You may have already noticed it. More bugs than last year? Bears encroaching on urban areas? Seeing armadillos in the road? Kudzu as far as the eye can see? What about bats?
We’ve got a story series on signal species — plants, animals, insects — and what they are telling us with their adaptive behaviors. Some of it is due to the changing climate. Some of it is due to human development. Some of it is due to disease. But all of these signals are revealing ways that nature is changing around us and how we are interacting with those changes.
Over the course of June, our team at WPLN, This is Nashville and our collaborative newsroom hub, the Appalachia + Mid-South Newsroom, will bring you a new story each week.
Turn on notifications and be sure to follow along for this 4-part series about bears, bats, armadillos and kudzu. You won’t want to miss it. Stay with us until the end to see how you can participate in documenting what you see around you with @iNaturalist.
Photos: Jacqui Sieber, Michael Snead/iNaturalist/Creative Commons, niff82/iNaturalist/Creative Commons, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
More details about Tennessee`s failed execution are becoming available.
Defense attorneys argue the event proves the state`s lethal injection protocol is causing pain and suffering.
The Tennessee Department of Correction attempted to execute Tony Carruthers on May 21. Prison staff struggled to establish an IV line in his arms, so attorneys say a doctor cut into the man’s chest.
Eventually, a phone call into the room prompted the warden to call off the lethal injection.
Attorneys are calling on Gov. Bill Lee to halt all executions until the courts can decide a longstanding lawsuit that’s challenging the constitutionality of Tennessee’s lethal injection protocol.
Tap link in bio for more stories.
What if you have a medical emergency, drive dozens of miles to the nearest hospital only to find a closed sign on the entrance?
In Jellico, Tennessee, that’s reality. It’s one of many towns in Tennessee impacted as tthe healthcare industry cuts unprofitable rural hospitals.
The National Rural Health Association says at least 91 rural hospitals have closed in the last decade. Tennessee has the most closures per capita, with nine. In Jellico, hospital operators cite a lack of demand.
Residents like Debbie Stanaford remember when the Jellico Community Hospital opened in 1974. It was a small, 25-bed hospital with limited services. But it helped save lives in a community that otherwise faced an hour-long drive away to Knoxville.
Jellico’s small-town government is struggling to reopen its only hospital.
It has become a polarizing issue for locals as city officials brought in multiple operators, each with lofty promises, before being abruptly shut down two years ago.
To help keep rural hospitals open, the Biden administration introduced new healthcare subsidies if they met certain criteria. Jellico’s hospital satisfied all but one: the federal government doesn’t consider the town to be rural because its lumped into the Knoxville metropolitan area.
Debbie Stanaford hopes the hospital will ibe restored to the way it was. She says she’s unhappy with the mayor’s handling of the situation.
“I really, honestly had high hopes for the mayor, I really did, about opening the hospital and just doing different things for our town … it’s let me down a little bit.”
Tap link in bio for more and also get links to more in our Healthcare Hollow series.
Photos: Pierce Gentry / WPLN News
For many, youth baseball is a rite of passage: full of home runs, walk-up songs and teamwork.
And now, WPLN’s Cynthia Abrams reports, there’s a different kind of baseball field growing in popularity: it’s called a “Miracle Field.” These are accessible baseball facilities that can accommodate players with disabilities.
The first field was built in Georgia in 2000, but these have been popping up more and more — and, today, there are now hundreds around the country.
Tap link in bio for more.
This week was very newsy — from a failed execution to lawsuits on redistricting to an outcry about NES tree trimming and no screens and schools.
We also threw in a little Summer Joy for good measure!
Tap link in bio for our in-depth stories and to sign up for the NashVillager newsletter, a human-powered. 5-day-a-week email direct to your inbox with local stories, info, and ticket giveaways.
Tennessee halted a man’s execution on Thursday morning after being unable to find a vein for lethal injection.
An attorney who was present for the planned execution of Tony Carruthers in Tennessee on Thursday said it was called off after officials struggled to find a vein for an hour.
Maria DeLiberato, an attorney for Carruthers, said she saw Carruthers “wincing and groaning” and called it “horrible” to watch.
Tap link in bio for more.
Tennessee redistricting shaken up congressional races across the state.
Incumbent U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen ended his re-election campaign after Tennessee Republicans approved President Donald Trump’s mid-decade redistricting plan.
The new congressional map splits Cohen’s home city of Memphis into three districts. Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District, which Cohen has represented for nearly two decades, now stretches 300 miles from Memphis to the edge of Nashville.
Marianna Bacallao (ba.marianna) reports that state lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have joined the race, hoping to take Cohen’s spot in Washington.
The Tennessee Democratic Party is among several groups suing to block the redistricting plan on behalf of Cohen and other candidates and voters. But a federal judge has allowed the maps to go into effect while multiple legal challenges go forward.
Tap link in bio for more stories or subscribe to our 5-day-a-week newsletter, the Nashvillager. It has our stories, some national news, and ticket giveaways.
Photos: Marianna Bacallao, Cynthia Abrams, the campaigns of Brent Taylor, Todd Warner and Chaz Molder
GOP-led states across the South have rushed to redistrict after a U.S. Supreme Court case weakened protections for Black voting blocs. Marianna Bacallao reports that new congressional districts in Tennessee mirror the way Black communities have been fractured in the past.
Tennessee was the first state to answer President Trump`s call for new congressional maps ahead of the 2026 midterms, dividing Memphis into three different districts.
The new map also split Nashville`s historically Black neighborhood of North Nashville. The neighborhood has been split before by the construction of Interstate 40. The highway cut through the heart of Nashville`s Black Wall Street during the 1960s, decimating Black-owned businesses.
The new congressional map splits North Nashville along the same streets as the highway.
Tap link in the bio for more.
Curious Nashville Returns!
Back by popular demand, the WPLN fan favorite series Curious Nashville is here to investigate oddities, share local history, tell stories of interesting people, and explain how local institutions operate.
You ask the questions, and we answer.
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