Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee chides Nashville Mayor John Cooper on budget management, COVID-19 business restrictions

Gov. Bill Lee chided Nashville Mayor John Cooper on Thursday for his management of the city's coronavirus relief spending, criticizing Cooper for not prioritizing small businesses while imposing "some of the most restrictive limitations" on them.

In a letter sent to Cooper on Thursday, Lee took issue with the mayor requesting tens of millions of dollars in additional aid from the state's federal award. Lee confirmed at a briefing later that day that the state would not grant those funds to Nashville.

Cooper asked the governor last week for an additional $82.6 million in COVID-19 relief to help aid Nashville's tourism industry, music venues and small businesses and to help expand the city's social resources, noting that Tennessee's financial recovery depended on Nashville.

"I must share my deep concern that, of the $93 million in Coronavirus Relief Fund dollars spent to date by your administration, only $5.7 million has been budgeted for relief to businesses," Lee wrote. "This concern is heightened by the ongoing challenges ahead for Nashville business owners who have already endured some of the most restrictive limitations on commercial activity, as well as a recently enacted property tax increase."

Lee said he would pass along the request to the members of the legislature who are part of the state's Financial Stimulus Accountability group, which makes decisions on how federal coronavirus relief funds should be spent. Later in the afternoon, Lee said the state would not "fund the current request as requested," but that he would likely be meeting with Cooper to discuss the issue.

"That's something that, for me to consider, I have to believe that the strategy that I'm investing in is consistent and aligned with the state’s strategy, and Metro Nashville is not," Lee said, noting that his own approach to reopening the state was to do so 

as soon as possible.

"We need Nashville to open up. We need conventions to be here. We need to operate safely, but we need to get our economy moving forward."

In a statement to The Tennessean, Cooper said it's his job to advocate for the Nashville and Metro should "of course" ask for available aid to for its residents and businesses during the crisis. 

"Nashville has been deeply hurt by the pandemic. We followed White House guidance on mask wearing and closing bars. I’m proud to report that we have gone from the worst to the 88th county in Tennessee by daily new cases per 100,000 residents. However, the deep economic injury from the pandemic is still with us," Cooper said. 

The administration has not responded to Lee's letter Thursday.

He said Nashville currently has "the least rapidly recovering economy of all metro regions in the United States," a comment his office later clarified was a reference to the Opportunity Insights economic tracker, a project affiliated with Harvard University, Brown University and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The tracker ranks Nashville as having the highest decrease in consumer spending compared to January, a 33.6% drop.

Lee calls Nashville's planned initiatives 'well-intentioned,' but says other counties need funds too

Lee said that any additional funding the state would give to Nashville would mean less for the other 94 counties.

The city's request for more relief includes $35.2 million for tourism-related businesses, which includes $11.7 million to assist live venues and musicians and $23.5 million for restaurants and hotels.

Asked about the letter, Lee's spokeswoman Laine Arnold said the governor is "unhappy" about ongoing business restrictions in Nashville and "fiscal mismanagement."

In the letter, Lee called some of Cooper's planned initiatives with additional funding "well-intentioned," but questioned whether they should be paid for through the Coronavirus Relief Fund. 

He said that his administration "has sought to find a more appropriate balance and make decisions based on data, while providing resources and guidance for businesses to operate safely," an apparent dig at Nashville's decision-making process on restricting businesses and events.

Cooper told Lee that immediate assistance is needed to save Nashville's "hard-won and easily-lost brand," and preserve the city's tax revenues. 

Lee asked that Cooper "re-prioritize" the city's budget of federal aid funds, specifically requesting that Nashville allocate the full remainder of the $27.3 million it has not yet budgeted toward business relief.

Tennessee has set aside $300 million in federal coronavirus funds for business relief.

Nashville received $121 million this summer in federal CARES Act funds to spend on pandemic-related costs. Since March, the city has spent $93.8 million of the federal relief.

Yihyun Jeong contributed to this report.

Reach Natalie Allison at nallison@tennessean.com. Follow her on Twitter at @natalie_allison.

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