economic development Archives - Page 6 of 6 - Tennessee Coalition for Open Government

17 Jul, 2014

Read judge’s order in Open Meetings case against Chattanooga Industrial Development Board

By Deborah Fisher|2019-09-11T18:50:08-05:00July 17, 2014|Categories: economic development, Open Meetings, open meetings lawsuits|Tags: Chancellor Frank Brown, Chattanooga, economic development records, Helen Burns Sharp, John Konvalinka, open meetings violation|1 Comment

Helen Burns Sharp, whose career included working as a community planner for state and municipal government, spent $50,000 of her retirement savings to bring a lawsuit against the Chattanooga Industrial Development Board in 2013. She alleged that the board approved tax-increment financing for a Black Creek Mountain golf course community. In the deal, the developers got $9 million from industrial board-issued bonds to build road and sewer up a mountain to the community. And property taxes from all the expensive homes built there would be used to pay them off. She didn't think that was right -- that TIF funds are not supposed to be used for such projects -- and [...]

17 Jul, 2014

Chattanooga judge voids $9 million deal on Open Meetings violation

By Deborah Fisher|2015-08-18T07:40:48-05:00July 17, 2014|Categories: economic development, Open Meetings, open meetings lawsuits|Tags: Chancellor Frank Brown, Chattanooga, economic development records, Helen Burns Sharp, John Konvalinka, litigation, open meetings violation, Times Free Press|0 Comments

A citizen spent $50,000 of her own money to bring a lawsuit against Chattanooga's industrial development board, and won. Hamilton County Chancellor Frank Brown says the board violated the Tennessee Open Meetings Act when it approved a $9 million deal for developers of a golf course community. The judge's ruling voids the deal. This is the second lawsuit that we've shared on TCOG's blog in recent days on citizen lawsuits involving economic development, alleging violations of the Sunshine Law and operating in secrecy. Citizens in Greene County allege Open Meetings violations in bringing to town a company that wants to make liquid ammonium nitrate used in industrial explosives. Read the Times Free [...]

14 Jul, 2014

Lawsuit probes secrecy in economic development

By Deborah Fisher|2015-02-26T05:06:58-06:00July 14, 2014|Categories: economic development, public records lawsuits Tennessee|Tags: economic development records, Greene County, Herbert Moncier, litigation, open meetings violation|0 Comments

By Deborah Fisher Executive Director of Tennessee Coalition for Open Government When government officials get into the business of economic development, they usually face the choice between transparency and secrecy. Too often, they choose secrecy. And sometimes the law allows it. At the state level, specific exemptions to the Tennessee Public Records Act give the state’s Department of Economic and Community Development broad latitude to keep confidential who they are talking with and incentives they are offering. Only after a deal is done, and the state has signed on the dotted line about how much money it has agreed to give a company in exchange for jobs, can the public [...]

1 Apr, 2014

Exemptions generous when it comes to economic development records

By Deborah Fisher|2014-04-10T11:27:50-05:00April 1, 2014|Categories: economic development|Tags: ECD, economic development records, newschannel5, Open Records Act exemptions|0 Comments

A few months ago, we reported here in a post about public records that the governor's office had denied state Rep. Mike Turner, D-Nashville, access to economic development records, citing two laws as the basis for protecting the information from public disclosure. Last night, those documents, leaked to NewsChannel 5's Phil Williams, became the basis of a story about the Haslam administration's effort to tie incentives to the outcome of work council discussions with Volkswagen over its plant in Chattanooga. The state's offer of about $300 million in incentives "subject to works council discussions between the State of Tennessee and VW being concluded to the satisfaction of the State of Tennessee" [...]

4 Feb, 2014

Tennessee Tower story exposes deal secret under records law

By Deborah Fisher|2019-09-11T16:13:42-05:00February 4, 2014|Categories: economic development, exemptions|Tags: ECD, economic development records, NewsChannel 5, Open Records Act exemptions|0 Comments

Phil Williams, chief investigative reporter for NewsChannel 5, uncovered confidential state documents that outline an economic development proposal to give Tennessee Tower to the Sears Corporation if it moved its headquarters to Nashville. The state told Williams that the Tennessee Tower "never really got serious consideration and that the governor never delivered those words drafted for him by his economic development team" for a video presentation. But they wouldn't let him see the video Haslam did record. Following is an excerpt from the script obtained by Williams. You can go to the story on NewsChannel5 and read the whole thing: "We're so committed to making your new home in Tennessee [...]