Metro Council News To Follow
There are a couple of pieces of legislation circulating through Metro Council that are important to not only the broader Nashville community, but could also have an impact on Old Hickory.
Metro Planning wrapped up a series of public meetings on their Housing and Infrastructure Study on Tuesday, March 11. The purpose of the study is to take a holistic look at residential development, existing and planned infrastructure capacity and if current zoning policies harm Metro's ability to address the city's housing needs. Read more about the study at engage.nashville.gov/housing.
BL2025-742, which would move the Metro Historic Commission under Metro Planning, has moved to public hearing on Tuesday, March 18th. This essentially would make renovations and remodels easier for individuals who live in a historic overlay space. Councilman Jeff Eslick is a co-sponsor for this bill.
Former councilman Larry Hagar established a contextual overlay for Old Hickory Village in 2016 to assist in maintaining a consistent, historic feel within the neighborhood. A contextual overlay includes appropriate design standards necessary to maintain and reinforce established form or character of residential developments in a particular area.
What The Village has seems to differ from the stricter historic overlay, which does not regulate use but rather focuses on architectural design.
This potential shift seems like it would not impact the Village, but we are still keeping an eye out. The HOHV Board simply suggests notifying codes before doing renovations to any homes on this map, as there are a few rules you must follow.
Additionally, BL2025-690 is an ordinance that would create guardrails for the use of a community safety camera network. This network includes FUSUS, a cloud-based video surveillance platform, and license plate readers (LPRs). According to WSMV News 4, the council approved the following guidelines:
No access to live video from a donor camera if located solely on a residential property.
No access to residential cameras just showing views of the front door or the entryway, or a family area other than a parking lot, parking garage, or other outdoor common area.
Additionally, council approved the following amendments to increase police accountability:
Any video capturing an MNPD employee utilizing excessive or unlawful force will be set aside immediately and sent to the MNPD office of professional accountability and the district attorney general.
No video from donor cameras can be shared with any individual, group, or entity for any purpose outside of an active investigation.
No facial recognition technology can be used to identify individuals.
Each officer utilizing a camera is required to document the access, including date, time, circumstance, and a narrative detailing the purpose.
An audit will be performed each quarter detailing each time cameras were accessed, the purpose, and outcomes.
MNPD will report to the Metro Council once a year (no later than September 1) and publish on its website the number of cameras registered in the network
You can find more legislative updates for Metro Nashville here: https://nashville.legistar.com/.