Tenn. Code Ann. § 5-9-101 (2026)

The county legislative body may appropriate moneys as follows:

• (1) For the payment of jurors;

• (2) For the payment of costs of criminal prosecutions chargeable by law to the county;

• (3) For the support of people who are indigent or have mental illness or intellectual or developmental disabilities;

• (4) For the burial or cremation expenses of any poor person dying in the county, leaving no means to pay for the same;

• (5) For the purchase of record books for the use of the circuit and chancery court clerks, the county clerk and the county register;

• (6) To pay solicitors, sheriffs and clerks for ex officio services;

• (7) To pay clerks for making out tax lists;

• (8) To pay the county mayor for the county mayor's services as financial agent of the county;

• (9) To pay the county mayor for other services;

• (10) To pay commissioners for settling with the officers entrusted with the collection of the public or county revenue;

• (11) For building, repairing and taking care of courthouses, jails and other county buildings;

• (12) For purchasing tools for overseers of roads;

• (13) For weights and measures;

• (14) For building bridges; but no county legislative body of this state shall appropriate any moneys to repair or build any bridges on chartered turnpike roads that charge and collect toll;

• (15) To compensate a judge of the court of general sessions and officers concerned in the arrest and examination of a person charged with a felony, as provided in this code;

• (16) For exhibits and buildings and other permanent improvements for or at county and state fairs;

• (17) For aiding farmers' cooperative demonstration work;

• (18) For public and permanent statutes of this state;

• (19) Toward the construction or maintenance of a public market house;

• (20) Toward the printing of histories of the county, and further in aid of the construction of markers or monuments of a historical character within the bounds of the county and toward the acquisition and development of historic sites, structures and buildings in the county;

• (21) To purchase all necessary equipment for use by the sheriff of the county for the preservation of the peace and for the service and execution of all process, criminal and civil, and to pay the salaries of deputy sheriffs appointed pursuant to title 8, chapter 20;

• (22) To make appropriations for the purpose of participating with the federal government in community planning services and training of older people or senior citizens in accordance with the Older Americans Act of 1965 ( 42 U.S.C. § 3001 et seq.);

• (23) To nonprofit volunteer fire departments or to nonprofit county-wide fire departments authorized by § 5-17-101, upon such terms as may be agreed to by the county legislative bodies;

• (24) To make appropriations for the purpose of participating with either the state or federal government, or both of them, to provide services and facilities for people with mental illness or intellectual or developmental disabilities;

• (25) To appropriate funds for any project otherwise statutorily authorized; and

• (26) For economic and community development.

Code 1858, § 4215 (deriv. Acts 1827, ch. 49, § 14; 1833, ch. 89, §§ 1, 2; 1833, ch. 92, § 16; 1855-1856, ch. 145, § 1); 1879, ch. 192, § 1; 1907, ch. 513, § 1; 1913 (1st Ex. Sess.), ch. 27, § 1; 1915, ch. 148, § 1; 1917, ch. 27, § 1; 1917, ch. 43, § 1; Shan., § 6045; Acts 1919, ch. 72, § 1; mod. Code 1932, § 10242; Acts 1943, ch. 91, § 1; C. Supp. 1950, § 10242; Acts 1951, ch. 4, § 1; modified; impl. am. Acts 1963, ch. 14, § 1; Acts 1967, ch. 57, § 1; 1971, ch. 8, § 1; 1975, ch. 9, § 1; 1976, ch. 647, § 1; 1978, ch. 674, § 3; impl. am. Acts 1978, ch. 934, §§ 7, 16, 22, 36; impl. am. Acts 1979, ch. 68, § 3; T.C.A. (orig. ed.), § 5-901; Acts 1980, ch. 731, §§ 1-3; 1986, ch. 725, § 1; 1989, ch. 189, § 1; 2003, ch. 51, § 1; 2003, ch. 90, § 2; 2011, ch. 158, § 4.