15 districts, five at-large
Nashville’s Planning Department has released two maps of potential new representation maps, a process brought about by new state law that could slice the size of the Metro Council in half.
17 districts, three at-large
The department used the same methods and principles that drove a 2021 redistricting process and generated the current 40-member (35 districts and five at-large members) map to create the two new initial maps, based on the state law that caps the council’s size at 20 members.
The two maps took slightly different approaches to segmenting the city, with one map consisting of 15 districts and 5 at-large members, and the other proposing 17 districts and 3 at-large members.
Metro Planning drew the maps with software that took factors such as population balance, community groups, minority representation, and district size and contiguity.
The Planning Department has scheduled five public engagement opportunities throughout the week to gauge public feedback on the maps, in advance of a three-judge panel hearing April 4 on Metro’s request to pause the new law’s implementation until after the Aug. 3 elections.
A detailed breakdown of the proposed redistricting maps can be found at redistrict.nashville.gov.
Titans select SeatGeek as official ticket partner
SeatGeek has announced an exclusive partnership with the Tennessee Titans.
The deal marks SeatGeek’s sixth NFL partnership as its official ticketing partner, starting with the 2023 season. SeatGeek’s technology also will power all concerts and other events in Nissan Stadium, excluding any events already on sale before April 1.
As part of the deal, SeatGeek’s back-end technology platform, Unify, will help the Titans and venue staff manage their sales and inventory efficiently to deliver a customized live event experience for today’s fans, with SeatGeek’s vertically integrated platform helping the team capture better economics.
Bradley honored as Tennessee Firm of the Year
Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP has been named the Benchmark Litigation 2023 USA Awards Tennessee Firm of the Year.
The Benchmark Litigation USA Awards recognize the country’s most distinguished litigators and firms in each state based on the significance of their representations from the past year.
The awards highlight the most impactful cases, the lawyers and law firms behind them, and the litigators who helped pave the way.
Bradley was one of three finalists for the award in Tennessee and was among the finalists for firm of the year in Alabama and Mississippi.
A total of 50 Bradley partners were recognized in the 2023 edition of Benchmark Litigation late in 2022, which also recognized the firm with a Tier 1 national ranking in Product Liability and Recall.
HealthTrust named a top health care workplace
HealthTrust Performance Group, a leading health care performance improvement company, has been named to Becker’s Healthcare’s Top 150 Places to Work in Healthcare list, which highlights hospitals, health systems and health care companies that promote diversity within the workforce, employee engagement and professional growth.
HealthTrust was recognized on the list for its support of nearly 10,000 employees through the company’s values of ethics, sustainability, integrity and culture, all while maintaining a supportive, high-impact environment to advance the improvement of health.
The Top 150 Places to Work in Healthcare list features hospitals and companies that offer benefits and opportunities for employees to build successful careers above and beyond the average organization – encouraging professional development and promoting leadership from within.
Parthenon Museum wins five statewide awards
Nashville’s iconic Parthenon Museum was a recipient of five Tennessee Association of Museums awards at the recent TAM conference.
The Parthenon received four Superlative Achievement Awards and one award for volunteerism:
• Looking Back: 125 Years After the Tennessee Centennial, a temporary exhibit
• Centennial Park History Tour, Tennessee Centennial Exposition, an educational/public programs
• Foreign Language Architecture Audio Tours
• STEAM: Expedition to the Parthenon (Polychromy) for educational/school programing
• Greg Delzer, a docent at the museum who spearheaded the Centennial Park History tour and provided many research hours for the exhibition, received an award for his volunteerism.
The TAM Awards of Excellence are presented to recognize, encourage and promote excellence within the activities of the Tennessee museum community.
State jobless numbers hold steady at 3.5%
Tennessee’s unemployment numbers remained unchanged at 3.5% for the fifth month in a row, according to the latest data released by the Department of Labor and Workforce Development.
The state’s seasonally adjusted jobless number has been at or below 3.5% since January 2022.
In a year-to-year comparison, the statewide unemployment rate is up 0.1% from 3.4% to 3.5%.
New nonfarm jobs across the state totaled 4,800 in February. The leisure and hospitality sector accounted for the largest number of new jobs, followed by the professional and business services sector and the government sector.
Between February 2022 and February 2023, Tennessee employers added 103,300 jobs to their payrolls. The leisure and hospitality sector businesses were responsible for the largest number of new jobs over the last year.
The education and health services sector had the next largest year-to-year increase, followed by the professional and business services sector.
Across the United States, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate grew by 0.2% in February to 3.6%. When compared to the national rate one year ago, that figure came in 0.2% lower.
Poll shows food insecurity on rise
An increasing number of Tennessee parents are reporting their families are food insecure.
Up more than 30% in just one year, 41.2% of Tennessee parents reported low or very low food security compared to 31.3% last year.
The latest release of the poll of more than 1,000 Tennessee parents by the Vanderbilt Center for Child Health Policy asked parents a series of questions focused on food security and changes in food spending due to increases in food prices. Food security was evaluated using a standardized questionnaire from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Previous polls from the center have shown nine in 10 Tennessee parents support free school lunch for all children.
Across the three grand divisions of the state, more parents in East (45%) and West Tennessee (44%) reported low or very low food security than parents in Middle Tennessee (38%).
There are also notable differences by race. More than half, 51%, of Black parents in Tennessee report low or very low food security compared to 38% of white parents.
Belmont makes 9th ‘military friendly’ list
Belmont University announced that it has earned the 2023-2024 Silver Military Friendly School designation.
As of Fall 2022, there were 316 veteran and military affiliated students at Belmont University. This is the ninth consecutive year Belmont has been selected as a Military Friendly® School.
Among the 1,800 institutions that participated in the survey, 665 schools received the designation for going above the standard, which serves as a resource for current military service members, veterans and military spouses. Being designated as a Military Friendly School indicates greater support and better outcomes for veterans who attend these schools.
Institutions earning the Military Friendly® School designation were evaluated using both public data sources and responses from a proprietary survey. The list will be published in the May and October issue of G.I. Jobs magazine.
New Ford plant aims for 500K EV trucks in TN
Ford said Friday that its assembly plant under construction in West Tennessee will be able to build up to 500,000 electric pickup trucks a year at full output, part of the automaker’s drive to produce 2 million electric vehicles worldwide annually by late 2026.
The company made the announcement as it provided updates on the so-called BlueOval City project at an event attended by Ford executives, project leaders, politicians and residents who live near the sprawling Tennessee site.
The Dearborn, Michigan, automaker announced the project in September 2021 that would build the truck plant and a battery factory on 3,600 acres (1,460-hectares) in rural Stanton, located in Haywood County northeast of Memphis. Known as the Memphis Regional Megasite, the land designated by the state for industrial development sat unused for years before Ford moved in.
Ford’s assembly plant, and the battery plant run by South Korean battery maker SK On, will employ about 6,000 people with an investment of roughly $5.6 billion, Ford said.
The joint venture will also construct twin battery plants in Glendale, Kentucky, with an estimated $5.8 billion investment. The projects are expected to create more than 10,800 jobs and shift the automaker’s future manufacturing footprint toward the South while putting an emphasis on green energy.
Construction on the Tennessee site began last year. Ford plans to start production by 2025, and that timetable remains in place, company officials said.