From: D E C I S I O N R E S E A R C H CALIFORNIA WASHINGTON D.C. MEMORANDUM To: Senator Jim Kyle
From:
Bob Meadow
Mark Mehringer

Date: August 27, 2001
Subject: Shelby County Polling Results

Our research is completed and we wanted to provide you with a brief statement of our key findings and their implications. These findings are based on 400 completed interviews taken from a sample of likely May, 2002 Democratic Primary election voters in Shelby County, Tennessee. Interviews were conducted August 15, 16, and 18, 2001. Sampling error is +/- 4.9%. Respondents were carefully screened to reflect voters in the May, 2001 Democrat Primary election. Our expectation is that most of the turnout will be limited to those “firm” Democratic voters. Summary Conclusion: You lead the field of candidates in the Democratic primary election for Shelby County Mayor, as you are the best-known candidate and have over a four-to-one favorability ratio. Carol Chumney benefits from being the only woman in the race, but still trails you significantly. Byrd is relatively unknown and trails far behind you and also trails Chumney overall. Other Key Findings: F The Candidates Nearly two-thirds of the voters are familiar with you, with four times as many having a favorable impression of you as have an unfavorable impression. Carol Chumney is less known to voters than you are, and Harold Byrd is largely unknown. Byrd also has a much lower favorability ratio. Your name recognition is bolstered by your strong profile in your Memphis based Senate District. Your image among Democratic voters has improved significantly from when you ran for reelection last year. Your income tax position has not hurt you with key Democratic constituencies and most people have forgotten the “gas” issue. Your favorability rating is especially high among those voters who have heard of all the candidates. Chumney is not as well known among African Americans as you are, and yet black voters will comprise a majority of the primary vote. Byrd’s profile is much weaker in Memphis than in the rest of Shelby County. Because Memphis accounts for 85% of likely Democratic primary voters, your strong Memphis base works to your advantage and against Byrd. F The Election When voters are given basic biographical information about the candidates, you lead with over one-third of the vote, followed by Chumney in second and Byrd trailing by a wide margin. Chumney benefits from being the only woman in the race, performing particularly well among young, white women. About one-fifth of her support comes from voters, particularly women, who do not know any of the candidates and likely vote for her only because they want a woman. Over the course of the campaign, this is likely to change if you emphasize women’s issues, your wife’s popularity and the fact you are the only candidate who is married with children. As the candidate raising a young family, you will be able to connect better with voters on important local issues such as schools, crime and taxes. In addition, your vote share is larger among voters who presently recognize all three candidates, which is a reflection of your credibility. Byrd’s support is limited to voters in the Seventh Congressional District outside Memphis and older men, and he performs poorly among most other groups. Conclusion: You are the clear front-runner, with the highest name recognition and the broadest base of support. You perform well in both Memphis and the rest of Shelby County. Chumney benefits from being the only woman in the race, leading among voters who do not recognize any of the candidates, but performs poorly outside Memphis. Byrd’s support is limited to suburban Shelby County, and shows little potential in Memphis. Lastly, among voters who know all three candidates, you win. Call with any questions.

STATEMENT OF CHUMNEY FOR MAYOR CAMPAIGN RE: Memorandum to Memphis Flyer by Decision Research for Jim Kyle While the poll summary release for Jim Kyle in the Memphis Flyer was interesting reading, the noticeable absence from the release of any real numbers as to the actual percentage of voters supporting Carol Chumney in comparison with Jim Kyle shows the strength of her position in the race. But, Carol doesnÕt need Washington and California pollsters to tell her how people in Shelby County think. She looks forward to continuing to hear the opinions of Shelby Countians firsthand in the months ahead. (Anything you want to say, Harold?)

It is two-and-a-half months away, and numerous distractions (Memphis', most notably, is the mayor's race) lie in between, but the special session of the legislature that Governor Don Sundquist is preparing to call for the first week of November will doubtless be one of the stormiest and most controversial periods in the state's political history. Several events of the past week or so make that clear. Among them: á As part of his preparation for the session, Sundquist is on a speaking tour of the state. Last Thursday that took him to a luncheon meeting of the Memphis Exchange Club, during which he used a variety of newly prepared charts and graphs to document his point that, without significant tax reform (and, in practice, that means increased taxes), the state will incur a $382 million deficit next year. Sundquist spelled out the areas most vulnerable to a revenue shortfall -- education, prisons, TennCare, roadbuilding among them -- and joked that he had ordered all state departments needing new vehicles to buy white ones instead of orange ones to save money on the paint. "This year's budget was put together with Scotch tape and baling wire," said Sundquist, who added he would be hesitant to propose specific formulas himself after seeing several versions of his tax reform plan shot down by the legislature last spring. The governor reiterated, however, that he would be willing to accept a state income tax if the legislature proposed one. "I'm willing to take responsibility and the political hit because I know what's required," Sundquist said. á The hits weren't long in coming, and the first salvo was lobbed in from a fairly lofty and distance source. The Wall Street Journal weighed in the very next day with a Friday editorial attacking the Sundquist administration for backing off from what it noted had been the governor's onetime commitment not to support a state income tax. "[L]ike many governors in their second term, he [Sundquist] is building a legacy that includes $582 million in new spending this year," the newspaper said, continuing, "The prospect of a special session has supporters of an income tax salivating: They range from teacher unions to businesses that want to shift their tax burden to ordinary folks." The WSJ editorial noted that Tennessee in 1978 passed "a constitutional amendment capping budget increases to the rate of economic growth unless the legislature specifically authorized an exception," but that the cap had been exceeded "nine times over the last 20 years." The paper quoted Michael Gilstrap of the Tennessee Family Institute, an ad hoc organization opposed to new taxation, as saying, "Tennessee is growing its government faster than the big spending states of the Northeast." The Journal called for the issue of a state income tax to be put on a state referendum ballot. "Of course, that won't happen," the editorial concluded, "because the real crisis is a lack of courage to reform the budget coupled with the knowledge that the voters of the Volunteer State aren't about to sign up for a tax they know will never go away." á Meanwhile, two conservative anti-tax groups promised anew to organize stout opposition to Sundquist's tax reform program. One of them was Gilstrap's Tennessee Family Institute. Another, the "Free Enterprise Coalition," is headed by former state Republican chairman Tommy Hopper, who this week likened the pending conflict to "war" and invokes the blood-and-guts rhetoric of the late General George S. Patton to justify his opposition. "It will tear apart parties. It will dramatically change the makeup of the legislature. And it will be one tough campaign," vowed Hopper of the upcoming special session struggle. á On the other side, several state PR firms are offering support to the state's main ad hoc pro-tax group, Citizens for Fair Taxes, which has already enlisted the services of former Senator Howard Baker and former Governor Ned Ray McWherter. Among those offering their aid and comfort as of this week: former McWherter spokesman Ken Renner; Lewis Lavine, a longtime aide to former Tennessee Governor Lamar Alexander; and Mark McNeely of the prominent Nashville agency, McNeely Piffot and Fox. Bo Johnson of the PR firm of Smith, Johnson, and Carr, which is heading up the main effort for CFT, announced that the ad hoc organization will spend $1.8 million to convince Tennesseans that the state is in a fiscal crisis. Johnson said, however, that the campaign would not specifically mention or endorse a state income tax in the TV, radio, and newspaper ads it will purchase, acknowledging that polls show that most Tennesseans are not yet convinced that the state needs to raise money. á Agreement to that last point came from outgoing Nashville mayor Phil Bredesen (see "Editorial," this week), who told the Nashville Tennessean in a weekend interview, "The argument being made is we [the state] need more money. But I'm saying I'm not on board with that notion, even though a lot of people are." Bredesen went so far as to say that the whole notion that the state is in fiscal crisis has been "overstated." (Perhaps not coincidentally, Bredesen -- the unsuccessful Democratic gubernatorial candidate against the GOP's Sundquist in 1994 -- also indicated that he may harbor political ambitions for 2002. "It [being governor] is something I've wanted to do. I wish I'd been governor, and I tried hard to be governor," Bredesen said.) The Nashville mayor did say that he thought a state income tax would be a fairer method of taxation than further reliance on the current state sales tax.