Mayor Kelly touts his One Chattanooga plan to the public, and gets an earful

Mayor's Office holds a listening session on how to spend the city budget in 2023

Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly has made it perfectly clear that there are two Chattanoogas: one for the affluent, and one for the not-so-wealthy.

The Mayor’s One Chattanooga Plan is up for public discussion, and the Mayor’s Office held a listening session.

Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly has a problem, and it didn’t start with him. How does a leader fix problems in a city that have been generational in nature?

Many low-income Chattanooga residents see the city as broken, and the research certainly doesn’t dispute it…

One in four children are living and growing up in poverty here.

Almost 40 percent of local renters pay at least 35 percent of the household income on rent.

And Chattanooga is ranked among the worst places in America in helping poor children climb the income ladder.

So what does Mayor Kelly want to do? Listen…to you. He did that tonight with an input session on Zoom to see what people in Districts 5, 8 and 9 want to see in their neighborhoods. One of the main feelings is increasing rent and home prices drive long-standing residents away from the Scenic City…

Orchard Knob resident Cory Russell said, “All they’re getting right now is increased tax payments. They’re getting absolutely nothing out of it because they all want to stay here. They’ve been here for 60 years or more some of them … and, yet, they don’t have the ability to keep their houses up.”

Mayor Kelly also wants to focus on early childhood education in his One Chattanooga plan. A great thought, but the issues start with fixing the fundamentals.

Adult success coach Audrey Ramsey leaned on Abraham Maslov’s “Hierarchy of Needs” to answer that question. “Before any of us can reach our highest potential, the basics have to be met. And that’s food, safety, shelter … and, so we start at that level. If we really want to uplift our communities and help our young children reach their highest potential.”

Mayor Kelly’s One Chattanooga plan isn’t a finished product, and he still needs the public’s help to put that plan in full motion. He has another listening session planned for February 10th through Zoom and it’s OK to sound off. He wants to hear it all.