Reporter
Bill Dries covers city and county government and politics. He is a native Memphian and has been a reporter for almost 50 years covering a wide variety of stories from the 1977 death of Elvis Presley and the 1978 police and fire strikes to numerous political campaigns, every county mayor and every Memphis Mayor starting with Wyeth Chandler.
There are 4048 articles by Bill Dries :
The plan for multiyear MLGW gas, electric and water rate hikes was rejected Tuesday by the Memphis City Council. It's the second year the council has gone instead for smaller one-year rate hikes – this time a 3 percent hike in water rates starting next month.
The Memphis City Council gave final approval to the de-annexation of South Cordova Tuesday.
Russell Sugarmon, civil rights icon, political strategist and retired judge who fought racial injustice in his hometown of Memphis, dies at 89.
The last in a set of five de-annexations, South Cordova, goes to the Memphis City Council Tuesday for a final vote and probably more debate than the council had with the four other de-annexations.
Memphis City Council members will try again Tuesday to make a final decision on Memphis Light, Gas and Water Division's rate hikes in an atmosphere that has come to also include questions about the future of the utility’s 80-year relationship with the Tennessee Valley Authority.
A study commissioned by the environmental group Friends of the Earth charts a course for MLGW to sever its historic ties with TVA in five years without the cost of building new transmission lines for electric power from new sources.
The late Carroll T. Dozier, the first bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Memphis, is among 42 priests named this week by the Catholic Diocese of Richmond, Virginia, as having a "credible and substantiated" allegation of child sexual abuse against him.
Tennessee education commissioner Penny Schwinn makes stops at two Shelby County High Schools just days after taking the state's top education post.
The federal Housing and Urban Development wants Memphis to pay back millions spent in one of the biggest take-backs ever proposed by HUD.
A collection of essays on the African-American struggle in Memphis by 17 historians is seen by its editors as a “powerful counter-narrative” to a more compressed history of the city.
The first of what is expected to be a multifaceted incentive package for FedEx Logistics' planned Downtown Memphis headquarters is a $2 million reimbursable grant.
City Hall says a redeveloped Tom Lee Park can be done in coexistence with the Memphis In May International Festival and that the festival will likely have to move out of the park temporarily in 2020.
Gov. Bill Lee is scheduled to be in Memphis Tuesday, Feb. 12, for what's expected to be his first economic development announcement in the city.
The only contender so far for the leadership of the Shelby County Republican Party said the local party needs candidates who are more representative and the party needs to seek out African-American and Hispanic voters.
Memphis City Council members are reviewing changes to their rules after the two-month stalemate in filling three open council seats. And some of the proposed changes are prompting renewed debate.
More than 50,000 used tires were recycled over two days last month in a $100,000 city-county tire drive.
Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland says a month ago, Electrolux executives assured him their Memphis plant would stay open and even expand to include new product lines. With word of the plant closing in 2021, he told The Daily Memphian Politics Podcast the city, county and state "overpaid" in terms of incentives.
Putting together the comprehensive 20-year Memphis 3.0 development plan required trying to change some ideas about what it means to encourage development in very different parts of a diverse city.
With just enough votes, the Memphis City Council approved a resolution that will post the financial disclosure reports of each council member next to his or her bio on the city's website.
A new "People's Convention" is being organized to run a slate of candidates in the 2019 Memphis elections. It shares some features of the 1991 gathering that backed Willie Herenton's historic bid for mayor, but there are some significant differences as well.
A city council resolution on the financing of a second convention center hotel added to Tuesday's agenda is an answer to changes in a lawsuit filed by the owners of the city's original convention center hotel recently.
Memphis city council members again delayed approval of Memphis Light, Gas and Water rate increases Tuesday, instead urging the utility to make its case to the public for an infrastructure overhaul before the council tries again later this month.
The Shelby County results in the special primary elections for state Sen. District 32 are certified and dates for early voting in the special general election are set.