Amelia Parker - At Large Seat C 
P.O. Box 6132
Knoxville, TN 37914
865-851-8561
[email protected]
Term ends: December 2027


Amelia Parker was sworn in as a City Council member on December 21, 2019. She was reelected in 2023 for another four year term and was sworn in on December 16, 2023.

She was the City Council representative on the Knoxville Transportation Authority Board from Dec. 2019-2021.

She currently serves as the City Council representative on the Knoxville Community Media Board (formerly referred to as Community Television or CTV) and she serves on the University of Tennessee College Scholars Board.

Amelia was born in eastern Kentucky and moved with her family to Knoxville in the early ‘80s. Amelia went to Belle Morris Elementary for Kindergarten and was a member of the Girl Scouts. Later, the family moved to South Knoxville where she attended South Knox Elementary and South Middle, and after the schools in South Knox were merged, she went on to attend South-Doyle Middle and graduated from South-Doyle High. During high school, Amelia worked as a weekend page at Lawson McGhee Library downtown. 

Amelia attended the University of Tennessee (Knoxville) and graduated with a B.A. in Comparative Studies of Race and Ethnicity, a degree she designed through the College Scholars program. While at UT, she served as coordinator of the campus Amnesty International chapter and was a member of the Cultural Attractions Committee and the Wesley Foundation. 

Amelia graduated from American University Washington College of Law in Washington, D.C. with specializations in International Human Rights Law and Gender and the Law, earning both her Juris Doctorate and LLM (master of laws) degrees. She volunteered with Election Protection, interned at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law, and served as Program Coordinator for AUW College of Law’s Center for Human Rights and Humanitarian Law. She studied at the University of Utrecht for a semester, and during the summers, she clerked for Judge Louisa Abbott in Savannah, Georgia, and volunteered at the Amnesty International office in Nederland, Colorado.

Amelia returned to Knoxville in 2009 to lead Statewide Organizing for Community eMpowerment (SOCM), one of the oldest grassroots organizations in Tennessee.

In 2017, Amelia ran her first campaign for a council seat, tying for second in the primary with former Tennessee State Representative Harry Tindell and then moving on to secure more than 2,000 write-in votes, 20 percent of the vote, in the general election.

Additional experience:

• Executive Director of Peace Brigades International-USA
• Board of Directors of the Birdhouse Community Center
• Coalition to Stop School Pushout
• Progressive Action Committee’s Police Reform group
• Founding member of Black Lives Matter Knoxville and the City Council Movement. 
• Contributing author to U.S. Human Rights Network’s 2008 shadow report on U.S. compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination



Swearing in ceremony of Amelia Parker on December 16, 2023.