When he wasn't encouraging people to read The Tennessean, the mayor was getting emotional at the Rotary Club with the tax increase hard sell:

“Look in the face of those young kids, who are working so hard trying to get ahead, and say, ‘Is this good enough for you?’ ” Dean said, recounting a recent trip to Antioch Middle, a school built in the Harry Truman era with a student population primed to explode. “I couldn’t do it.

“We shouldn’t,” Dean added.