NEWS

A Few Questions with CouncilmemberEmily Benedict, District 7

BY JUDITH TACKETT

It became apparent quickly while talking to District 7 Councilmember Emily Benedict how much she loves the area she serves.

“I believe District 7 has the best that Nashville has to offer,” Benedict said. “We have a lively and growing neighborhood in Madison, a suburban neighborhood in northern Inglewood, and urban growth in South Inglewood. We have bustling growth on Gallatin Pike, where our WeGo route 56 has the highest ridership in the city. We have the highest volume bus stop at the Madison library. I ride that bus often. It's an efficient and easy way to get downtown.”

Over pizza and a drink, we asked Benedict some questions about her first term serving District 7.

What are currently the main issues and concerns you hear about from your constituents?

Traffic calming and pedestrian safety. This is by far the largest opportunity we have to improve lives in District 7. Gallatin is the second most dangerous street in the city. We need to make it safer, and NDOT (Nashville Department of Transportation) is working on that.

The Nashville Vision Zero Action Plan aims to end all traffic-related deaths and severe injuries. How bad have accidents been in District 7?

That’s a passion of mine. I actually chaired a special committee on sidewalks when I was first elected and we learned a lot about why it’s expensive to build sidewalks, why it’s so slow to build sidewalks, and some of those findings from that committee NDOT has already implemented.

I’m riding tomorrow with our new NDOT director. I know that we are working to fund some of the pieces of Vision Zero. I’m hopeful that we will get a lot of federal dollars to help us build out bike lanes and crosswalks. Everybody wants sidewalks, but truly crosswalks make a bigger difference in pedestrian safety. Of course, we need cars to obey the law.

We don’t want excess, but we’ve got to be able to serve the community, and we’re not doing that when we don’t have crosswalks, when people are dying on the street from crossing the street or walking alongside it. It’s inequitable, and it’s something we need to spend the money on.

As the representative of District 7, what are the main goals you set for your first term?

The first thing is to make it a more equitable neighborhood, with the right growth in the right place. When I talk about equity, I don't mean equality, which is very important. Rather, I mean that we all have the opportunity to have well-paying jobs, safe places to live, and affordable/attainable housing.

The second thing is to fix the budget. We had mismanaged money for quite some time, including that we have had one of the lowest tax rates in the city's history. We couldn't keep up with the growth, so now we have been playing catch up. We have done well with fixing that problem, although there is more work to do. For instance, in 2019, we had three days' cash on hand for operations. In 2021, we now have a reserve fund that would pay for city operations for up to a month. The average major city has four months on hand, so we have a ways to go, but we have to do this in case we ever again are faced with headwinds like a pandemic or a tornado. We have given raises to our teachers. That was foundational to my campaign. And we have improved pay across the board for Metro employees who hadn't had a raise in years.

You are a realtor, as such you observe the housing market. What do you see as Nashville’s opportunities for the city to grow in a healthy way?

For one, find ways to partner with affordable housing programs. This is something GNR, the Greater Nashville Realtors, is focused on including with its own committee for affordable housing. As home prices continue to rise at record rates, we need to help

developers buy in places where they can build smaller and more affordable housing units, likely apartments, or condos. When we put these developments on main thoroughfares, that also helps with affordability due to access to things like public transportation, and oftentimes resources like grocery stores.

You also serve on the Human Services Committee*, and as much as I try to stay out of the current discussions due to my background as the former director of the Homeless Impact Division, I would be remiss not to ask whether you had anything to add to the recent hearing of the Jefferson Street Bridge removal. In your words, what are your thoughts?

It was handled horribly. I'm very concerned about the residents who have been placed elsewhere or displaced altogether. I am especially concerned that we don't currently have a program to track housing for everyone. For instance, if the city is able to place someone in a home or hotel, we don't track if they have stayed in that home or hotel, or if they have returned to the streets. Anyway, we need to help people in encampments, and this was a pilot. It didn't work, and there was no contingency plan. It wasn't communicated well to the encampment residents nor internally. We are talking about peoples' lives. We must take better caution in the future.

Secondly, we need to listen to the right voices, not the loudest.

And finally, I believe the interim director at the Homeless Impact Division was tasked with finding a solution to encampments as his first priority. I am concerned he was not provided enough resources to be successful both with working on encampments and with his role overall. I'm sure that you are familiar with the lack of resources the city has historically given to the Homeless Impact Division. I'm hopeful that we are able to create a standalone department of homelessness and rehousing so we can really allocate resources to end homelessness. As you well know, housing is the only cure to homelessness. It's obvious but I'll say it: no one chooses to become homeless. We need to provide better resources — better human services — to our community so no one will ever end up on our streets. I want every Nashvillian — in a home or not — to be safe, and warm, and fed. I'm hopeful we can do that more quickly than we have historically.

*Tackett agreed in early January to be available as a subject matter expert to the committee members during their discussions of homeless solutions, which is why she launched this interview series with members of the Metro Council Human Services Committee.