MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Reducing youth gun violence and increasing economic development in Memphis neighborhoods were the two, very specific goals set by a group backed by Mayor A C Wharton.
It got more than $6 million to get the job done. But has the group lived up to its promise?
The On Your Side Investigators tracked those dollars to see whether it’s made a difference in your communities.
The Four Way has served up soul food for decades in South Memphis.
“This was a prime location for gatherings for the community,” owner Willie Earl Bates said.
The once-thriving community Bates remembers has been replaced by boarded up and burned out homes, along with empty storefronts. It’s an all too common sight in South Memphis.
Bates told WREG though, “It’s no question in my mind there are business people who see what I see. They see the past, and they see the future, they’re smart enough to do that.”
That vision for South Memphis was a major focal point for the Mayor’s Innovation Delivery Team.
The group started in 2012, housed under a private non-profit, the mayor’s Institute for Excellence in Government, or MIEG.
It got a $4.8 million grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies and a match from the City of Memphis for $1.6 million, from Wells Fargo settlement funds.
The task was two-fold: to increase neighborhood vitality and decrease youth gun violence by the fall of 2014.
Doug McGowen is the executive director.
“We have the data to show that in our specific target areas, that we were able to achieve results,” McGowen said.
Those results came with a hefty cost.
The On Your Side Investigators combed through MIEG’s tax filings.
Much of its money went to salaries – more than $700,000 the first year and even more the following.
The payroll funds roughly 20 employees, with two, McGowan and a project manager, making more than six figures.
We asked Mayor Wharton, “Has the money been well spent? Is that the right way to do it?”
He replied, “It’s designed to be heavy on the personnel side because the whole idea of innovation is that you free people up to do things that those of us on the tight, city payroll simply cannot do.”
According to McGowen, there were specific rules that came with the grant money. It had to be spent on thing like salaries, rent, and travel.
Only the match could be used for implementing programs.
MIEG spent more than $70,000 in travel in one year, another $10,000 or so for conferences and conventions, along with thousands for branding, materials, and supplies.
McGowen said, “Much of the travel that was reflected in our 990 is part of the gatherings that we have as teams with our other Bloomberg peer cities, that was part of the grant as well.”
He also said crime intervention workers visited places like Los Angeles and Baltimore for training.
The On Your Side Investigators asked for a list of employees and salaries, along with travel receipts and a breakdown of those other expenses, but MIEG refused, noting in a response that our request exceeded the “scope of records subject to public access” for non-profits.
In one of the Innovation Team’s own presentations, it said it wouldn’t be a “secretive think tank” and would be held “accountable for progress,” but it took WREG months of requests, emails, and back-and-forth to schedule an on-camera interview to talk about it.
WREG said to Mayor Wharton, “What some people are saying is, they say we don’t need any more programs…we don’t need anymore buzzwords, we need to get it done.”
“This was not about studies this was about results, we are apart of that get it done mentality,” Mayor Wharton replied.
Vibrant Neighborhoods
The neighborhood economic vitality work had three focus areas: South Memphis, Binghampton, and Madison Avenue. Some of the programs include MEMShop, MEMFix, and MEMMobile.
McGowen provided WREG with a list of 14 new businesses that opened as a result. Many of them came with the renovations along Broad Avenue, such as My Heavenly Creations, Memphis Guitar Spa, and Five In One Social Club.
Eric Evans, who owns Sache Clothing and Designs, has benefited too. He’s one of five business owners that received a forgivable loan through the MEMMobile program.
“The whole entire program that they’ve laid out it’s just been a great, great thing for everybody to be a part of,” Evans said, adding many of the mobile truck owners now meet up with one another for events.
Another program is Economic Gardening. It provides what McGowen calls “strategic business intelligence” for small businesses, like using software to identify untapped markets.
“That is information that they wouldn’t necessarily be able to get by doing a Google search or by doing anything online by themselves,” he said.
However, not every area has seen the same level of success.
The corner of Mississippi Boulevard and Walker in South Memphis was the site of MEMFix pop-up shops. The area was even the focus of a study on retail development.
Wharton said, “Have we saved that area? No. Have we given up? No.”
Safer Communities
Memphis Gun Down is the program the Innovation Delivery Team launched to tackle the goal of reducing youth, gun violence. The target areas were Frayser and South Memphis.
The goals were to reduce youth gun violence by 10 percent city-wide and by 20 percent in the target areas.
According to Gun Down Director Bishop Mays, they’ve seen a decrease of more than a 20 percent in one area and more than 55 percent in another.
“It’s about saving lives, it’s about changing behaviors,” Mays told WREG.
He also said there are a number of other factors that helped contribute to the decline and community partners working toward the same goal.
Gun Down tracks murders, aggravated assaults, and aggravated robberies of suspects under the age of 24 for its fiscal year.
Despite the decrease, it notes overall violent crime in Memphis is up, including in the same categories.
Mays said, “Just because numbers fluctuate up, down, whatever, that’s no reason to stop the fight.”
Memphis City Councilman Harold Collins asked for more proof of those results when the group requested additional funding at a December council meeting.
Collins wanted to know how many guns the group had helped to get off the streets.
“And then the question then becomes, ‘So what are you doing with the money?'” he said.
Mays said, “If you find out what we’re about, you’ll understand that we’re not wired that way. They’re (law enforcement) doing the police work, what we’re trying to do is change that desire to pick up that gun to resolve conflict.”
Delvin Lane heads up the 901 BLOC Squad, which is part of Gun Down. He says they’ve worked with 177 kids and helped to deescalate more than 200 incidents.
“You take a team like us away, that’s 202 situations where I can venture to say that 60 or 70 of them would have been gun fire, somebody would have been hurt or possibly killed,” Lane said.
Lane says they need even more intervention workers to do the job. He hopes they can move into other communities.
Another program related to reducing youth gun violence is the Hospital-Based Violence Intervention Program, which WREG recently profiled.
MIEG provided WREG with a Gun Down budget itemization it gave to City Council. Most of the money went to salaries for the Gun Down staff and Intervention team. The rest went to programs like Safeways, Youth Summer Employment, and other outreach projects.
Memphis Gun Down Budget Itemization
Overall, McGowen said, “Real lives are being saved, real businesses are being started, but we understand that many, too many people feel that disinvestment, simply said, there`s more work to be done.”
Work Bates says he’s proud of so far, but hopes the rest will happen soon.
Future of MIEG and Innovation Delivery Team
The grant money has come to and end. A June budget presentation showed the Innovation Team would have roughly $85,000 through July. Many of the programs it started are now being handed over to other groups in town, which the team considers another measure of success.
- Memphis Gun Down – Not finalized, but will likely be housed in the city through Office of Youth Services or Parks and Neighborhoods.
- MEMShop and MEMMobile – Communities Unlimited
- MEMFix – Livable Memphis
- Economic Gardening and ICED – EDGE