New data intake processes are needed by State of Tennessee officials to accommodate citizens that puke at the mention of Fred Smith, Pitt Hyde and Christine Richards. This dissent at least needs to be formally heard. Governor Lee will fail in his Memphis turnaround efforts if he can’t accept the basic fact that the FedEx/Memphis Tomorrow complex is a national embarrassment. The complex has resulted in the product of SPOONERGATE and implementation ecosystem decline over 20 yrs that accommodates elitists feeding on a community in need. Here are a few evidence snapshots of elitist led ecosystem decline:
- City cuts off retirement benefits for public employees
- Botched workforce development efforts
- Increasing poverty levels
- Excessive corporate/real estate incentives justified with bogus projection accounting for the benefit of the small few while achieving far below average wage growth
But Lee continues to appoint FedEx/Memphis Tomorrow rigged system bureaucrats in for example Christine Richards on the Tennessee Public Charter School Commission. Why such a nightmare decision that is nothing other than more of the status quo?
Richards, formerly Chief Counsel at FedEx, was core to the last design for decline 2014 economic development plan in Memphis and subsequently a key contributor in the botching of the Memphis workforce development system while serving on the first Greater Memphis Alliance for a Competitive Workforce (GMACW) Board. An early warning concern of Richard’s involvement came from the University of Memphis Planning Department in 2015 and cited conflict of interests concerns regarding Richards related to the local economic development need to diversify away from the logistics industry.
The UofM report goes on to articulate plan concerns around a lack of specific timelines, measurable deliverables and GMACW workforce development efforts in 2015. The report was published prior to the new UofM Board of Trustees when the University seems to have been more free to raise concerns regarding the local establishment while exercising communitywide thought leadership.
Here is an email that I sent to Richards regarding deficient workforce development efforts in 2016. The email was dismissed and today, in 2019, deficient workforce development efforts remain with no plan or data to support connected career pathways development efforts. Its a closed elitist system that feels entitled to dismiss taxpayer concerns regarding publicly funded work. And, Fred Smith and Pitt Hyde have been entirely content with Memphis ecosystem decline provided that their FedEx/Memphis Tomorrow machinery can botch ecosystem evolution at will while feeding on a community in need using taxpayer funds. Its been going on for 20 years.
Following the lead of Smith and Hyde, consequently, locally based state officials are invested in elitist decline as well. Its all they know for Memphis. Representative Mark White and Memphis area Tennessee Economic and Community Development Director Gwyn Fisher, routinely entertain meetings with the embarrassing FedEx/Memphis Tomorrow complex but won’t meet with non-establishment organizations. So there is no real help from the state in questioning the elitist monopoly and Memphis ecosystem decline. There are a number of solutions, but White and Fisher are not open to hearing them.
As a result, White and Fisher support an elitist system of decline that rips off small business, uses bogus accounting to justify excessive corporate/real estate incentives while botching the workforce development system over 5 years. The excessive incentive mentality is evident in the data where Memphis has $500M+ in job incentives and Indianapolis has $135M with greater percentage job growth than Memphis. In this way, its not about economic development but elitist bullying and feeding on a community in need that has continued, without critical measurement, under Richard Smith as Chamber Board Chair. And then there is re-elected Mayor Jim Strickland.
Rigged System Furthered
Re-elected Mayor Jim Strickland only knows decline over the last 20yrs. He is unalarmed with business as usual decline under the FedEx/Memphis Tomorrow complex. During Strickland’s first term the workforce development system was botched as excessive corporate/real estate incentives roared for the benefit of the small few. Strickland might as well change the city logo to that of a silver spoon.
Excessive incentives in Memphis have roared over 8 years without any fiscal impact analysis, an alarming unreported fact. Those excessive incentives are a primary reason for a lack of transit funding and neighborhood decline. The EDGE incentive scam was launched soon after the great recession and contains glaring similarities to that Wall Street scam in bogus assumptions used in economic impact studies and projection accounting that underwrites excessive incentives for the benefit of the small few.
Fiscal impact analysis of incentives is fundamental to measuring the effectiveness of economic development efforts and budget forecasting. But fiscal impact analysis does not happen in Memphis regarding some $800M+ in corporate/real estate incentive awards. This is a design for decline. And the former occurs, as control of workforce development efforts circulates back to the where they were originally botched at the Chamber. Its a social construct in Memphis that demands loyalty to ecosystem decline under Fred Smith and Pitt Hyde. All in all, its a closed system that is not good for business and why Memphis hasn’t grown in 20 years with the same rigged system of players directing ecosystem decline.
Conclusion
The only plan in Memphis is a rigged closed system that consists of the same players, no real measurement, legislative or press oversight while feeding on a community in need. A real measurable economic development plan still does not exist after almost 2 years under Richard Smith’s Board leadership at the Chamber. There is no sense of urgency under the FedEx/Memphis Tomorrow entitled spooner complex. Its just a closed social construct that furthers Memphis ecosystem decline.
State solutions to resolve the problem could include an intake process to formally accommodate non-establishment viewpoints but it looks to be more of the same under Lee. Good luck to Governor Lee in listening to the nationally embarrassing FedEx/Memphis Tomorrow complex who has authored Memphis decline over 20 years.