The Mayor of Nashville continues to provide quotes that make it seem as though he doesn’t care about locally owned businesses in Nashville going under because of property tax hikes.
Chances are you’ve heard of the property tax problem that many local business owners in downtown Nashville are trying to navigate at the moment. Basically, the new property appraisals that were completed in 2024 have raised property taxes to heights that have never been seen before. So high, in fact, that many Broadway staples are in danger of closing their doors.
Acme Feed and Seed owner Tom Morales revealed in comments earlier this month that he may have to close his bar, one of the few locally-owned venues left on Broadway, because of the rising property taxes:
“It went from $129,000 a year to $600,000 a year. That’s more than our rent and net profit combined… We can’t pay it. It’s punitive.”
And Morales isn’t alone.
Layla Vartanian, the owner of Layla’s Honky Tonk on Broadway, has also previously sited relentless property tax hikes as a reason why her iconic venue might shutter. She said that it’s the largest property tax increase she’s seen since she opened up her bar in 1997:
“I’ve never seen an increase of any kind of property tax or any kind of tax in such a short period of time. We’re having an increase of 300-400% on these buildings down here, on our commercial buildings. Even on personal properties, residential properties, the increase is 300% and 400%.”
Simply put, those types of increase are impossible for a locally owned business to offset. Conveniently, most of the corporate owned businesses (many of the artist-owned bars on Broadway) are able to withstand raises in property taxes like the ones that have happened in the past couple of years.
That’s created quite the dangerous situation – in terms of trying to preserve the history and local owners of Nashville – and the state government has heard the cries for reform and relief. The Tennessee General Assembly is currently considering two different bills, and both would set out to limit annual property tax growth (one is tied to inflation, while the other caps increases at 2% a year).
House Speaker Cameron Sexton told FOX 17 the state will do all that it can to protect the city of Nashville now and into the future:
“Tennessee is moving in that direction. We need some kind of protection. They don’t want to stop the tax increases — just put a cap on it year to year over a three-year period…
We’re hearing from Tennesseans, and we have the will to protect them and give them the ability to feel like they can live here, be successful, and hopefully their kids want to stay here whenever they get older as well.”
That sounds promising.
But when you hear what Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell has to say about it (yes, he’s been quoted saying something not ideal again), the outlook on rising property taxes doesn’t look good at all. He wasn’t exactly as eager to help the small, locally owned businesses. In fact, it sounds like he’s looking out for the “big guys,” and is more worried about the city’s long-term finances:
“We’re trying to do this on a fiscally responsible basis, and we’re also trying to make sure that as we do that the entire community — including our business community — is benefitting from it.”
Mayor O’Connell is against a state-imposed cap, saying it could create budgeting issues for Nashville.
And that’s very much in line with what FOX 17 previously quoted Mayor O’Connell saying. One of his first headline-worthy responses suggested that it wasn’t up to him – the Mayor of Nashville – to keep certain businesses in the city afloat:
“It’s not up to me whether he keeps that business open. The market evolves. New businesses start even as beloved old businesses close.”
The owner of the Peg Leg Porker in Nashville begs to differ.
Carey Bringle, the barbecue restaurant owner, recently shared a video calling for Nashville residents to call politicians to help fight the good fight. He says that he first sounded the alarm on this issue five years ago, when former Mayor John Cooper initiated a 34% property tax increase right in the middle of the COVID pandemic.
That knocked out a lot of small, independently-owned businesses… and Bringle believes that history is about to repeat itself in 2026.
The Nashville business owner described the property tax hike as a nonpartisan issue, and warned that if nothing is done about it, the city people have come to know and love will no longer look the same. Bringle believes it’s a spending problem by the government more than anything else:
“If we continue down this road, with the reckless spending from our current mayor and his city council, then this town will lose almost all the things that brought most of the people here in the first place…
This city just isn’t about lower Broadway or the hot areas in town. This is about all around Nashville. These new assessments are devastating to small businesses. They’re unsustainable. This isn’t about a money problem for Nashville. This is about a spending problem.”
This might be a situation where it takes all of Nashville to come together and fight to keep locally owned businesses alive. Residents and business owners like Bringle are going to have to tirelessly oppose the rising property tax trend, and in some way, convince the people who have the power (the politicians) to actually do what they were elected to do: represent the people.
At least at the Tennessee General Assembly appears to be taking steps in the right direction.
