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Three Petitions. Two Years.Who Actually Represents Us?

An open letter to Councilmember Terry Vo, NDOT, and Nashville's elected officials, after the Nashville Scene covered our fight. Three completed petitions, two years, and still no clear answer.

Read the open letter
01
A Letter From Music Row

We didn't plan on doing this.

We live on Music Row in District 17. We are artists, songwriters, managers, lawyers, students, doctors, nurses, bartenders, and professional workers. We are a community of local people who pay taxes here and love living in Midtown.

And between all of us? Making noise and getting attention is kinda what we do.

And for more than two years, our community has been trying to get straight answers from the City of Nashville.

Emails. Meetings. Petitions. More emails. Different answers. No answers.

Now NDOT has asked our councilwoman to accept our community's THIRD attempt at submitting our RPP petitions.

And we can't get her to respond.

This is bullshit. And we are not afraid to say it.

We didn't plan to build a website over a parking issue. But then something happened.

We got louder. And people started paying attention.

Last week, NewsChannel 5 put our story on the 6pm news.

So now we are curious.

If this is what's happening to us, what's happening to everyone else in Nashville? How many people are fighting City Hall and eventually just give up? Who makes noise for them?

Maybe we do.

The facts of our situation are below. Read them. Make up your own mind.

As for us, we're not going anywhere.

Keep ignoring the emails. Keep making it unnecessarily difficult. We'll keep getting louder.

We have time.

And making noise?

This is what we do.

Do better, Nashville.
This site belongs to all of us. One of us answers the email. Meet Bo →
850
days since NDOT promised our parking signs, in writing
86.8%
of residents signed the petition. The city required 75%
116+
emails with the city, documented and on file
0
parking signs installed
02
In The News

Nashville Is Watching

We did not set out to be a news story. We were happy just being neighbors. But when nobody answers your emails for two years, eventually you end up answering questions on the 6pm news instead.

As seen on NewsChannel 5
"Nashville's residential parking program is on pause, and Music Row neighbors are paying the price"
"We have another guy over here with $700 in tickets."
Watch the story Hannah Can Help · NewsChannel 5
03
Watch The Time Go By

This Is What Waiting Looks Like

On April 16, 2024, NDOT told us in writing that our parking signs were two to three weeks away. Watch every month since then go by, exactly like we did.

0months
0days
0signs installed
The city said 2 to 3 weeks.
04
Exhibit A

The Record

We are not activists. We are neighbors with day jobs who asked for one simple thing: the residential parking program our block qualifies for. We followed every rule the city gave us, nicely, for more than two years. Here is what that got us. Every entry below comes from written correspondence we keep on file.

Early 2024

Paid parking meters appear on our block.

NDOT installed paid parking on 18th Avenue South. Residents received no notice. Neighbors with one garage space and two cars now had nowhere to park. So we did what the city says to do: we applied for Residential Permit Parking.

March 2024

NDOT's own analysis says we qualify.

The staff analysis prepared for Metro's Traffic and Parking Commission found our block met every one of the four criteria and recommended approval.

"Recommendation: Approval of new Residential Permit Parking for 150 ft on the west side of 18th Ave S at 807 18th Ave S, 24/7."NDOT staff analysis, Traffic and Parking Commission agenda, 2024
April 8, 2024

The baseline: nothing was wrong with our application.

The Traffic and Parking Commission did not reject our application that day. It did not find it deficient, incomplete, or short of the criteria. It deferred the matter 30 days to get one piece of information: the number of available spaces. So on April 8, the official record held two things and only two things:

NDOT: criteria met, approval recommended.
Commission: no adverse finding, a 30-day deferral for one number.The official record, April 8, 2024

Everything the city has claimed since has to be measured against this baseline. If the outcome changed after April 8, the record should say what changed, what new information justified it, and who made that call. It says none of those things.

April 16, 2024

NDOT promises our signs. In writing.

"NDOT will install RPP signage at this location so that it may be enforceable... I'd expect the sign shop to take 2-3 weeks... Once signs are up, you should contact Marcus Jackson for your RPP permits."J. Andrew Smith, P.E., NDOT, email to residents
The rest of 2024

Then, nothing.

No signs. No permits. No follow-up. Communication simply stopped. When we asked our council office, we were told the application "was denied." But the reason kept changing: first the criteria, later a signature threshold, later the paperwork. To this day, no 2024 denial appears anywhere in the record. What the record holds is an approval recommendation, a written promise of signs, and then silence.

March 2025

The city's answer: start over.

Councilwoman Terry Vo met with NDOT and relayed their position: the old application was dead and we would have to begin a brand-new process from scratch. When we pointed to NDOT's own written promise from April 2024, no one addressed it.

May 2025

Even our councilwoman can't get an answer.

"I was hoping to write you all back with an update but I am still waiting to hear back from NDOT. I have done a few follow-ups but haven't received a response."Councilwoman Terry Vo, email to residents, May 2025

Days later the answer arrived: no other pathway. Resubmit everything.

March 2026

We resubmit. NDOT calls it a "duplicate."

Our new application was flagged as a duplicate of the one they had already denied. Read that again: they told us to start over, then rejected the restart for matching the original. Our compliance became the defect. More weeks lost untangling that.

April 17, 2026

We go to the Mayor and the full Metro Council.

Subject line: "URGENT: Midtown Residents Denied Access to Parking Permit Program for Over One Year." One council member's reply said more than she probably intended:

"Metro can be horribly disorganized."A Metro Council member, April 2026
May 4, 2026

Finally, a meeting and a clear finish line.

Our HOA met with Councilwoman Vo and NDOT leadership. The instructions were explicit: collect signatures from 75% of eligible residents and submit the petition. We started knocking on doors that week.

May - July 2026

Neighbors deliver 86.8%.

Weeks of door-knocking, printed forms in a green folder by the elevator, signatures collected one unit at a time under rules that disqualified e-signatures, out-of-state owners, and anyone without a Tennessee license. We did not clear the bar. We cleared it by almost twelve points.

July 17, 2026

With petitions in hand, the program goes "on hold."

After working with the city on the process, we went to work. We achieved 86.8% of our residents. We reached out to Councilwoman Vo to deliver the petitions, and that is when she informed us that the program had been put on hold.

"At this time, the RPP program is on hold. I have asked NDOT to inform me as soon as the program resumes."Councilwoman Terry Vo, email to residents

Two years of process, a finish line we crossed, and the race was called off.

August 5, 2026

Metro's own portal sells us permits.

Residents discovered Metro's Residential Parking Permit portal accepting applications for our address. Neighbors applied, paid the $10 fee, and printed official permits the same day. We believed it was finally over.

August 6, 2026

Metro issued the permit. Metro issued the ticket.

Less than 24 hours later, a vehicle displaying that brand-new permit received a parking citation. Metro accepted the application, took the payment, issued the permit, then ticketed the car carrying it.

August 6 - 11, 2026

The city's answer: it was all "an error."

NDOT said the permits were generated by mistake, refunded them, declared them invalid, and offered to dismiss the citation "as a gesture of goodwill." NDOT now also says the 2024 commission item was deferred, not approved, despite its own staff recommendation and its own engineer's written promise of signage. The program remains on hold. Our street remains without the protection the city's own analysis said we qualify for.

August 2026

The story makes the news.

NewsChannel 5's Hannah McDonald covered our fight: two years of process, permits sold in error, tickets issued to the cars carrying them, and a program on pause while neighbors pay the price. Watch the NewsChannel 5 story.

Today

Still no signs. Still asking.

This site exists so the whole record stays public. We will keep posting every development here, word for word, until Nashville does better.

05
You Cannot Make This Up

In Their Own Words

We are trying to be as nice about this as we can. So nothing here is our opinion. These are direct quotes from the people running our city, dated and on file. They said it. We just kept the receipts.

"NDOT will install RPP signage at this location so that it may be enforceable."
NDOT engineer, in writing · April 16, 2024
That was 850 days ago. Signs installed: zero.
"I have done a few follow-ups but haven't received a response."
Councilwoman Terry Vo, on getting answers from her own city's transportation department · May 2025
If your own councilwoman cannot get NDOT to answer, what chance do you have?
"Metro can be horribly disorganized."
A sitting Metro Council member, replying to our complaint · April 2026
Their words, not ours.
"This is 100% an error on our end."
NDOT, after Metro's own portal sold residents parking permits, then ticketed a car displaying one · August 2026
They kept the program on hold anyway.
"...as a gesture of goodwill."
NDOT, offering to dismiss the ticket it issued against the permit it sold · August 2026
Goodwill would have been the signs they promised in 2024.
"The commission deferred the request for RPP at the April 2024 meeting without approval."
An NDOT engineer, August 2026, explaining why no signs were ever installed
Written by the same engineer who promised our signs, in writing, eight days after that meeting. Both statements are in the record. They cannot both be true.
06
The Demands

What We Want

We are reasonable people, and this is a reasonable list. No mystery. No maze. Five things, in writing. That is the whole list.

  1. Honor the 2024 approval. The commission approved us in 2024. We were not denied. NDOT's own analysis said we qualified, approval was recommended, signage was promised in writing, and no denial ever appeared in the record. We worked hard for that approval. Respect it.
  2. An independent review of this entire process. From 2024 to today, reviewed by an independent firm outside NDOT and outside Metro. Not the agency grading its own homework.
  3. A written finding. Did NDOT's conduct breach the standards that govern the agency? If so, say so in writing, and name the corrective action. Not a summary. Not a shrug. A finding.
  4. Install the signs. The 150 feet of Residential Permit Parking at 807 18th Avenue South that the city's own analysis recommended. A few signs. Two years and counting.
  5. Rules that hold still. Restart the RPP program with criteria that do not move mid-process, for us and for every other Nashville neighborhood stuck in the same maze.

And why are we owed every one of them? One of our neighbors said it best:

"Governmental accountability should not be asking NDOT to explain its conduct; it should include determining whether NDOT's conduct breached the standards governing the agency and, if so, what corrective action is required. Our community's application should and does not shield NDOT from being held responsible for their actions regarding this matter." A neighbor of 807 18th Avenue South · August 2026
The government cannot evaluate an application under one set of criteria, determine that the criteria are satisfied, recommend approval, and then, without identifying any change in the facts, the requirements, or the standard, recast that same application as deficient.
01

Standards do not move.

Criteria and evidentiary standards must be applied consistently and transparently. An agency cannot retroactively convert its own request for clarification into a finding that the application was deficient.

02

The burden is not ours.

An applicant should not have to prove a negative that the agency created after its own evaluation was already complete.

03

The subject is NDOT's conduct.

Accountability here is about how the agency behaved, not about an applicant's supposed failure. Our application does not shield NDOT from responsibility for its own actions.

07
Buckle Up

Our Next Moves

We never planned any of this. But honestly? We are finding out that local community organizing, and standing up for what is right when your public officials kinda suck, is actually kinda fun.

We didn't want to go on the news last week. Truth is, we had been talking to the news for months, because we had every hope we could get things done by working with the city. But here we are.

We now have a whole website. We told you last week we would have a website. Here we are.

So what's up next? Well, we happen to have a lot of experience in events, programming, and fundraising. So we will be spending our spare time working on ways to make sure the residents of Nashville know that Councilwoman Vo, NDOT, and everyone connected to this situation are ineffective and neglecting to do their jobs for the people they serve.

So you could say: we are going to just keep getting louder.

We are inviting people to follow along. Follow us. Sign up for the email list. We will see. Maybe this strikes a nerve. Maybe we end up with a nice group of people here who can actually make change in a community.

When city leadership fails, it usually means it is time for new leadership.

So this is the start of that.

Join the email list Follow @dobetternashville
08
The Latest

Updates

First update coming soon.
09
Make Some Noise

Email The People In Charge

Every address below comes straight from our own correspondence with the city. These are public officials, at their public government addresses, paid with your tax dollars. Be respectful. Be specific. And ask them one question: when will Nashville do better?

The Mayor's Office
[email protected]
Email →
Councilwoman Terry Vo · District 17 (that's us)
[email protected]
Email →
Every Metro Council member, one address
[email protected]
Email →
NDOT Interim Director
[email protected]
Email →
Email all of them at once
The full list: every city address from our case record (56 addresses)

Mayor's Office

NDOT staff on our case

Metro Council

10
Stay In The Loop

Get our email updates

One email when something actually happens. We have day jobs, so we will never flood your inbox. And we never share your address with anyone.

11
Your Turn

What's your neighborhood dealing with?

These two years taught us something: we are not the only ones. So now we are curious. What have you been asking the city to fix while nobody writes back? Tell us. We read every single one, and if you have a valid concern, we will help you get attention on it. Getting attention happens to be what we do for a living.

Your complaint comes straight to us, not to the city. We keep your email private and only use it to follow up with you.