Life on the 40-member Metro Nashville Council may look very different by this time next year.
For starters, its membership could be cut in half, courtesy of a looming Tennessee Supreme Court decision that would mark the end of a nearly four year legal battle between Nashville and the state. And even if the council’s size doesn’t change, half of its current membership is term-limited, meaning lots of seats will feature new faces during the 2027-2031 session.
There’s still a long way to go until we know for sure. The election is set for Aug. 5, 2027, and seats where no candidate secures more than 50% of the vote will be subject to a runoff election about a month later on Sept. 16.
For now, here’s an early look at the lay of the land and what could
change in the next year.
How a Tennessee Supreme Court decision could change the council as we know it
Local government junkies will tell you that Nashville’s council is uniquely large. The 40-member body is the only one in the state with more than 20 members and the third-largest in the nation, behind only New York and Chicago.
If not for a protracted court battle, that piece of trivia would’ve become defunct back in 2023 when Republican state lawmakers passed a law capping metropolitan councils at 20 members.
Legislators who supported the bill publicly said it was meant to improve government efficiency, while local leaders argued that the law violated the local sovereignty protections enshrined in the Tennessee Constitution because the cap would have only affected Nashville.
The city secured injunctions blocking the law in 2023 and 2024, before a three-judge panel on the Tennessee Court of Appeals reversed that decision and ruled that the law was constitutional in 2025. That led to an appeal before the Tennessee Supreme Court, which heard the case back in February.
The court has yet to issue an opinion, however, and there hasn’t been much movement in the case in the six months since. In a July 31 pending case report, the court noted that it asked for supplemental briefs from both sides, which were filed by July 1.
But if the court does decide to rule in the state’s favor, the remaining outcomes include either an appeal all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court or the law finally taking effect. The latter outcome would officially limit Nashville to a maximum of 20 council districts and trigger redrawing the current district map.
That could lead to several knock-on effects. The council would likely become less diverse than its current iteration, which is possibly the most diverse in the body’s 60-plus year history. All five of the council’s at-large seats are filled by women, who also make up a majority of the council’s overall membership. Since 2019, Nashvillians have elected the body’s first-ever transgender, Muslim and Latina members.
A smaller council would also mean more constituents per member. District council members currently represent an average of about 20,000 constituents, a number that could balloon to more than double depending on how the city trims its district count.
As for what redrawing Nashville’s council district map would look like in practice, many of those details remain to be seen. Nashville’s planning department would be responsible for drawing the districts, the Metropolitan Planning Commission would be responsible for reviewing the maps and making a recommendation to the Metro Nashville Council, and council members would have the final say on whether to approve or reject them.
But what the maps could look like is another story. After the state law passed in 2023, Nashville’s planning department began working to plot out new district lines, before the court cases put everything on pause. At the time, council members proposed several different map configuration options, including these:
- 15 districts, five at-large seats
- 20 districts, zero at-large seats
- 16 districts, four “super district” seats representing approximately one quarter of the Davidson County population
- 16 districts, four at-large seats
Unpacking who’s term-limited and who can run for reelection
Even if the council’s size remains the same heading into the next four-year term, get ready for it to look quite a bit different.
A combined 20 seats, two at-large and 18 representing districts, are currently filled by members who will not be eligible for reelection to the same seat because they’ve already served two terms. That includes the council’s longest tenured member, Burkley Allen, who represented District 18 for back-to-back terms before being elected an at-large member in 2019.
Several council members throughout Nashville’s history have carved a similar path, a common next step for term-limited district representatives. Before becoming Davidson County trustee, Erica Gilmore served two council terms in District 19 before she was elected to an at-large seat in 2015.
Plenty of members who are term-limited in their district seats would be eligible to run for an at-large seat instead. At the moment, two at-large members have served two terms there: Allen and Zulfat Suara. Fellow at-large members Quin Evans Segall, Olivia Hill and Delishia Porterfield each would be eligible to retain their seats if they choose to run for reelection.
Here’s the full list of district council members who are term-limited but could opt to run for an at-large seat: Jennifer Gamble, Sean Parker, Emily Benedict, Tonya Hancock, Erin Evans, Russ Bradford, Ginny Welsch, Tom Cash, Bradon Taylor, Sheri Weiner, Thom Druffel, Courtney Johnston, Bob Nash, Sandra Sepulveda, John Rutherford and Antoinette Lee.
The following council members, meanwhile, are completing their first terms in district seats and could pursue a reelection bid: Joy Kimbrough, Mike Cortese, Clay Capp, Deonté Harrell, Jennifer Frensley Webb, Jeff Eslick, Jordan Huffman, Jeff Gregg, Terry Vo, Jacob Kupin, Rollin Horton, Brenda Gadd, Jeff Preptit, David Benton, Tasha Ellis, Sandy Ewing and Jason Spain.
Some council members look toward higher office
Kyonzté Toombs and Joy Styles would also be included in the list of term-limited district council members, but both have already announced runs for higher office.
Styles announced her 2027 mayoral bid in January and will challenge incumbent Mayor Freddie O’Connell, after two terms representing part of Antioch in District 32.
Toombs announced Aug. 14 she’d be running for vice mayor, a position currently held by former two-term district council member Angie Henderson, who for her part has said publicly she’s waiting for the Supreme Court’s decision on the council size case before deciding whether to run for reelection.
Suara’s running for the vice mayor seat, too, she confirmed to The Tennessean. For now at least, that sets up a battle between Suara, the highest vote-getter in the 2023 council race, and Toombs, a two-time chair of the council’s budget and finance committee. Both have previously served as the council’s President Pro Tempore, tasked with running council meetings in the vice mayor’s absence.
“I am running for vice mayor because this moment calls for a leader who understands that relationships matter,” Toombs said in a news release announcing her candidacy. “The vice mayor must be able to work with people who do not always agree, find common ground, build consensus and move Nashville forward. I have spent my time on the council doing exactly that.”
Suara said announcing her candidacy has come a bit earlier than she would’ve liked, as she wanted to keep the focus on the candidates running in this year’s midterm election in November. But timing aside, Suara said pursuing the seat in 2027 feels like a “natural next step.”
“But more than anything, it’s the fact that the people of Nashville have trusted me overwhelmingly in the last couple of years to represent them, and it’s been an honor for me to do that,” Suara said. “And I want the opportunity to continue to do that in this next capacity, to continue to give back to this city that has given me so much.”
Austin Hornbostel is the Metro reporter for The Tennessean. Have a question about local government you want an answer to? Reach him at ahornbostel@tennessean.com.
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This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Nashville's 2027 council elections hinge on term limits, ruling on size
