Marcus Mauldin News Today

Former Oklahoma State basketball player Marshall Moses and Soulbody Cyphers present a unique event, the Cinematic Showdown.

In all of the challenges facing our city — affordable housing, education, health care and living wage jobs — the lack of equity underpins them all. Disparities among class and racial groups are well-documented.

Chattanooga will spend $20,000 on a social and economic equity study that will aim to provide officials with a roadmap for addressing inequities in areas like education, health care, food security and the criminal justice system.

A nearly $20,000 study by a professor at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga would evaluate citywide disparities in education, health care, food security, and the criminal justice system and aim to provide leaders with ways to solve those problems.

Chattanooga officials intend to move forward with an equity study that would highlight existing disparities in the city and provide recommendations for closing socioeconomic gaps.

Although some members had questions about how it would coincide with similar, past efforts, the Chattanooga City Council is contemplating a social and economic equity study that would assess disparities within the city.