Where are My Red Bank Property Taxes Going? 

A Word from City Manager Martin Granum 

Where are my Red Bank property taxes going?  

Excellent question… thank you for asking! Speaking as your City Manager, I’ll begin my answer with “Thank you.” Thank you for your support of the city staff; we take our responsibility to be stewards of your tax dollars as our duty.  A duty to provide the municipal services you rely upon; police, fire, public works, and court services that sustain the City of Red Bank. So beyond simply saying “Thank you”, what are we actually doing with your tax dollars? The following is a brief top-of-mind list of things we are doing right now to serve you …

In law enforcement: two new patrol vehicles, an emergency generator for the police station (it’s never had one), two additional police officers (going from 24 to 26 sworn officers), introducing ALPRs (automated license plate readers) along the State Routes in the city, implemented body-worn camera technology and synched them with new in-car cameras for seamless data retrieval, new in-car laptops, and created Lieutenant and Deputy Chief positions for improved levels of leadership. And RBPD was just recertified by the State for the fourth consecutive time. There are few cities of 12,000 with this level of law enforcement excellence. So, you should feel safe in your home, safe in your neighborhood, and safe in your city.   

Modernization of City Hall functions and shared internal support services: We are installing and creating new digital infrastructure for all departments this year starting with new audio/visual (A/V) equipment for commission meetings. I invite you to watch online or view the YouTube recordings at your convenience. You will now find the quality of the online and recorded meetings is vastly improved; you can actually hear what people are saying!   We are migrating our digital archives from old servers (yes, they were really in the janitor’s closet) to secure, cloud-based storage, and we’re replacing firewalls and improving cybersecurity measures.   

We are implementing digital document management, starting with the Court, which will ultimately allow much faster access to records and allow us to demolish the dilapidated Annex building behind the police building and destroy hundreds of musty old boxes of records. We’ve completely renewed our website and implemented the iWorQ application for all things Public Works and it’s transformed how we engage with the public (have you tried our Citizen Portal for free bulk trash at your home?)  And our new Facebook page is amazing… please have a look @redbanktn.gov

We are also looking after our most precious resources, our human resources, and are endeavoring to be an ‘employer of choice’. In this tight labor market, we are attracting and retaining great employees. It wasn’t always that way.  Back in 2021, we were losing police officers to the Sheriff’s Office, the TVA, and the Tennessee Highway Patrol. We’ve turned that around and are now attracting great officers to Red Bank from other agencies, in addition to our existing officers staying and seeking opportunities here in Red Bank for promotion to higher levels of leadership and responsibility while all in a very competitive environment for law enforcement talent.  And it’s a similar story in RBFD and Public Works.  An amazing turnaround in attracting and retaining talent started with onboarding the City’s first-ever Human Resources professional (Tracey Perry) and offering competitive pay and benefits to all city employees. It is just that simple. You get what you pay for in all things, and it’s especially true regarding talented employees.  

 We have quadrupled the number of Commission-appointed advisory committees from two (planning and BZA) to now include festival, cemetery, art, nonprofit, park/rec, and urban transportation.

Other major accomplishments with this current budget are in three key areas: eliminated the practice of projecting a budget deficit… we are now funded to accomplish all the tasks envisioned in the budget itself; incorporated the realities of the highest inflation seen in a generation; and growing to adequate staffing in the following areas: police (2 officers), fire (one additional firefighter 24/7/365) and in Public Works adding two staff in stormwater (1), and sanitation (1).  

In Public Works, we purchased a new jetter truck for stormwater system maintenance, a first-ever street sweeper, new pickups (4 ordered), and a replacement brush truck. We’ve installed a network of AEDs in all our public buildings, painted and re-roofed the restroom at Kids’ Corner, installed Wi-Fi at multiple locations, installed new roofs at Morrison Springs and White Oak Park restrooms, we’re constructing a new playground at White Oak Park, installing smoke detection at the Community Center and made upgrades at the pickleball courts (lighting, fencing, surfacing).  We’re replacing the HVAC at the boxing club and are managing a host of major TDOT grant-funded projects, with the largest being the signalization project at five intersections.  We are about to install two grant-funded EV charging stations. These will be the first public EV charging stations anywhere in Red Bank they will literally put Red Bank on the map when you search for public EV charging stations. We are also upgrading the ADA access to City Hall and the Courtroom.

Speaking of the Courtroom, we repaired the HVAC which made it more comfortable and much quieter and replaced all the lighting.  Between these repairs and the new A/V mentioned earlier, the Commission and Courtroom experience is an order of magnitude better now.

On the firefighter side, we added a firefighter across all shifts (I mentioned that earlier) which takes us from four to five firefighters on duty at all times… that’s a 25% increase in available firefighters which makes a difference in what you can do upon arrival at an actual fire.  We have also added a second set of turnout gear for all firefighters, significantly expanded our in-house training efforts, and added an off-road utility vehicle for areas where our fire trucks cannot access.

Looking ahead, we have commenced three major planning efforts: a parks master plan, a city-wide comprehensive plan, and a stormwater asset management plan.  The parks master plan will inform everything we do for parks in the future, and it also makes us competitive for parks grant funding.  We are in the initial stages of a stormwater asset management plan… we have over 4,4oo stormwater ‘structures’ throughout the city… and we’ve never inventoried or managed them, until now.  And the stormwater threat is real… a half-mile of Stringers Branch flows underneath our central business district and the condition of the pipes down there requires we actively manage that critical stretch of our stormwater system.  To understand the stormwater issue, please know that all the stormwater from about Lillie Maes flows south through Red Bank and ultimately joins Mountain Creek on the Baylor campus… so our entire city depends on the stormwater system doing its job.  We are now proactive against that stormwater requirement in an effort to ensure we are not surprised by any drainage issues.  Additionally, we are undertaking the city’s first-ever comprehensive plan, including a small area study to inform what will happen at the former Red Bank Middle School site.  This will resolve the long-standing ‘conversion agreement’ issue with the State and the National Park Service, which has been stuck for over a decade with no resolution.  Lastly, regarding planning, we are wrapping up our first-ever sidewalk inventory which will inform where we make our next sidewalk investments, and we have begun a pavement condition index (PCI) of the 72 miles of road we maintain.  We will get a PCI score for every bit of roadway and that will be the basis of all our street maintenance, repair, and replacement decisions going forward.

I’m so pleased with the work the city is doing across every aspect of municipal service delivery, and I am grateful, profoundly grateful, for the support and resources our taxpayers provide, so we can, in turn, provide the municipal services… Police, Fire, Public Works, Court… that the city relies upon every day. My personal values, which I internalized from my career in the US Air Force, are integrity, service, and excellence.  I hope it shows.   

I will wrap up with one final piece of good news: our last three annual audits were ‘unmodified’, ‘clean’ audits… which means the auditor found no deficiencies and made no findings.   The Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury has presented the City of Red Bank with a ‘budget certificate’ each of the past two years, putting us in the top quarter of cities across that state and commending the City of Red Bank for responsible management of public funds.  

I remain grateful to the Commission and each of you for this opportunity to serve as your city manager.     

In Service, Martin Granum

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 Have a Plan to Get Home Safely  

If you plan on attending a Super Bowl party this year, designate a driver beforehand. Don’t want to wait until the end of the night to find a safe ride home. You can also use Uber, Lyft, or contact a cab company to pick you up. The important thing is to think about your options and have a plan before you start drinking.  

 Hosting a Party?  

If you host a Super Bowl Party, make sure to take care of your guests. Make sure you know of your guest's plans to get home. When all else fails, offering a spare bedroom or couch can be a great option. Drunk driving is 100-percent preventable. It’s important to remember that buzzed driving is drunk driving, and even one drink can be one drink too many. If you plan on drinking alcohol during the Super Bowl, don’t get behind the wheel of a vehicle.

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Red Bank Fire Department Winter Heating Safety