Part 3 of big paper

Consolidation has been the center of Mayor Willie

Herenton's focus for Memphis, Tennessee for some time.

Some people are confident that it will make things

better, but others are not quite so sure that this is the

case. Key concerns about consolidation are debt, school

systems, crime, and a host of other smaller issues. To

this day, all of Herenton's arguements have been one-

sided, and no downfalls have been mentioned, but is this

really the best thing for the city?

Many good arguements have been made for

consolidation, but the downsides have been consistently

left out. The biggest arguement for consolidation is that

it will get rid of the outstanding debt for both the city

and the county. This theory is that consolidation should

produce economies of scale which allows cost savings to

be achieved- average costs are reduced when spread out

over a wider set of users. What is not brought to light

is that this does not always happen. There are many

things that cause this which are; Labor intensive,

Bureaucracy growth, Merging personnel-related costs,

Merging service quality costs, and One-time transition

costs. Through resent studies, it has been proved that

consolidation can even cause and increase in spending

which would put us further in debt. This would


defeat one of the most important reasons for

consolidating.

Combining the school systems is also a major

component to the consolidation issue. Mayor Herenton

wants to join Memphis City Schools and Shelby County

School systems. There are many problems with this

suggestion. The Shelby County School system is known to

be very good with passing grades. On the other hand, the

Memphis City School system is the complete opposite. It

is known as a horrible school systems with most of the

schools failing in many areas. Shelby County Schools are

also well-known for their up-to-date technology such as

computers and sources, while Memphis City Schools are

behind in this department. I do not see how bringing

these two totally opposite school systems together will

help. At best, this change will make both school systems

mediocre. If the best is mediocre, what about the worst?

It could bring Shelby County's school system down, and

there is no positive in that situation.

Crime is another area of concern that consolidation

raises. Memphis has one of the highest crime rates in

America. It is also in the top five most dangerous

cities. The areas that would be consolidated such as

Collierville, Germantown, and Bartlet do not want this

crime to affect them. These outskirts of Memphis are

fairly quiet with minimal crime, pollution, etc.

Consolidation could change all of this. The crime and

other concerns could leak into this normally quiet towns

and raise havoc. It could also bring things such as house

values down. These are all major concerns that these

small, growing towns have.

Although there are many big issues with

consolidation, there are also smaller concerns. These

concerns range from who will be over trash and recycling

to the fire and police departments. All of these aspects

determine the appearance of the city as well as the

county. The county is known to be tremendously clean

compared to the city. Most of the neighborhoods are kept

up and held to certain standards, therefore, having a

clean appearance. The city is known for being very dirty

and sometimes foul smelling and filled with pollution.

County-livers do not want this to come into their

beautiful communities. Police and Fire Departments will

also have to change. They have discussed reducing the

amount of police officers and fire fighters. This will


potentially be harmful to everyone. Citizens already feel

like there needs to be more police officers, and now

there will be less. This means that the ones that are

left will have to cover a bigger jurisdiction, which

could result in more criminals getting away clean. There

has also been countless numbers of situations where whole

houses and buildings have been burnt down. By down-sizing

the number of fire fighters, more buildings will be at

risk of burning completely down before help can get to

them. I don't think that any of this is worth the risk of

consolidation.


Consolidation can be potentially good or bad. Many

risks have to be taken in order to consolidate. These

risks could possibly put both the city and the county in

danger and in unwanted predicaments. Some feel

consolidation is good, but I do not feel it is the best

decision.