Improving the quality of life in downtown Knoxville

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and length.

Can you describe your capstone project?

Knoxville, about 15 to 20 years ago, made revitalizing its downtown a priority. The boundaries of downtown have grown, putting our homeless population and supportive resources for that community across the street from multimillion-dollar developments. Simply put, my project asked: How can we deal with this in a humane way, facilitate help where we can, and address the quality-of-life concerns of people who are living, visiting, and working downtown?

What in particular from the PLA helped you develop and execute your capstone?

The big piece was community involvement. Several classes at the PLA helped us realize that not everything is a police problem. Picking up what I learned during our courses, I led a task force walk through part of our downtown with city officials and private stakeholders. By the end of the walk, I realized only two things in my notes had to do with law enforcement. Everything else had to do with everybody else. For example, we discussed how the Neighborhood Codes Enforcement team, who investigates codes violations regarding dilapidated buildings, could support with removing abandoned buildings. We also saw opportunities for the Transportation Engineering Division to help us tackle speeding violations in the area.

I think that was an “a-ha moment” for a lot of folks. Like, Hey, let’s not just throw it at the police department. Let’s come back to the table and see what we can do to support each other. Our partners slowly started chiming in, like, Hey, we can provide this or that. Maybe this is a traffic issue more than it is a police issue, for example. That led to community and agency meetings. Some of these departments have slowly started to step up and say, Hey, we may have a little responsibility here, too.

Can you talk about how the PLA prepared you for implementing this capstone project?

The PLA helped with networking most of all. It didn’t take long to realize that from coast to coast, we all had the same problems. The internal networking was important in addition to the material that was being taught. I was starting to hear names, see emails, see faces, go to conferences, and be plugged into a network that I was never a part of previously. For decades, my agency tended to only look inward. Now, we’re starting to look outward for help and ideas. Now, I’ve got places I can go for help.

What specific problem within the department were you aiming to address with the capstone project?

Everything that we had tried previously to assist the homeless population and address quality-of-life issues had fallen short. Our toolbox in this area is shallow to start with, but it started and ended with throwing cops at the problem. We needed different strategies. We started implementing staffing designs, schedules, the creation of a district, collaboration with other city departments and entities, the assignment of officers to the community group, etc. And it started working.

Learn more about the capstone