The Knoxville City Council voted 5-4 Tuesday night (September 30, 2025) to withdraw the proposed sale of 12.7 acres of Chilhowee Park to Emerald Youth Foundation, marking the final withdrawal of a controversial deal that has divided the city for months. While the community and Advocates celebrate the withdrawal as a victory for transparency and public input, the narrow vote exposes dangerous flaws in city leadership and a planning process built on obsolete foundations.


A Planning Process Built on Pre-Pandemic Assumptions

What most media coverage has missed is this: The entire Chilhowee Park development proposal is based on a 2019 Request for Proposals and strategic plan created before COVID-19 fundamentally altered economic reality.

The market conditions, construction costs, labor availability, interest rates, and community needs of 2019 bear little resemblance to 2025. Yet the City of Knoxville proceeded with implementation planning based on six-year-old data without updating its analysis.

Professional planning standards require plans to be updated when conditions change materially. Using pre-pandemic assumptions to make post-pandemic decisions isn't just poor practice—it's financially reckless and legally vulnerable.

When Council member Andrew Roberto stated he didn't want to expose the city to a lawsuit, he was acknowledging this reality. Proceeding with major public asset dispositions based on obsolete planning documents creates legal liability. Any unsuccessful bidder or community member could challenge the process as arbitrary and capricious under Tennessee law.

When Process Doesn't Matter: The Dangerous Four Plus One While five council members voted to withdraw the proposal, four voted to proceed despite knowing the process had significant deficiencies. These four, along with City Mayor Indya Kincannon who supported the sale, represent a dangerous mindset in city leadership.

Council members heard from constituents demanding transparency and inclusion in the process. They knew the city had not provided required cost-benefit analysis. They knew community members felt excluded from decisions about their public assets. They knew the planning foundation was outdated.

Yet four council members were willing to move forward anyway, and the mayor advocated for a deal that would have exposed taxpayers to legal and financial risk.

This wasn't a close call on a complex technical issue. This was a fundamental failure to follow established processes and meet basic standards of transparency. That four elected officials were prepared to proceed anyway reveals a troubling disregard for both proper procedure and public input.

Sports Fields or Economic Development: The Wrong Question Was Asked

Emerald Youth Foundation's proposal centered on athletic facilities: combo fields, walking and running trails, a gym, a medical building, and a career center. On the surface, these sound beneficial. But the proposal raises a question nobody in city leadership has asked: Why does every major "investment" in Black communities default to sports and recreation rather than economic infrastructure?

East Knoxville has some of the highest unemployment rates and lowest median incomes in Knox County. The community needs job creation, business incubation, business funding for existing business owners and aspiring entrepreneurs,workforce training that leads to actual employment, and economic development that builds generational wealth.

Instead, the proposal offered facilities that, while valuable for youth programming, do little to address the systemic economic disinvestment that has plagued East Knoxville for decades. The city's own acknowledgment of historical harm through urban renewal—and its $100 million reparations commitment that has paid out only $150,000 in five years—makes this pattern even more egregious.

Who decided athletic fields were the "highest and best use" of this public land? What economic analysis compared job creation potential of alternative developments? Were East Knoxville residents given meaningful input on what kind of development they actually wanted?

The answer appears to be: nobody, none, and no.


The Cost of Using Outdated Plans

When the city issued its 2019 planning RFP, construction costs were significantly lower, interest rates were near zero, and the labor market was completely different. Moving to implementation in 2024 without updating those assumptions creates multiple problems:

Financial risk: Cost estimates based on 2019 data are meaningless in 2025. This virtually guarantees change orders and cost overruns—which benefit contractors at taxpayer expense.

Missed opportunities: The post-pandemic economy created new workforce needs and development opportunities that a 2019 plan couldn't anticipate.

Legal vulnerability: Courts have consistently held that government decisions must be based on current, relevant information. Using six-year-old data to justify major asset transactions invites successful legal challenges.

Community exclusion: Conditions changed dramatically between 2019 and 2025. Community input from 2019 doesn't reflect current needs and priorities.

Professional planning firms would insist on updating a plan this old before implementation. Based on the fact that the city proceeded anyway suggests either incompetence or a predetermined outcome that couldn't survive fresh scrutiny.


What the Withdrawal Reveals

The 5-4 vote to withdraw wasn't a victory of good government over bad. It was a near-miss that exposed how close Knoxville came to a legally and financially dubious deal.

Five council members—barely a majority—had to stand against:

• Their mayor's support for the sale

• Pressure from a well-connected nonprofit with influential board members

• A predetermined process that had already invested significant time and resources

• The inertia of "we've come this far, let's finish"

That four council members and the City Mayor were prepared to proceed despite obvious process failures shows how normalized poor governance has become. These weren't difficult judgment calls. This was a basic failure to follow established procedures and standards.


Questions City Leadership Must Answer

The withdrawal doesn't resolve the underlying problems. Before any future proposal for Chilhowee Park or other public assets, city leadership owes residents answers:

• Why was implementation pursued based on a 2019 plan without updating for changed conditions?

• Who benefits from using outdated cost assumptions that guarantee change orders?

• What economic analysis compared job creation alternatives for this land?

• Why were sports facilities prioritized over economic development in a community with high unemployment and decades of disinvestment?

• What transparency and public input processes will be required for future public asset decisions?

• Will the City mayor and four council members who supported proceeding specifically acknowledge that the process was deficient?


Moving Forward

East Knoxville deserves development that addresses its actual needs: economic opportunity, job creation, business ownership, and wealth building. The community deserves a planning process based on current conditions, not pre-pandemic assumptions. And all Knoxville residents deserve city leadership that won't proceed with flawed processes just because it's convenient or politically connected entities are involved.

The withdrawal of the Chilhowee Park sale isn't the end of this story. It's an opportunity to demand better: better planning, better transparency, better prioritization of community needs, and better leadership that won't risk taxpayer interests for expedience.

The five council members who voted to withdraw deserve recognition for standing firm. The four who wanted to proceed, and the mayor who advocated for the sale, owe the public an explanation of why they were willing to move forward with a process even they must have known was deficient.

Knoxville can do better. The question is whether its leadership will choose to do so.