2018 Revue: Reshaping a City

MPC meeting

Newcomers on City Council, public improvements projects and a new zoning code are signs that major changes are in store for Knoxville.

The Bully Pulpit

Glenn Jacobs

Three months in, Glenn Jacobs is finding his feet — and his voice — as chief executive of Knox County.

Black Wednesday: The Compass Primer

Black Wednesday Main Assembly Room

The Black Wednesday scandal still reverberates through Knox County political culture, even though most of those involved are no longer in office.

How It Works: The University of Tennessee

Neyland Stadium

State university systems take an array of forms, and the University of Tennessee is a particularly odd one. It is less a system than a small collection of affiliated schools.

Knox 2018: Knox County

Glenn Jacobs' swearing-in.

In Knox County politics, the stage was set for this year to be mostly an encore performance, with lots of familiar faces in slightly different roles.

How It Works: Knox County Schools

Andrew Johnson Building

With 60,000 students and nearly 4,000 teachers in 88 buildings, Knox County Schools serves every community from Farragut to Five Points. Here’s how the complex system works.

How Local Government Works

Road closed sign

Local government is complicated, but don’t despair! We have compiled a handy set of quick guides to the structure and history of our local institutions.

Knox 2018: A User’s Guide to Local Government and Politics

City County Building

Knoxville in 2018 is a complicated place. A moderate-progressive Southern Appalachian city in a libertarian-conservative Southern Appalachian county, it is home to a strong and diverse culture fueled by competing and often contradictory interests and philosophies.

Knox 2018: The Economy

One of the long-noted ironies of life in East Tennessee is that in a region dominated politically for a century and a half by the Republican Party and its limited-government philosophy, the economy relies significantly on the federal and state governments.