Will German/Collier ever be annexed? (Memphis, Bartlett: neighborhood, school, property taxes)

[madsbrittsmom]

I keep reading that Germantown and Collierville will never be annexed by Memphis. My question is how do you know? Is there a law somewhere or something that states this? Specifics please. Thanks!

[Pearlbob]

They will never be annexed. Gtown and Cville are their own cities, separate from Memphis. It's hard to explain, if you don't live here. They have their own mayors, they own school systems. Same with Bartlett.

Raleigh would be another example of a "city" around Memphis that really wasn't it's own city. It's just part of the city of Memphis now, even though if you said "I live in Raleigh" people would know what you meant.

So, Cordova is not it's own city, it's just an area, and it is being annexed by Memphis little by little. Germantown cannot have this happen because it's its own city. It would be like Miami annexing Ft. Lauderdale or LA annexing San Diego. Dallas annexing Ft. Worth. It just can't happen.

And the idea of Germantown allowing itself to be annexed by Memphis is laughable. Germantown is white, upper class, wealthy people. They want nothing to do with Memphis.

[highliner]

Don't be so cocksure about that annexation issue. I often heard people jeer about Louisville swallowing up their highly self-sufficient suburban towns, during my decade there. "We'll never let that slum town take us" they swore. Guess what happened a couple of years ago. You got it, buddy, and boy, did it ever come back to bite them in the butt! Best of luck staying independent.

[Pearlbob]

I don't know anything about the situation in Kentucky. But Germantown is its own city, Cordova never was. Germantown has it's own mayor, it's own police force, etc. Cordova was just a name for an area outside of Memphis, it wasn't really its own city like Germantown is. Maybe I'll be proved wrong, but I would be willing to bet anything that Germantown will never be annexed by Memphis. As for Collierville, it's just too far away. Memphis would have to annex the entire city of Germantown before annexing Collierville, just by geography.

[Pearlbob]

What?

I moved to Memphis specifically for my job, and I am still here for my job. I could get a job anywhere, but for the time being, I choose not to. I have friends here and I like Memphis as a young adult. As I stated above, I would not raise children here and thus would move somewhere else if that were to come up. If I could have gotten a job elsewhere years ago, I'd have done that. But I am here now, I like my job, I like where I am, and I don't feel like moving. Memphis is fine for me now. But I moved here for my job. If I stated that incorrectly previously, I apologize.

I just started posting on this site a couple days ago, I don't recall asking anyone to ban anyone. I have no clue what you are talking about.

[JMSTiger]

Germantown and Collierville are incorporated municipalities (the same as Memphis). They can not be annexed. An incorporated municipality in the state of Tennessee can only annex unincorporated areas within their own county within their own annexation reserve areas. Some of these conspiracy theories about Memphis are laughable. Counties and cities are creations of the state government. Some of you act like Memphis can go around and do whatever it likes with no regard to state law. If the state wanted to, they could abolish the city of Memphis tomorrow. Quite being consumed with such non-sense such as Memphis being able to annex existing incorporated municipalities.

[JMSTiger]

Originally Posted by highliner

Don't be so cocksure about that annexation issue. I often heard people jeer about Louisville swallowing up their highly self-sufficient suburban towns, during my decade there. "We'll never let that slum town take us" they swore. Guess what happened a couple of years ago. You got it, buddy, and boy, did it ever come back to bite them in the butt! Best of luck staying independent.

You are talking about metropolitan government, such as what Nashville and Davidson County have and what was adopted in Louisville and Jefferson County. That will never happen to Memphis and Shelby County because it would not pass within the city of Memphis and it would not pass in the areas of Shelby County outside of the city of Memphis.

[JMSTiger]

Originally Posted by madsbrittsmom

I keep reading that Germantown and Collierville will never be annexed by Memphis. My question is how do you know? Is there a law somewhere or something that states this? Specifics please. Thanks!

Because both of those places are incorporated municipalities and in the state of Tennessee (and everywhere in the United States as far as I am aware), incorporated municipalities do not annex each other. They can't because they are separate independent cities. The only way Germantown and Collierville would ever become part of the city of Memphis is if they both surrendered their city charters and THEN they were annexed by Memphis. There is about as much of a chance of that happening as seeing pigs fly and hell freezing over.

[Ottervarium]

Exactly what Pearlbob and others have said.

Germantown, Collierville, Arlington, Bartlett, etc. are each their own cities, each with its own city charter, mayor, city council, police force, etc., so they are immune to annexation by any other independent city.

(To contrast, Cordova is merely the name of a neighborhood, a particular area, like Raleigh, Egypt, Frayser, Hickory Hill, Whitehaven, Berclair, etc. It has never been its own city nor had its own government. At first it was unincorporated and outside the Memphis city limits, but over the past twenty years or so Memphis has annexed it.)

The only umbrella government over these cities, other than the state government, is the government of Shelby County, which also governs Memphis. The reason so many people complain about property taxes in the city of Memphis is because Memphis residents have to pay approximately double the amount of property taxes, since they have to pay to both the city of Memphis and also Shelby County, while county residents (i.e., people who live in one of the aforementioned cities or in an unincorporated area) only have to pay taxes to the county.


Some city and county leaders have judged this whole parallel city/county government structure as a waste and have called for a consolidated Memphis/Shelby County government (and personally, I agree). The suburbs hate the very suggestion of this, of course, since a consolidated government would eliminate the benefits of suburban sprawl and "white flight." The last time consolidation was seriously discussed, about fifteen years ago, these suburban cities threatened to petition the state to secede from Shelby County to form their own "Neshoba County."

[defiepilex]

bartlett is it's own city,with it's own government but several parts of bartlett have been annexed. someone touch on how memphis did that but they can't do it to germantown or collierville.