He helped take down Confederate statues in Memphis. Now, Van Turner wants to lead the city

There’s a story Van Turner likes to tell on the campaign trail.

It starts when the former Shelby County Commissioner was just 14 years old.

He had asked his fellow ninth-grader Tamara Wiggins to dance with him at homecoming, but she said no.

The Monday after homecoming, he slipped her a note in biology class, asking if she’d, “go with me.”

She circled “Yes.”

Now, the couple have been married for 21 years.

When he’s told the story — whether at a forum or at his mayoral announcement — Turner, an attorney, brings it back to the mayoral race.

On Oct. 5, he’s “passing a note to the citizens of Memphis,” he says, “and I’m asking them to circle ‘Yes.’”

Turner rose to prominence with takedown of Confederate statues

Turner, now 48, served on the Shelby County Commission from 2014-22 and is also the former president of the Memphis branch of the NAACP, told The Commercial Appeal in an interview that he tells the story because he thinks it’s “inspirational.”

“That's what I want to bring to the city: inspiration, new energy, stability, hope, a sense of urgency,” Turner said. “I know that we have to tackle tough issues now — crime, infrastructure and jobs — but we can get it done.”

Turner is one of 17 people on the ballot for mayor of Memphis, but he’s widely considered one of just four with a shot at winning.

The attorney, a graduate of Morehouse College and the University of Tennessee Law School, was already well-known in political circles in Memphis when he garnered widespread attention for his role in removing Confederate statues in Memphis parks.

Turner, at the suggestion of then-City Attorney Bruce McMullen, created the nonprofit Memphis Greenspace, to which the city of Memphis sold two parks housing Confederate statues. By selling the parks to a nonprofit, the city used a loophole that allowed the statues to be taken down even though the state legislature had passed a law banning the city from removing the statues without permission from the Tennessee Historical Commission.

It was partly because of his father that he waded into the fight over the statue removal, Turner said.

His father, Van D. Turner Sr., grew up in Memphis. He often went through the former Forrest Park (now Health Sciences Park), which housed both a statue of Nathan Bedford Forrest as well as the grave of Forrest and his wife.

“It was painful to him to not be able to go to the park to enjoy the park like other members of society, and to see that statue which sent a message of white supremacy,” Turner said of his father. “It sent a message of ‘You Black person staying in your place. You’re inferior.’”

When the opportunity came to play a role in the removal of the statues, Turner remembered stories of his father and his uncle enduring Jim Crow Memphis, riding on the back of buses, going to the side of restaurants, having to sit at the top of the theater.

The statues were removed at night on Dec. 20, 2017, a strategic date chosen so the state legislature couldn’t interfere.

That date was also Turner Sr.’s last birthday before his death six months later.

“The first call I made that night was to him and he cried,” Turner said. “He never thought it could happen. And so it was just a great birthday present for him and it was a birthday present for the city. For over a century that monument has stood there and had been symbolic of white supremacy and the Old South rising again.”

Plan was not to live outside of Memphis, Turner says

Turner’s campaign for mayor has been marked with controversy over his residency, but that hasn’t stopped him from being one of the top fundraisers, bringing in $151,000 in the second quarter, leaving him a balance of $212,000, behind Paul Young and Floyd Bonner.

A judge also ruled that Memphis has no five-year residency requirement for Memphis mayor, paving the way for both Turner and Bonner’s campaigns to continue.

Turner, a Whitehaven native, has lived in unincorporated Shelby County for years. When he decided to run for Memphis mayor, he purchased a family home in Binghampton, which he is currently renovating.

He told The CA that he and his family live in a Binghampton apartment nearby as the home is renovated.

The plan was never to leave Memphis, Turner said. Rather, when he and his wife decided to start a family and move away from Downtown, they moved into a part of the county they believed would be annexed into the city, he said.

“It was never my intent to not live in the city,” Turner said. “I wasn't running from the city.”

First 100 days would include creation of crime plan

Turner’s platform in the race for mayor includes police reform, strengthening of infrastructure and bringing jobs to Memphis.

Some of his work that he’s most proud of from his time on the County Commission includes supporting funds for HIV and AIDS care that went to Planned Parenthood, working toward the reinstatement of a program to increase county dollars used with minority-owned businesses and starting to raise awareness of the need for funding to rebuild Regional One Health.

And as a local NAACP leader, he’s proud of the work done alongside attorney Ben Crump in addressing the death of Tyre Nichols, who died after being beaten, tased and pepper sprayed by Memphis police officers. Turner has often appeared alongside Crump and Nichols’ family in news conferences, calling for peace during protests, urging for the release of the video of Nichols’ beating and pushing reform in the police department.

Turner has also said he supports measures passed by the City Council to block certain forms of policing, such as pretextual traffic stops, in the wake of Nichols’ death, but also that he wants to ensure police have what they need to fight crime.

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If elected, his first 100 days in office will include creating a transition team that includes representation from labor organizations, law enforcement, community advocates and more. They will work on plans such as how to engage in crime remediation.

Some of those plans will be offering affordable childcare to city employees, offering mentorship to youth, increased technical education and extended hours at community centers.

“I have a three-pronged approach: suppression, intervention and prevention with a whole mindset of looking at the underlying issue of poverty, which is driving so much of what we're seeing start out as economic crimes,” Turner said.

On infrastructure, he wants to expedite tree trimming and the replacement of old utility poles. Perhaps, the city could invite emergency workers from other areas to help with MLGW infrastructure even in times when there is no crisis, he said.

State Rep. G.A. Hardaway said it’s Turner’s innovation, but also his willingness to listen that makes him stand out from the crowd.

Hardaway has known Turner for at least 20 years, including as a county commissioner and through his work in the Shelby County Democratic Party.

“He’ll watch, listen, analyze situations before he opens his mouth, and when he does he’s going to have something intelligent to say and it will be something to address a problem,” Hardaway said. “He doesn’t get into all that personal, back-and-forth petty stuff. He’s highly intelligent. He’s a people person. He understands how to get the best out of people.”

‘Eight years to make it better’

At a debate on Aug. 15, Turner stressed his progressive credentials, taking multiple jabs at Young, who has voted in Republican primaries.

The city needs leadership willing to take on the state when priorities over gun laws conflict and someone who is willing to address poverty as the root cause of crime, he said.

“So, for the last couple of decades, this has been a decision and a goal to get back to Memphis and I think you can ultimately get things done and give back to Memphis if you're in the mayor's office,” Turner told The Commercial Appeal. “And the way that I view it is you have eight years to make it better, potentially eight years to make it better if reelected and then you pass it on to the next group of individuals who want to continue trying to make Memphis better. So, I feel that this is just a natural progression of what I've started when I first moved back in 2002.”Katherine Burgess covers government and religion. She can be reached at katherine.burgess@commercialappeal.com or followed on Twitter @kathsburgess.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Van Turner in Memphis elections: Get to know the mayoral candidate