News - Friday, March 30, 2018

Realtor Brandi Pearl Thompson is standing on a piece of property on Stringer’s Ridge, taking in a bird’s eye view of downtown Chattanooga. The sweeping vista includes the Tennessee River at her feet and Lookout Mountain to her right.

The air is chilly and dull gray clouds stretch across the sky, so the view isn’t at its best, but it’s still a sight to see. And it’s all hers.

Jane Fitzpatrick was just settling into her thirties when she started a journey that’s only now coming to an end as she pushes 79.

Bored with waiting for her children to come home from school and tired of presiding over various clubs, she went to work for a Chattanooga jeweler. Eight years later, after she became an experienced buyer, she went into business for herself.

The Tennessee General Assembly is making some monumental decisions these days – literally.

Not only is the Legislature prepared to put a statue of Tennessee folk hero Davy Crockett in front of the State Capitol, replacing obscure Nashville politician Edward Carmack, it’s also likely to erect a monument, or memorial, to unborn children in the ongoing battle against abortion.

Rosemarie Hill, a shareholder in the law firm of Chambliss, Bahner & Stophel, has been inducted as a Life Fellow of the American Bar Foundation’s global honorary society, the Fellows. Membership in the Fellows is limited to one percent of lawyers licensed to practice in each jurisdiction and is dictated by peer nomination as well as election by the Board of the American Bar Foundation.

The Group has launched its comprehensive Builder Advantage Program and New Homes Sales Solutions. Committed to providing specialized service to their clients, The Group is the first real estate brokerage in Chattanooga to develop a program designed to support builders in their efforts to market and sell their new homes and to provide all-inclusive support for buyers purchasing a newly built home.

The Young Lawyers Division of the Chattanooga Bar Association hosted the Hamilton County Mock Trial Competition Feb. 22–27.

Special thanks to the Hon. Alex McVeagh and Logan Threadgill for their work on this competition, to the Hon. Travis McDonough and the Hon. Christopher Steger for judging the finals, to Judges Pamela Fleenor, Kyle Hedrick, Tom Greenholtz, Lila Statom, Gary Starnes and Kevin Wilson for judging the preliminary rounds.

After recently adopting a dog from a local shelter, I began to think about the challenges pet owners face when selling a home. We all love our pets, whether they’re dogs, cats, hamsters or rabbits – but that doesn’t mean potential buyers want to be greeted by them when viewing our home or see evidence of them when considering whether or not to make an offer on it.

For homeowners in Chattanooga and throughout southeast Tennessee, warmer weather means it’s time to get organized and tackle your spring home maintenance jobs early so you – and your home – can enjoy the change of seasons with minimal stress.

If you’re in your twenties or thirties, you might be starting to focus more on investing to reach your financial goals. Because of this, you also may be more attuned to moves in the financial markets.

Depending on your age, you may have only experienced the bull market of the past nine years, so you might not know what to expect – or how to respond – whenever the next bear market strikes.

Film is an experimental medium. Beyond its basic rules lies all the room moviemakers need for innovation. Unfortunately, experiments sometimes fail. Case in point: director Steven Soderbergh’s psychological thriller “Unsane,” a ghastly, awful film that will waste the time and money of everyone who sees it.

Thank goodness Tennessee spring football is here. Vol Nation needs a diversion with all that’s happened the past couple of weeks, like the men’s basketball team losing to Loyola-Chicago in the NCAA Tournament’s second round, and Loyola advancing to the Final Four.

Plan now to join us for the second annual Believe Bash, to be held Saturday, April 14 in Wilson Air Hanger at Chattanooga Metropolitan Airport.

The gala will begin at 6 p.m., when guests will be greeted by flappers and a speakeasy that will take them back in time to the roaring ’20s.

The Catoosa County Chamber of Commerce has named Crye-Leike North Georgia its Business of the Year.

The office topped its competitors in the medium-sized business category, which includes businesses with 20-50 staff members. The award recognizes Crye-Leike North Georgia’s community and Chamber of Commerce involvement.

Crye-Leike Realtor Donna Darnes and Community Mortgage Branch Manager Rebecca Pool will host a free home buyers’ seminar on Tuesday, April 3.

The event will begin at 6:30 p.m. at Crye-Leike’s Ooltewah office, 5913 Main Street.

Darnes and Pool will provide an array of information about the home buying process and answer questions from attendees.

The men and women of the Chattanooga Fire Department are often called upon to save citizen’s lives. Now donations from the local community could save their lives during water emergencies.

The Chattanooga Fire Department has received 140 personal flotation devices from the Firehouse Subs Public Safety Foundation. The Chattanooga Fire Department applied for the Firehouse Subs grant last year and recently received an award of $19,922 to purchase the PFDs. The new flotation devices will replace the aging PFDs purchased years ago.

Drivers who use Martin Luther King Boulevard to navigate downtown Chattanooga can add back the block between Market Street and Georgia Avenue to their daily commutes. After 130 days of work, construction crews on the project recently removed the “Road Closed” signs, opening the block to pedestrian and vehicular traffic.

The waning days of fall and the arrival of winter in the Southeast bring with them colder, and wetter, weather. This dour season might dampen the spirits of the region’s human residents, but days of steady winter drizzle help refill temporary forest pools that serve as a vital habitat for many animals.

Southern Lit Alliance will welcome author George Singleton as part of the South Bound lecture series for an evening reading of his new collection of short stories, “Calloustown.” The event will take place Wednesday, April 4, at 5:30 p.m. and will be followed by a discussion and book signing with the author. The event will be held at the Arts Building at 301 East 11th St. in downtown Chattanooga and is being hosted by the Writers@Work program at Chattanooga State.