I'm Ellen Smith, member of the Oak Ridge City Council. Thank you for visiting my blog and reading my views on public and private life in and around Oak Ridge, Tennessee. This website is my own; content here does not represent the official policies or views of the City of Oak Ridge. To add your own comments, click on the topic title to open a comment box. To read posts about a particular topic, scroll down to "Categories" (in the sidebar) or use the "Search" box in the sidebar. Look under "Archives" to see collections of past posts organized by date.
The Oak Ridge city staff and and the Knoxville Transportation Planning Organization (TPO) have been working quietly to get started on a process to update the city’s pedestrian and bicycle plans. City Council found out earlier this week that an advisory committee had been formed and several meetings have been held. Currently the city has [...]
Thursday’s Oak Ridge Observer reported that Alex Moseley is circulating a petition to force a referendum on the matter of whether handgun carry permit holders should be allowed to carry guns in Oak Ridge city parks. The strange thing about this news is that there is no provision in the city charter — and apparently [...]
The issue of guns in municipal parks has aroused a lot of emotion and is generating a lot of e-mail to City Council members. On one side are people are strong proponents of gun rights and residents who believe that having a concealed gun when they are in a public place helps to ensure their [...]
Phew! This year’s Secret City Festival was a big success but it’s a relief that it’s over, and a relief that we made it through last evening’s marathon City Council meeting.
We had a long agenda and a long meeting. Kudos to John Huotari for quickly spinning out reports on two of the major business items [...]
I’ve heard from an Oak Ridger who is concerned that his neighbors have been feeding raccoons. As far as I know, there’s no local ordinance or state law against feeding wild animals in Oak Ridge, but I wonder if that’s a direction that the city might need to take in the future. Cities in bear [...]
According to a press release from the City, the 30-day warning period for the City’s first traffic safety camera has ended. This is the camera that monitors southbound traffic on Illinois Avenue at the intersection of Illinois Avenue and Robertsville Road. It monitors red light and speed violations. Violations “caught” by this camera will [...]
E-mail from the city manager indicates that the Redflex traffic enforcement cameras are installed and being tested. It looks like they will be ready to start issuing warnings some time later this week (the $50 penalties won’t come until after about a month of warnings-only operation). Cameras at the Illinois-Robertsville and Turnpike-Lafayette intersections will monitor [...]
I’ve already heard from one citizen with a question about an item on the April 13 City Council agenda (the agenda was posted Friday), so I guess it’s high time to discuss some of the business items. There’s a rezoning, action on the Chamber of Commerce contract, numerous bids and contracts including purchase of new [...]
At Tuesday’s meeting of the City Council Budget and Finance Committee, fire chief Mack Bailey shared some statistics that reminded me why it makes sense to live in Oak Ridge. Per capita fire losses per capita in our city are only about 1/3 of the average in the southeastern U.S. (just $15 to $25 per [...]
Good news for families or communities with older drivers — and good news for all of us who expect to get older. It seems that the higher rate of auto accident fatalities for older drivers is not because they are bad drivers, but because they are more frail. This suggests that the number of senior [...]