April 22,  2024 - Partnership/City Feud Spreads to Chamber of Commerce
by Josh Blevins
On Friday afternoon, a representative of the Shelbyville-Bedford Partnership hand-delivered uncashed Chamber of Commerce membership fee checks and a memo to Shelbyville City Hall stating that the city is “not eligible for Chamber benefits.” It went on to state that “Government participation is recognized through membership within the Shelbyville-Bedford Partnership.”

This is another step in the ongoing feud that included the city defunding the Partnership in this year’s budget. Other incidents have included the Chamber posting a photo album of a recent grand opening event which had only one government official in attendance, City Mayor Randy Carroll, and framing or cropping all the photos so he was nowhere to be seen. More recently, last week’s ribbon cutting at the airport featured the new Chamber director referring to the Shelbyville Municipal Airport as the Shelbyville-Bedford Airport, despite the county having no ownership in the airport.

Despite the wording on the memo delivered to Shelbyville on Friday, the Chamber of Commerce website continues to show another government entity as a member (Town of Bell Buckle) and even though no longer funded by the city, the Partnership continues to use the city’s name and has the city listed on their website as a “Business Partner”.