Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell on Thursday described the triple digit percentage property tax increases experienced by business owners as “a cost of doing business” associated with the rise in the value of properties in the city.
With popular businesses hit with tax hikes as high as 356 percent, and some already announcing closures, O’Connell on Thursday cited the recent increases to Nashville property prices, and suggested most Nashvillians would trade the higher taxes for higher property values.
“I think there’s a recognition that this is a moment when we’ve seen property values go up in an extraordinary way, right across the board, 45 percent median increase in property value, and that’s challenging in its own right,” said O’Connell during his appearance on the Fox 17 Growing Nashville Town Hall. “But I also don’t talk to a lot of people who want to see their property values go down.”
The mayor added, “This is a place where when you add that value, when you’re creating things that are contributing to the city’s growth, there is a sort of a cost of doing business associated with it.”
O’Connell also pointed to the city’s abilities to raise revenue, saying the city works to make sure Nashvillians receive value in exchange for paying their tax bill.
“But I also the results also speak for themselves. This is one of the only tools the state gives us to collect revenue,” said the mayor. “The things that we do to keep parks and libraries open, to fund our schools, to fund our police and fire. And what we’ve done with that is drive crime rates down for multiple years in a row now, including across the city last year in all categories, decades, low rates in some categories.”
He stated, “We’re trying to deliver a lot of value as low a cost as we possibly can. We only establish that rate in accordance with the five year impact of inflation on Metro, because we also experience those growing costs.”
O’Connell also offered more details about his new program to offer grants to certain Nashville establishments in order to defray the increases to taxation and the cost of doing business, explaining that it will likely be part of the city’s existing grants that award fast-growing businesses with up to $50,000 in property tax incentives.
“We’re looking at all the details of how long you have to be established,” said O’Connell. “We’re going to have sort of a working group help us define criteria, but we think probably something in the neighborhood of that, you know, $40-$50,000 per business, we’ll pilot it out.”
The mayor last week confirmed he will seek reelection to a second term.
Watch O’Connell’s full remarks:
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Tom Pappert is a 2025 recipient of the Dao Prize and the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star. He also reports for the Star News Network. Follow Tom on X. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Mayor Freddie O’Connell” by Mayor Freddie O’Connell.
No votes for Freddie.
Tennessee law needs to change immediately. Property tax should not be based off assessed values sins what you’re doing is taxing on unrealized gains. You’re either need to do away with property tax all together. A second option would be to tax everybody in the in a region such as Nashville, Davidson county at the same rate, square foot of house and square foot of property, with any increase at those rates to be approved by the taxpayers not by the council, or three. Three you go back to the tax value of your home when you bought it or business. Not what they think it’s worth because they’re they’re incompetent at determining what values are
Government needs to get out of business. Trying to be everything to everybody. This is America. We don’t rely on the the government to provide us a living unless we’re physically working for them. There’s nothing efficient about Metro government, they are the exact opposite wasting money on b******* projects all the time.