CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) – An ordinance was proposed this week and quickly taken back that would have slammed the brakes on all new construction in Clarksville – imposing a 180-day suspension on issuing building permits, grading permits and construction permits, as well as the filing of rezoning applications, to allow for more study of the city’s infrastructure and stormwater capacity.

Councilperson Jerry Haywood sponsored the ordinance and had it put on the City of Clarksville Finance Committee meeting agenda. However, he told Clarksville Now Monday morning that he pulled the proposal before the meeting because, after word got out to business leaders and developers, it had already served its purpose.

“I proposed this ordinance not to stop growth, but to start a serious conversation,” Haywood said. “After the devasting floods in February and April, it’s clear that we lack a real plan to protect our residents. This was about putting a spotlight on a problem we cannot afford to ignore, because we cannot keep moving forward while leaving people under water.”

Haywood said he received more emails regarding this ordinance than any other matter that has been brought to the council in 2025. His inbox and phone were lighting up even on Easter Sunday. He said he doesn’t understand why some didn’t have the same reaction when peoples’ houses were flooded. “We didn’t get the same reaction of, ‘Hey let me help,'” he said.

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“I brought this to a committee so it would go on an agenda, and people would start talking and seeing, ‘Hey let’s see if we can figure out how to stop this and how to help our community get back on its feet.’ Because it’s not just one community that has been devasted with floods. There are multiple areas of Clarksville, multiple roads of Clarksville, that when it rains, you’ve got to find a detour, you’ve got to find another way around the city,” Haywood said.

One of the people that reached out was a developer with a civil engineering degree, who said they are willing to help find a solution, Haywood said. “That was my main purpose behind this, to open eyes and see if we can get everyone to come together and figure something out for the community,” Haywood said.

Moratorium would damage economy

Business leaders and developers flooded to City Hall Monday afternoon to sit in on the Finance Committee meeting. The board room, with a capacity of about three dozen, quickly went over capacity, and about a dozen people were turned away.

Outside the city Finance Committee meeting on Monday, Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Smith told Clarksville Now, “As a small-business owner, this moratorium would have directly affected my business that we just made a huge investment, building a brand-new building in Montgomery County. So, with the stop of construction in the entire county, it would have affected all industries.

“When you shut down an entire sector of industry, it would have hurt Clarksville economically, which would have hurt thousands and thousands of families. So, to me, this seems more like a kneejerk reaction to an issue that’s been ongoing with the flooding. Where a moratorium for public health and safety, should have been put in place in certain little areas, not citywide,” he said.

Smith said that he’s glad Haywood pulled the ordinance from the agenda, and he’s hopeful the city can come together with some viable solutions.

When asked about those solutions, Smith said, “To me, they need to get engineers in these low laying areas and figure out either A.) why there is no injection well, or B.) why the injection well was not maintained. There are injection wells in the Exit 1 area, and we need to figure out if it’s HOA maintained, or city maintained because there are some city-maintained ones out there, and why they weren’t releasing water.”

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