Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam has appointed the Hon. Muecke Barker to a new advisory board for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
Haslam recently appointed 20 members to new advisory boards for each of the four campuses within the University of Tennessee system (the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, the University of Tennessee at Martin, and the University of Tennessee Health Science Center).
The advisory boards were created under the UT FOCUS Act the General Assembly passed last session.
Barker is a member of the litigation section at Chambliss, Bahner & Stophel, where he concentrates on mediation, arbitration and alternative dispute resolution.
He began his service in the Tennessee Judicial System in 1983, when Gov. Lamar Alexander appointed him to become judge of the Circuit Court of the Eleventh Judicial District of Tennessee.
Barker was elected to two eight-year terms and was consistently the highest rated circuit court judge in the Chattanooga Bar Association’s bi-annual polls.
In 1995, he was appointed to the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals; Tennessee voters elected to keep him there in August 1996.
In 1998, Gov. Don Sundquist appointed Barker to the Tennessee Supreme Court. He was then elected to a full eight-year term. In 2005, Barker was unanimously chosen by his colleagues to become chief justice.
After being elected to a second eight-year term, Barker retired from the Supreme Court in September 2008. The Tennessee Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates subsequently named him Appellate Judge of the Year.
“These board members will positively impact the multiple and diverse campuses that comprise the UT system,” Haslam says. “We wanted members who could focus their attention on the individual campuses and respond nimbly to the specific needs of each institution.”
The UT advisory board members are appointed by the governor and confirmed by the General Assembly. Each board is comprised of five public members, one faculty member and one student member.
Haslam also select Chattanooga attorney Scott LeRoy of LeRoy Law Firm to serve on the advisory board.
Sources: Haslam; Chambliss Law