Athens City Charter

Section 1. Be it further enacted, That said municipal corporation, in addition to the powers, rights and authority vested in it by all other articles and sections, shall have the power by resolution or ordinance:

1. (1) Taxes: To assess as hereinafter provided and to levy and collect taxes for all general and special purposes on all subjects or objects of taxation and privileges taxable by law for state, county or city purposes.
2. (2) Classifications of Taxation: To adopt such classifications of the subjects and objects of taxation as may not be contrary to law.
3. (3) Special Assessments: To make special assessments for local improvements.
4. (4) Contracts: To contract and be contracted with.
5. (5) Borrow Money: To anticipate the annual revenue by borrowing to meet the payments of interest on the bonded debt of the city or other budgeted obligations; provided the amount borrowed in any year shall not exceed fifty per centum of the annual tax levy for that year, which shall promptly be repaid out of such tax collections.
6. (6) Refunding Bonds: To issue and exchange, sell, pledge or in any manner dispose of negotiable or non-negotiable interest bearing or non-interest bearing refunding bonds and fix the interest rate and maturity date thereof to refinance or extend the existing bonded indebtedness of the city, upon the credit of the city or solely upon the credit of income derived from any property used in connection with any public utility owned or operated by the city, or solely upon the credit of the proceeds of special assessments for local improvements, or upon any two or more such credits.
7. (7) New Bonds, Issuance: To issue and sell any new interest bearing or non-interest bearing bonds for any purpose permitted by this charter or permitted by the statutes of Tennessee; to fix the interest rate and maturity dates of such bonds and to issue the same upon the credit of the city or solely upon the credit of income derived from any property used in connection with any public utility owned or operated by the city, or solely upon the credit of the proceeds of special assessments for local improvements, or upon any two or more such credits.
8. (8) Money Expended: To expend the money of the city for all lawful purposes.
9. (9) Acquisition and Disposition of Property: To acquire or receive and hold, maintain, improve, sell, lease, mortgage, pledge or otherwise dispose of property, real or personal, and any estate or interest therein, within or without the city or state.
10. (10) Eminent Domain: To condemn property, real or personal, or any easement, interest, or estate or use therein, either within or without the city, for present or future public use; such condemnation to be made and effected in accordance with the terms and provisions of sections 3109-3134 of the Code of Tennessee, or in such other manner as may be provided by law.
11. (11) Property out of City: Administration of trusts; to take and hold property within or without the city or state upon trust; and to administer trusts for the public benefit.
12. (12) Public Utilities: To acquire, construct, own, operate and maintain, or sell, lease, mortgage, pledge, or otherwise dispose of public utilities or any estate or interest therein, or any other utility or service to the city, its inhabitants or any part thereof; or to inhabitants in areas adjacent to the city.
13. (13) Public Utilities, Grants, Franchises, Regulations: To grant any person, firm, association or corporation, franchise for public utilities and public service to be furnished the city and those therein and to grant rights-of-way through the city streets, avenues, alleys, squares, ways and over the bridges and viaducts of the city for the use of public and quasi-public utilities; provided further, that such new franchise shall not destroy the terms of any existing franchise. Franchises may be granted for a period of twenty-five years or less, but no longer. Franchises may, by their terms, apply to the territory within the corporate limits of the city of the date of the franchise, and as said corporate limits thereafter may be enlarged; and to the then existing streets, alleys, and other thoroughfares that thereafter may be opened.
14. (14) Contracts for Public Utility Services: To make contracts with any person, firm, association or corporation, for public utilities and public services to be furnished the city and those therein. Such contracts may be entered into for the period of twenty-five years or less, but not longer. The City Council may prescribe in each such contract entered into, the rates, fares, charges, and regulations that may be made by the person, firm, association, or corporation with whom the contract is made. Such contracts may, by their terms, apply to the territory within the corporate limits of the city at the date of the contract, and as said corporate limits thereafter may be enlarged; and to any other streets, alleys and other thoroughfares that thereafter may be opened.
15. (15) Regulations of Public Utilities: To prescribe reasonable regulations regarding the construction, maintenance, equipment, operation and service of public utilities, and compel from time to time reasonable extension of facilities for such services.
16. (16) Highways, Streets, Parks: To establish, open, relocate, vacate, alter, widen, extend, grade, improve, repair, construct, reconstruct, maintain, light, sprinkle and clean public highways, streets, boulevards, parkways, sidewalks, alleys, parks, public grounds, cemeteries, and squares, bridges, viaducts, subways, tunnels, sewers, and drains within or without the corporate limits and to regulate the use thereof within the corporate limits, and property may be taken and appropriated therefor under the provisions of the general law.
17. (17) Abutting Property Improvement: To construct, improve, re-construct and re-improve by opening, extending, widening, grading, curbing, guttering, paving, graveling, macademizing, draining, or otherwise improving any street, highways, avenues, alleys or other public places within the corporate limits, and to assess a portion of the cost of such improvements upon the property abutting upon or adjacent to such streets, highways, or alleys under and as provided by Section 3408 to 3493, Code of Tennessee, or any general law of the State, now or hereafter in effect.
18. (18) Charges Against Abutting Property: To assess against abutting property within the corporate limits the cost of planting shade trees, removing from sidewalks all accumulations of snow, ice, and earth or other nuisances or danger to the public health and welfare, cutting and removing obnoxious weeds and rubbish; the lighting of streets; the cleaning and rendering sanitary, or removal, abolishing, and prohibiting of closets and privies, in such manner as may be provided by general law or by ordinance of the City Council.
19. (19) Market Places, Public Buildings, Bridges, Etc.: To acquire, purchase, provide for, construct, regulate and maintain and do all things relating to all market places, public buildings, bridges, sewers, cemeteries, and other structures, work and improvements.
20. (20) Drainage, Sewage, Offal, Etc.: To collect and dispose of drainage, sewage, offal, ashes, garbage and refuse, or to license and regulate such collection and disposal, subject to any applicable state laws and regulations.
21. (21) License Tax: To impose a license tax upon any animal, thing, business, vocation, pursuit, privilege, or calling so long as said tax is not prohibited by law.
22. (22) Regulation of Businesses, Callings, Etc.: To define, prohibit, abate, suppress, prevent, and regulate all acts, practices, conduct, businesses, occupations, callings, trades, uses of property and all other things whatsoever detrimental, or likely to be detrimental, to the health, morals, comfort, safety, convenience, or welfare of the inhabitants of the city, and to accomplish that purpose by the exercise of general police powers.
23. (23) Limit Occupations Likely to Become a Nuisance: To prescribe limits within which businesses, occupations and practices liable to be nuisances or detrimental to the health, morals, security or general welfare of the people may lawfully be established, conducted or maintained.
24. (24) Inspection, Weights and Measures: To inspect, test, measure and weigh any article for consumption or use within the city, and to charge reasonable fees therefor; and to provide standards of weights, tests, and measures.
25. (25) Same: To establish, regulate, license, and inspect weights and measures.
26. (26) Buildings, Regulated and Inspected: To regulate the location, height, construction and materials of all buildings and structures, and to inspect all buildings, lands and places as to their condition for health, cleanliness and safety, and when necessary, prevent use thereof and require any alteration or changes necessary to make them healthful, clean, or safe.
27. (27) Charitable, Educational, Corrective, Institutions: To provide and maintain charitable, educational, recreative, curative, corrective, preventive or penal institutions, departments, functions, facilities, instrumentalities, conveniences, and services.
28. (28) Workhouse or City Colony: County Workhouse: To purchase or construct, maintain and establish a workhouse or farm colony for the confinement and detention of any person convicted in the city court of offenses against the laws and ordinances of the city who fails to secure the fine and costs imposed upon him; or to contract with McMinn County to keep said persons in the workhouse of said county and to provide by said contract and by ordinance for the commitment of such persons to the workhouse so provided, until such fine and costs shall be fully covered by compensation due for such labor.
29. (29) Enforcement of Ordinances; Civil Penalties and Imprisonment. To enforce any ordinance, rule or regulation, by means of civil penalties, forfeitures and imprisonment or by action or proceedings in any court of competent jurisdiction or by any one (1) or more of such means and to impose costs as a part thereof.
30. (30) Schools: To establish schools, determine the necessary boards, officers, and teachers required therefor, and fix their compensation to purchase or otherwise acquire land for schoolhouses, playgrounds and other purposes connected with the schools; to purchase or erect all necessary buildings and to do all other acts necessary to establish, maintain, and operate a complete educational system within the city.
31. (31) Animals Running at Large, To Suppress: To regulate, tax, license or suppress the keeping or running at large of animals within the city; to impound the same and in default of redemption, to provide for their disposition, by sale, gift, or humane killing.
32. (32) Bridges and Viaducts: To require and compel any steam, gasoline, diesel or electric railway company operating within the said city and crossing with its lines any of the streets of the city, to build and construct and maintain all necessary bridges, viaducts and underpasses under and over the tracks of said railroad company wherever said track or tracks cross the public streets, alleys, ways and thoroughfares of said city, when in the judgment of the legislative body of said city such bridges, viaducts or underpasses should be built or constructed for the preservation or protection of the public using such streets, alleys, ways, and thoroughfares; and the entire costs of the construction of such bridges, viaducts, or underpasses over such railroad or right-of-way of such railroad or railroads, to be paid and borne by such railroad or railroads, and the costs of the construction of the approaches to said viaducts or underpasses to the points above indicated to be borne by the City of Athens, together with all damages which may accrue to the property owners by reason of change of grade, and the portion of such viaducts or underpasses constructed respectively by the railroad or railroads and by the City to be maintained by them respectively; provided the City of Athens shall have no right, power or authority to build or require of any railroad or railroads to build such bridges, viaducts or underpasses unless and until said City shall have available sufficient funds to lay out and construct the approaches to said viaducts, bridges or underpasses for that purpose and to so certify such fact to such railroad or railroads, the owners or operators thereof. In order to enforce this subsection, the legislative body of said City shall cause the necessary plans and specifications for the construction of such bridge, viaduct or underpass to be made and prepared by licensed civil engineers, such plans and specifications to make due and proper provisions for the safe operation of trains over and under such bridge, viaduct or underpass as well as traffic using said bridge, viaduct or underpass, and upon approval of such plans and specifications, the legislative body of said City may, by ordinance, order and require the building and construction to be begun not more than sixty days after the passage of such ordinance and the work to be completed within such reasonable time as may be fixed and named in said ordinance and in case of the failure of the owner or operator of any such railroad or railroads to comply with such ordinance, it shall be subject to a civil penalty for each day that it fails to comply therewith, such fine to be assessed and collected upon conviction before the City Judge of said City; but the City may also, by mandatory injunction, enforce compliance with such ordinance in the Chancery Court at Athens, Tennessee, or in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee; or it may proceed to build and construct such bridge, viaduct or underpass, charging the cost thereof, as above provided, where the same shall cross any railroad or railroads, to such railroads, or the owners or operators thereof, and recover such cost and expense with interest thereon, by suit instituted for that purpose in any court of competent jurisdiction.
33. (33) Regulation of Motor Vehicles: To levy a privilege tax upon all vehicles operated upon its streets for hire; to require all such vehicles to file with the Head of the Department of Finance, indemnity insurance contracts as prescribed by the Tennessee Financial Responsibility Law of 1977, as amended in favor of any person or persons who may suffer loss or injury to persons or property on account of the operation of such vehicle by the operators thereof; to regulate by ordinance, the parking spaces to be used by such vehicles and the parking arrangements to be made therefor; to regulate the fares charged all passenger-carrying vehicles for hire in the City of Athens; to regulate and provide for the number of taxicabs which may operate on the streets of the City of Athens and to regulate and provide for the condition in which such vehicles shall be maintained in order that they may operate in said City.
34. (34) General Powers: To have all the powers granted to municipal corporations and to cities by the constitution and general laws of this State, together with all the implied powers necessary to carry into execution all the powers granted; and, except as prohibited by the constitution of this State or restricted by this charter, the city shall and may exercise all municipal powers, functions, rights, privileges and immunities of every name and nature whatsoever. The enumeration of particular powers by this charter shall not be deemed to be exclusive, and in addition to the powers enumerated therein or implied thereby, or appropriate to the exercise of such powers, it is intended that the city shall have and may exercise all such powers, under the constitution of this State that it would be competent for this charter specifically to enumerate. [As amended by Priv. Acts 1971, ch. 136, § 1; Priv. Acts 1990, ch. 213, §§ 2 and 3; Priv. Acts 1994, ch. 180, §§ 1 and 2; and Priv. Acts 1995, ch. 6, §§ 1 and 2]