326 would change the makeup of the board to give two appointees each to the House speaker, the Senate speaker,  the governor and the mayor. Currently, the board is made up of seven members appointed by the Nashville mayor. 

The bill passed Thursday through the Senate on party lines and will be heard in the House Finance, Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday. Similar to the Sports Authority bill, the legislation only applies to Nashville despite other major cities having airport boards — again leading critics to point to the Home Rule Amendment. Notably, a lawsuit in Jackson, Miss., related to similar legislation has lasted seven years. 

Describing the ongoing battle between Metro and the state, Yarbro said it was like “getting in a fight with your wife and burning the garage down.”