“By calling this press conference here today, it really represents one of the most important announcements that I have made in my over 30 years of public service.

“Let me first reference the book of Ecclesiastes the third chapter. ‘To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.’ There is a season and there is a time.

“It is now a season and a time for me as a mayor of the great city of Memphis to announce to you today that effective July 10, 2009, I will resign my tenure as mayor of the city of Memphis.

“My service as mayor of this great city has been one of the highlights of my professional career. And I have immensely enjoyed serving the citizens of Memphis in this capacity for the last 18 years.

“I am most proud of the fact that during my tenure as mayor the city of Memphis has grown and prospered for all of its citizens. And I will leave behind a much better and stronger city government than I inherited.

“However, retirement from city government does not mean that I am retiring from private endeavors or from public service.  As always, I am busy making plans for     the next chapter of my life.

“In the immediate future – and I have been looking forward to this – I will join my son Rodney and Herenton Capital Management, a Memphis-based holding company, which focuses on institutional investments and management business. This locally based firm pursues opportunities in the private sector and with governmental institutions located throughout the state of Tennessee.

“I promised my son at some point in time I would join him in business.

“On the public side, I have previously announced my intention to seek the seat of the Ninth Congressional District. That remains my intention and over the next several months I intend to devote a great deal of time and energy meeting and listening to the citizens of the Ninth Congressional District.

“One of the things that I am acutely aware of is the fact that pursuing one public office while holding another creates the appearance of a conflict of interest. I have always been opposed to such behavior by public officials and if I follow the same course of conduct that I have criticized in the past, it would subject me to the same criticisms that I have publicly stated about others.

“Although – and some of them are here – many of my colleagues friends and constituents have tried to persuade me otherwise. They said, ‘Mayor, don’t leave. Stay mayor and run for Congress.’ But I am convinced that serving as mayor while pursuing a seat in Congress is really not a good idea and would become a distraction.”