MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Federal court action Thursday cleared Tennessee to keep pressing its takeover of Memphis-Shelby County Schools, ending a pause that had frozen the state’s oversight timeline.
U.S. District Judge Waverly D. Crenshaw Jr. issued the order a day after Judge Melanie Taylor Jefferson stepped aside. With that block gone, the state-appointed oversight track is free to move again.
District lawyers went to chancery court in Shelby County on Oct. 7 trying to freeze the takeover. Their complaint says the statute singles out Memphis-Shelby County Schools and collides with state constitutional guarantees on equal treatment, local self-rule and the ballot.
At a virtual session last week, the oversight board talked through money controls, outside consultants and possible leadership shifts. Sitting district board members could only jump in through chat and public comment while the appointed panel ran the meeting.
That panel is also sketching committees covering academics, budgets, buildings, legal work and leadership, and it has put an executive-director search near the top of its list as the takeover advances.
Crenshaw’s move removes the federal brake that had stalled the calendar. Families and staff now have a clearer sense that day-to-day decisions will keep shifting toward the new oversight structure.
District leaders had hoped the lawsuit would preserve local control. With the pause lifted, attention turns to the oversight board’s committee build-out and the director search already marked as urgent.
Section: More Memphis TN education news
