The Curse of Inaffordus Rex
🌃 Metro's affordability miss mark · Last night at the Metro Council · SNAP funding gap · Much more!
Good afternoon, everyone. The Planning Department goes densification or bust... A recap of last night's Metro Council meeting... State steps in to fill the SNAP funding gap... And much more!
Veteran's Day Screening November 11th, we're hosting a screening at NuMynd Studios of Call Sign Courage, a documentary about the current Under Secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Col. Matt Lohmeier, blowing the whistle on Marxism in the military. RSVP here.
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Opinion: The housing is not the issue here, Dude.
From Davis Hunt
"There's a lot of difference between listening and hearing."
G.K. Chesterton
The single issue that will increasingly dominate politics — local, state, and national — over the next five to ten years is housing. Rents and home prices have outpaced wages for decades. College grads are in debt, cannot find jobs, and suffer the same from inflation as the rest of us. It is objectively true that living in a major metro — where the jobs are — costs more now than ten or twenty years ago.
Zohran Mamdani just won the New York City mayoral race on a splashy “Freeze the Rent.” promise. This is the new populism on the Left, and it’s not going anywhere — so get familiar with it.
I've only been called a Nazi one time, and it was for voicing support for single-family zoning. Last week, a tweet of mine went viral responding to a girl proudly declaring, "Yeah, I'm a bad girl / I say cuss words, I don't tip at chipotle and I want to eradicate single-family zoning." That’s the tenor of the debate now: your neighborhood preferences are now a moral failing.
Aside from subsidizing rents as Mamdani proposes, the most popular approach at the local level is zoning reform, which essentially means encouraging densification in places that aren’t dense. That’s what the suite of bills up for vote at last night’s council meeting seeks to do: allow more housing types, increase density, and — in theory — lower prices through supply.
For those who already live in the city, there's not a whole lot on offer. The fig leaf is that they will also impose design standards to "protect the character of your neighborhood."
The city's planning department treats zoning as if it's an esoteric dark art whose codas come from an old piece of marble in the basement of the planning department with inscriptions in a dead language only they can decipher. They put on robes, do occult rituals in the basement, and then emerge at public meetings to explain the codas to you, slowly, like you’re a kindergartner.
To the Density Dimwits, zoning reform is something that you will never understand, and all of your pushback is based on a misunderstanding (you're stupid), misinformation (you're gullible), or bigotry (you hate minorities).
With help from our Zombie Council, public opposition to these proposals falls on increasingly deaf ears. They know better than you. They get paid to do this. You don't. Also, we're in a crisis. We need to do this now, or Demon Overlord Inaffordus Rex will curse this land and banish you and your children to the nether realm of Rutherford County.
Lost in this entire discussion is what we get in exchange for our tax dollars. Does Nashville offer you, the taxpayer, a good enough deal to stick around even if housing is marginally more affordable?
If a family could move to a higher-tax city and, in exchange, receive access to good schools, functioning infrastructure, a competent judiciary, adequate police staffing, and a city government capable of delivering services, they might accept higher taxes because the services they receive reflect that.
But Nashville is dealing with "affordability" concerns through subsidization or upzoning, as the quality of city services collapses. More people, same sewer capacity, staffing lags at MNPD, declining enrollment at public schools as the budget balloons — and somehow, the response to all this is a moral lecture about housing.
Never mind the rising tax burden, the terrible public schools, the pot-hole ridden streets, the slowing pace of job growth, and the tenuous hold on public safety, quadplexes will save us from the dominion of Inaffordus Rex and his prefect, Fleeing To The Often More Expensive Ring Counties!
To be clear, Nashville doesn’t have a housing problem. It has a governance problem.
✹ THE SOUTHERN REVIVAL SALON
Join us for a classed-up, cowboy-formal type thing with an open bar, music, and the opportunity to meet some of the most talented and influential people in Nashville. Use the discount code PAMPHLETEER to get 25% off your ticket. (Buy Tickets)
🖋️ Edited by Megan Podsiedlik.
🏛️ Last Night at the Metro Council The council sat through two public hearings related to the newly proposed zoning changes supported by the Planning Department’s Housing & Infrastructure study during last night’s meeting. While the council deferred all four bills, they passed the legislation that creates two additional zoning districts (RN & RL) and expands/simplifies codes for Detached Accessory Dwelling Units (DADUs) on second reading.
Both bills will be on their third and final readings during the council’s meeting on December 4. The legislation that simplifies the rules for building duplexes will be on second reading with a public hearing on December 4 and the bill that creates a Voluntary Attainable Housing Incentive Program will be heard on second reading during the meeting on January 20.
The most robust public hearing occurred during discussions on BL2025-1005, which creates two new zoning districts. Many commentators in support of the bill spoke in broad favor of all newly proposed zoning bills and emphasized the need for avenues that create more affordable housing.
Those in opposition encouraged the body to consider the infrastructure needs of current residents and asked the body to take a more refined look at how to upzone Nashville without exacerbating the system and destroying neighborhoods.
“I think it is such a slap in the face,” said Councilmember Courtney Johnston, referring to the body’s willingness to pass the bill on second reading despite “overwhelming opposition.”
Bill sponsor Jennifer Gamble motioned to pass BL2025-1005 on second reading and defer its third reading to December. “If we are willing to defer, why not defer second reading?” asked Johnston.
Despite the fact Johnston stated her intention of making a motion and describing the need to defer the bill’s second reading until December 4, Vice Mayor Angie Henderson did not recognize her motion on the grounds of a technicality.
Instead, Councilmember Thom Druffel had to make the proper deferral motion and used his time to remind the council of the guardrails they passed in 2024 that got the ball rolling on these studies.
A resolution passed by the council last March included stipulations for Metro to determine funding needs for supporting infrastructure while pursuing density and assess whether proposed changes will assist long-term affordability.
“That was our goal a year and a half ago, and I don’t believe we’ve met all those goals,” said Druffle, stating that housing affordability and infrastructure costs haven’t been addressed in the new zoning legislation.
Regardless, the council passed both BL2025-1005 and BL2005-1007 on second reading. A robust discussion about the current amendments proposed for the new zoning bills will be held during the Planning & Zoning Committee meeting on November 18.
🍕 Filling The SNAP Funding Gap On Tuesday, Governor Bill Lee announced that he will be allocating $5 million from TennCare reserve funding to support food banks across the state. The decision comes in response to the disruption of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits due to the current government shut down.
During last night’s Metro Council meeting, the body supported Councilmember Erin Evans’ resolution to support the mayor’s office and other entities working with local food banks in preparation for the disruptions of SNAP.
Evans requested that O’Connell’s office provide regular updates on available resources, consider providing free bus fare for those in need of transportation to food banks, and to take look into discretionary funding that may be available to supplement those in need.
🛣️ Keeping Up With Infrastructure In a recent study conducted by Think Tennessee, it found Nashville will need $15.5 billion to cover infrastructure projects through 2028. According to WSMV, Davidson County accounts for about 20 percent of the state’s infrastructure projects.
The cost of fending off Tennessee’s decay has continued to grow over the last decade. In 2015, Tennessee projected the need for $42.3 billion of public Infrastructure improvements through 2018; in 2018, it was $45 billion; in 2022, $61.9 Billion; and in 2025, Tennessee cites a need for $77.7 billion over the next five years.
HEADLINES
- 🛠️ According to Tennessee's WARN Notices, there were more layoffs in the month of October (1,528) than there were for the whole year in 2024 (1,124).
- 🎓 Several schools in southeast Nashville were placed on lockout after a suspect was reported firing shots from a vehicle; the lockout was lifted once the Metro Nashville Police Department captured the individual near Dodson Chapel Rd. and Bell Rd. on Wednesday.
DEVELOPMENT
- Renderings, high-profile partner revealed for 100-acre luxury mall in Williamson County (NBJ)
- Ascend to retain naming rights at Opry-run amphitheater (Post)
- Permits issued for Belle Meade Village project (Post)
THINGS TO DO
View our calendar for the week here.
📅 Visit our On The Radar list to find upcoming events around Nashville.
🎧 On Spotify: Pamphleteer's Picks, a playlist of our favorite bands in town this week.
👨🏻🌾 Check out our Nashville farmer's market guide.
TONIGHT
✨ Purity Ring @ Brooklyn Bowl Nashville, 8p, $53+, Info
🪕 Mountain Grass Unit @ The Basement East, 8p, $56.87, Info
🎸 Briston Maroney Presents: Paradise! (Night 1) @ The Blue Room, 6:30p, $45.50, Info
💀 Tennessee Dead @ Tennessee Brew Works, 6p, Info
🪕 Bluegrass Night @ The American Legion Post 82, 7p, Free, Info
📰 Check out the full newsletter archive here.
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Today's newsletter is brought to you by Davis Hunt, Megan Podsiedlik and Camelia Brennan.