Attorney General Opinions 
Relating to County Government

2017 Annexation

• Under Tennessee’s Comprehensive Growth Plan legislation (1998 Public Chapter 1101), each county’s growth plan was to be developed by a coordinating committee, and then ratified by the county legislative body and the governing body of each municipality in the county. Thereafter, the county or a municipality may propose amendments to the growth plan by filing notice with the county mayor and each municipal mayor, and the county mayor is required to “reconvene or reestablish” the coordinating committee to consider the proposed amendment.  The law permits a county to create an alternative entity to perform the functions of the coordinating committee, under T.C.A. § 6-58-104(a)(9)(B).  The county legislative body and the governing body of each municipality must all agree that the alternative entity will perform the coordinating committee’s duties.  The statute contains no qualification requirements for the members of the alternative entity, so the membership would be governed by the charter or agreement that creates it.  Until a growth plan has been amended in accordance with the law, all land use decisions made by the legislative body and the municipality or county’s planning commission must be consistent with the growth plan, even if the coordinating committee has not reviewed the plan every three years as required by the plan adopted by the coordinating committee.  Recent amendments to the law evidence the General Assembly’s unequivocal intent to prohibit all annexations by ordinance that are not operative and effective before May 16, 2015.  Therefore, a municipality may no longer annex territory by ordinance under T.C.A. § 6-58-111(c)(1), which has been impliedly repealed.  Op. Tenn. Att’y Gen. 17-37 (August 31, 2017).