‘With poise and purpose’
Junior Commissioners Sail Through Mock Meeting ‘Like Pros’
By Mike Steely
Senior Writer
steelym@knoxfocus.com
The 2025 Class of Knox County Junior Commissioners held a mock commission meeting on Wednesday, March 5. After learning how the local government works, the members of the group were seated at the newly-renovated main assembly room in the City-County Building and got down to business.
“Our Junior Commissioners took command control over their mock meeting with poise and purpose. From the first gavel through every motion and resolution, the students took it seriously, debated laws, worked through parliamentary procedures and handled it like pros,” Commissioner Larsen Jay told The Focus.
“I’m very proud of their hard work to operate like elected officials. I fully expect we will see one of our Junior Commissioners in office one day.”
Chaired by Keya Patel with Vice Chairman Matthew Greenwood, the high school students launched into a unique agenda of their own creation.
Like the regular commission, the high school juniors and seniors debated agenda resolutions with motions and discussions. The meeting saw several audience members take part in addressing the meeting in the Public Forum setting on a variety of topics.
Each junior commissioner took part in the various discussions.
The topics tended to be a bit more progressive, such as requiring paper bags versus plastic in grocery stores on motion by Shylyn Whitcomb. Jason Kingsford suggested a traffic study at high-risk accident-prone areas and establishing a county-wide waste reduction program.
Charity Davis saw her resolution to recognize the South-Doyle 2024 boys soccer state champion team pass.
A motion by Olivia Price suggested that judicial candidates seeking office should run in a non-partisan race and that discussion passed in a 6-4 split vote.
Other resolutions included Junior Commissioner Estella Tarbox’s tax incentive for businesses offering employee daycare; Olivia Graves offered a declaration making March “Clean Up Knox County” month and another to require interior sidewalks in new housing developments.
Greenwood suggested an extension of the Pellissippi Greenway to Hardin Valley Road and Jakhi Powell wanted to amend the county code to provide changes to its personnel plan.
One consent item pulled for discussion was a resolution sponsored by Powell and Tarbox to repurpose unused inclement weather days for an additional school break.
The junior commission will attend a Media and Politics Night this week to meet the local press corps, followed by a dinner at WBIR-TV, an address by John North and a taping of “Inside Tennessee.”
The 11 high school students in the 2025 Junior Commission Civic Education Program will be honored by the Knox County Commission as their education and training ends with a graduation at the March 31 meeting of the “regular” commission.
