Chattanooga, Hamilton County mayors talk equal opportunity

In a conversation about the future of local Black businesses, Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly and Hamilton County Mayor Weston Wamp told a gathering of small business owners Saturday morning that, even as government adjusts to the state law that mandated the end of diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, neither mayor wants a divided economy.Both Kelly and Wamp said that past DEI efforts were mostly performative and that strides are still being made in city and county government when it comes to ensuring equality of opportunity.Kelly said it’s not difficult for city government to make the shift to talk about access and opportunity, while expelling terms like equity, diversity and inclusion.”If you understand just a little bit about history, you happen to have one group of people who has been historically very disadvantaged,” Kelly told the crowd of fewer than 100. “So, great, let’s just make it about access and opportunity. You don’t have to be Black to take advantage of these programs or need them, right? But they clearly are going to be more useful to a group of people that’s historically been disadvantaged and boxed out.”It’s just another way around the barn,” Kelly added. “But the work itself will not change. It has not changed.”Before the recent legal changes, Wamp said the county had diversity goals “but they were really just to say they had a goal and we were falling tremendously short of it.”The moderator, Ken Jones, asked what their administrations’ priorities were, related to Black small businesses.Kelly said one of his core goals since coming into office has been to close the gaps between white and Black Chattanoogans.”We’ve got a foundational ecosystem here that’s very much focused on economic mobility,” he said.(SIGN UP: Get breaking news in your inbox as it happens by going to timesfreepress.com/breaking)Wamp said he is focused on providing more opportunities through workforce development programs like those held at the Construction Career Center, where the Level Up event was held Saturday morning. Chattanooga Business Elite, a group that works to support and connect Black small businesses, hosted the summit.”The students who have an opportunity to spend a half a day here all go, you know, they’re all zoned to either Howard or Brainerd or East Ridge,” Wamp said. “It represents career pathways and career opportunities that simply did not exist over the last couple decades.”The former BlueCross BlueShield building at West M.L. King Boulevard and Gateway Avenue, purchased by the county in 2023, will be used for another workforce development center in the future, he said.Wamp said the Hamilton County Commission had also approved more than $5 million to be spent on renovating the county-owned Small Business Development Center in downtown’s North Shore, which is managed by the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce.”I think a lot of things there have got tired,” Wamp said. “From a taxpayer perspective, it’s one of the most valuable, publicly owned buildings, and if we’re going to run an incubator in this community, let’s make sure that it’s not just serving as subsidized rent to people who could find space elsewhere.”Let’s make sure that it’s really a force for good, for people who need a hand up and may have faced different types of barriers on their entrepreneurial journey,” he said.Staff photo by Matt Hamilton/ Hamilton County Mayor Weston Wamp answers a question during the Level Up Summit at the Construction Career Center on Saturday, August 9, 2025.(READ MORE: Republican supermajority passes bills to ‘dismantle’ DEI in state, local government)What changes have been made that positively impact minority businesses, asked Jones, the moderator.Kelly said the city is working on a plan to bolster small business corridors and is pivoted to focus more on small business entrepreneurs.A new entrepreneurial center is also soon to open in the city-owned Kelly building downtown on M.L. King Boulevard, he said.”That’s going to be a really exciting center for the community to focus probably largely on the creative economy,” Kelly said.Wamp pointed again to the county’s workforce development efforts, such as finding business partners for the planned downtown workforce development center at the former BlueCross building, and the county-owned Small Business Development Center. The space the county is building there is “going to be the most resource-rich environment we’ve ever had,” Wamp said.”There will be space on the second floor that the county occupies that we hope will be the front door for entrepreneurship,” he said.The moderator then asked how the mayors were helping Black entrepreneurs grow their businesses.(SIGN UP: Get Business news from the Times Free Press in your inbox five days a week by going to timesfreepress.com/business)In his second term, Kelly said the city’s economic development work will shift focus toward historically disadvantaged communities, which will require resources.”My point to council has been, we have to continue the work, and the work isn’t cheap,” he said.Kelly said projects like the Kelly building entrepreneurial center will require investment.Wamp said the county had changed its procurement rules since he came into office, making things more small-business friendly.He said he is skeptical about the effectiveness of government when it comes to growing businesses, but more convinced of the value of investing in schools like Tyner Academy, which the county just renovated.(READ MORE: Chattanooga Housing Authority reaffirms commitment to DEI policy in message to staff)When asked what government was doing to remove barriers and allow Black businesses to secure contracts, Kelly said the city needs a scoring matrix that values local businesses recirculating local dollars.Staff photo by Matt Hamilton/ Hamilton County Mayor Weston Wamp, back, looks on as Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly answers a question posed by moderator Ken Jones during the Level Up Summit at the Construction Career Center on Saturday, August 9, 2025.”We’re working on that now, because whatever we come up with is going to have to withstand a legal challenge by the state,” he said. “This is not a race-based thing. This is about the local community.”Wamp said some of the best ideas he hears don’t work under current state law.Shay McCowan, one of the event organizers, told the Chattanooga Times Free Press that the dismantling of DEI efforts is hurting and discouraging local, Black small businesses. Three businesses in the collective have had to close recently, she said.McCowan said her takeaway from what the mayors said was that they were still learning what was going to work. She said she was thankful they were willing to have the conversation.”Now, do I think all of the answers they gave were exactly what we needed to hear? Yes and no,” she said. “More dialogue is needed, and more seats at the table must be filled by Black business owners. There’s still a lot of work to be done and Chattanooga Business Elite is committed to pushing for that work.”Contact projects editor Joan McClane at jmcclane@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6601.

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