TVA's top executive to give ash spill deposition

KNOXVILLE, (AP) — The Tennessee Valley Authority's top executive is to answer questions behind closed doors for seven hours about the utility's coal ash spill.
TVA Chief Executive Officer Tom Kilgore is scheduled to give a deposition Tuesday at the utility's headquarters in Knoxville, answering questions by lawyers for people who have filed damage lawsuits. A TVA spokeswoman said the session is closed to reporters.

A breach in an earthen dam in December 2008 sent 5.4 million cubic yards of ash into the Emory River and onto surrounding landscape at TVA's Kingston Plant in East Tennessee.

TVA unsuccessfully opposed the deposition.

A federal magistrate approved the questioning after plaintiff attorneys said Kilgore has "unique personal knowledge of the events and relevant matters."

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

Petition to recall Chattanooga mayor nears goal

Associated Press
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — There's a political rumble in Chattanooga, a recall effort by tax-protesting tea partiers and others aimed at a mayor who would rather be talking about new Volkswagen jobs and the success of a redeveloped riverfront.

Mayor Ron Littlefield won't even comment about his antagonists who are close to collecting enough recall signatures to force an unscheduled mayoral election, possibly on Nov. 2. Critics of the mayor, who is one year into his second and final term, are mostly upset about him pushing through a property tax increase.

Recall petitioners who have been knocking on doors near the end of a 75-day effort are optimistic. Election officials said Friday they have delivered 8,525 valid signatures, less than 500 short of the total needed before a Monday afternoon deadline.

Later Friday, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported on its web site that election officials said enough signatures had been obtained. The election commission was closed for the night when an Associated Press reporter called for confirmation.

The mayor's spokesman, Richard Beeland, said Friday that if the petitioners force an election, Littlefield will be a candidate.

Regardless of how many signatures are gathered, election officials say the recall effort is likely headed to the courts before there is any election. If recall petitioners get enough voter signatures, Littlefield and other prospective candidates would have until Sept. 9 to collect 25 voter signatures and qualify to be on the ballot.

Tea party activist Charles Wysong said he voted for Littlefield twice and was a longtime supporter until the mayor recommended a 33 percent property tax increase that City Council members reduced to 19 percent before approving it in June.

"I got people to vote for him and I was horrified that there was so little consideration for the people on fixed incomes, those without jobs and those who are underemployed," Wysong said. "The thing that probably angered me the most is when Ron Littlefield stood before the City Council and told them we had come out of the recession in February of this year. I think the issue right now is getting one unjust civil servant out."

Beeland said the recall effort is casting a shadow on Chattanooga's reputation as a city attracting tourist dollars with a gleaming Tennessee River shoreline and on its recent successes like landing Volkswagen's new assembly plant with 2,000 jobs.

"They are hellbent on not only destroying the community but destroying the man," Beeland said.

He said the recall effort is "systemic from this national movement of anger. Everyone is mad and wants something but I don't know if they know what they want or not."

Chattanooga businessman Jim Folkner, an organizer of Citizens to Recall Mayor Ron Littlefield, said the property tax increase is one of several reasons to remove Littlefield, who in 2009 received just over 10,000 votes in a city with about 99,000 registered voters to win the nonpartisan election. Folkner said Littlefield also engineered a storm water fee increase, has led the city into some questionable financial transactions and has spent extravagantly on projects such as a little-used parking lot with a porous surface.

"It's the only way to stop someone who is out of control in their lame duck term," Folkner said.

Folkner said the recall effort involves a broader political spectrum than tea partiers.

"As a leader of this thing I have some people on the left and some people on the right," Folkner said.

Folkner won't say if he might be a candidate for mayor if there is an election.

Another petitioner, Chattanooga Organized for Action leader Chris Brooks, said the mayor has failed to address the city's gang problems and refused to be open with city financial documents during budget discussions.

"My organization is composed of teachers, city workers, retirees and college students," Brooks said. "For us it is accountability and transparency of our government."

Tennessee election officials said they do not keep a record of such recall efforts but they are rare.

In New Jersey, the state's highest court has agreed to hear the case of a tea party group looking to recall Democratic U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez. Tea partiers want Menendez removed because he supports health care reform and because of his votes that favor government spending.

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga political analyst Robert Swansbrough said the effort against Chattanooga's mayor "seems like an accumulation of grievances, after failing to defeat Littlefield in his re-election."

"For most Americans, elections are when we show our displeasure against politicians, unless corruption or similar scandal, not simply policy differences provoking recall movements," Swansbrough said in an e-mail. "Each party could then launch recalls after their candidate loses 'take my baseball and bat and go home if I don't get my way' syndrome."

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

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