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Chattanooga Update - July 8, 2013

61 views · Published 8 July 2013 · 4:14 · Indexed 8 November 2026

Channel: chattanooga times free press · 2013 · News & Politics

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First of all, a decision by the state Board of Education to change how teachers are paid has led to a push to remove Education Commissioner Kevin Huffman.

More than 2,000 people have joined Facebook pages calling for Huffman's ouster. And a Change.org petition now has hundreds of signatures as well.

The outrage comes after changes last month that reduces steps in salary increases for teachers and eliminates incentives for doctorate degrees.

Officials say Huffman's ouster would be unlikely, though.
The state education board chairman and Gov. Bill Haslam have both come to Huffman's defense. They say the teacher pay change was the board's decision, not Huffman's.
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Four nursing homes in the Chattanooga region have been cited for serious deficiencies in the last two years.

That means there's been a threat to patients' safety, or potential for a patient's life to be endangered.

Of the four, only one violation involved a fatality: a 66-year-old Alexian Village resident who tumbled off her bed as a nurse's assistant was turning her. She later died from internal bleeding.

In fact, of the 900 nursing homes in the tri-state area, 90 serious deficiency findings have been issued in the past three years.
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An important Civil War trail has been uncovered on Moccasin Bend.

It's a 200 year old trail that began as a well-used Cherokee path and was used for the Trail of Tears before becoming a major supply line for Union forces.

Archeology teams used everything from ground penetrating radar to light detecting technology to locate the road, but in the end the most useful tool was simply digging out old maps.

The historic path is scheduled to open to the public on Oct. 26 for the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.
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Police say an Athens, Tennessee, woman has killed her husband in self defense.

Eleven minutes after Robert Vann Marshall was let out of the McMinn County Jail, officials say he violated a protection order and tried to force his way into his wife's home.

Authorities say Melissa Marshall shot her husband in the chest. No charges have been filed against her but an investigation is underway.
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A vacationing Tennessee woman has died after she fell from the 10th floor balcony of a Panama City Beach condominium.

Authorities say the 22-year-old woman was visiting Panama City Beach from McMinnville, Tennessee.

Her body has been turned over to the medical examiner's office for an autopsy, but no foul play is suspected.
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Also, a Bledsoe County man has finished his challenge of visiting every county in the United States.

J. Stephen Conn started marking off counties in 1995. Now Conn has become the 34th member of the Extra Miler Club to visit all 3,142 counties. But his journey's not over. While he's been to 57 different countries around the world, there's still more to explore.

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And the gloomy weekend of near-constant rain has pushed the Chattanooga area 15 inches above the average rainfall for this time of year.

We've received nearly four inches of rain in the last week alone.

In fact, 11 people were rescued from Little River in East Tennessee over the weekend.

Rescue crews arrived to find adults and children holding onto tree branches Saturday afternoon.

The victims were riding tubes on Little River when the water level rose quickly and turned the river into a dangerous threat.

And I'm afraid we've not seen the last of the rain. More showers and thunderstorms are expected all week.

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