CRITIC’S CORNER REAL ESTATE ‘It’ will do more With a little help than scare you from his friends Find Public Notices Don’t like scary movies? Realtor Jay Hudson inside & online: Too bad. ‘It’ is so more throws a party to show www.HamiltonCountyHerald.com than a cheap scream. clients his appreciation. P15 P13 Volume 104 | No. 37 Single Copy 50¢ CHATTANOOGA, HAMILTON COUNTY, TENNESSEE September 15 – 21, 2017 What was going on in Chattanooga in 1967? Saturday, Sept. 16 Mrs. Z. Cartter Patten, Chattanooga area histori- an, won the Certifi cate of Commendation at the an- nual meeting of the Amer- ican Association of State Emily O’Donnell and Local History held Aug. Heidi Hoffecker 29-Sept. 2 in Toronto. She Photograph by David Laprad won the award for her work Virginia Anne Sharber with the Association for Photograph provided Preservation of Tennessee Antiquities and her spon- Photograph provided sorship of the Messages of the Governors of Tennes- see, edited by state histori- an Robert H. White. Life after law: Mrs. C.C. Burgner, a teacher in the Chattanoo- ga and Hamilton County school systems for 37 years, Taking legal skills to new fields died ursday after a long illness. Her last position of law school, passing the bar exam and was at Tyner High School, Attorneys give up practices, find new establishing careers as attorneys, they where she taught for 15 stepped away from the legal profession. years. Her husband, C. ways to aid organizations, community To non-attorneys – and some prac- C. Burgner, was principal ticing attorneys – this sounds crazy. there from 1922-1959, By David Laprad and write contracts. But lawyers do leave the profession when they both retired. “If you have to work for a living and for a variety of reasons, some of which Sunday, Sept. 17 hattanooga attorney Emily you’re going to be a lawyer, then, by include the insurmountable work load, O’Donnell loved the prac- Open house for the gen- golly, litigation is pretty darn fun,” she the pressure to constantly prevail in an tice of law. She enjoyed eral public was held Sunday says. antagonistic system and boredom with the thrill of spotting an at the multi-million dollar Virginia Anne Sharber was one of the daily grind. issue in a case and devising new facility of Chattanooga the attorneys Hoff ecker apparent- ere are other reasons attorneys a strategy to address it. She liked the State Technical Institute, ly didn’t know existed. After a brief call off their careers mid-stride, some of gamesmanship of going up against an- 4501 Amnicola Highway. dalliance with trial work, Sharber found which are not as black and white as be- Cother entity and, as a Legal Aid lawyer, her niche in commercial real estate. She Sessions Court Judge ing overworked, stressed or bored. Such was scratching her itch to do good in Russell Hinson will moder- says the win-win nature of putting to- was the case with O’Donnell, Hoff ecker the world. gether a deal suited her better than the and Sharber, each of whom has a new See 50 YEARS, page 23 Likewise, Heidi Hoff ecker could adversarial nature of going to court. career. not imagine a better job than being a “I also liked pointing out the build- As these former lawyers pursued INSIDE litigator. In law school, she was so eager ings I’d worked on to my kids,” she says. new frontiers, they found themselves to someday be in court that she never But O’Donnell, Hoff ecker and Shar- challenged in fresh ways and discovered ■ FINANCIAL FOCUS P10 even considered that some people were ber are no longer practicing law. After See CAREERS, page 2 ■ REAL ESTATE P13 there to learn how to negotiate deals enduring (and paying for) three years Representing Tennessee and Georgia clients since 1989 CIVIL WILLS & PERSONAL BUSINESS LITIGATION ESTATES INJURY LAW 724 Cherry St. Chattanooga, TN 37402 423-265-5100 www.epsteinlawfi rm.net 2 | September 15 – 21, 2017 Hamilton County Herald www.hamiltoncountyherald.com News and notes from the Chattanooga Bar Association Bar Association CAREERS From page 1 that although they’ve left the law, the law has yet to leave them. The lure of the law A Decatur, Georgia, native, O’Donnell earned her undergraduate degree at Se- wanee: e University of the South, where she enjoyed what she calls “an indulgent educational experience.” “I didn’t grow up feeling called to be a lawyer,” she says. “I didn’t even have aspi- rations of going to graduate school.” When O’Donnell found her political science degree to be less than helpful in securing employment, she joined Ameri- Corps, a civil service program supported by the federal government. While stationed in Flagstaff , Arizo- na, O’Donnell did trail work in national parks, cut down massive Ponderosa Pines that were infested with bark beetles and camped for several days at a time. She also developed a love for environmental preservation. When O’Donnell’s term of service ended two years later, she’d accumulat- ed several thousand dollars in education credit. She didn’t want to waste it, so she “took a stab at the LSAT.” Photograph by David Laprad “While I was grappling with what I Emily O’Donnell has gone from Legal Aid to the Public Education Foundation to The Women’s Fund, where she is now executive director. wanted to be, a family friend, who’s an at- torney said, ‘Emily, only priests are called. e rest of us have to get a job, so take the LSAT and go to law school. It will open doors,’” O’Donnell says. With an eye on becoming an environ- mental lawyer, O’Donnell made her way to the Georgia State University College of Law. An internship with the Environ- mental Protection Agency crushed her aspiration. “ e lawyers I worked with never went CHATTANOOGA BAR ASSOCIATION CHATTANOOGA to court,” O’Donnell says. “Most of them were researchers and writers, and I had learned through mock trial that I liked courtroom advocacy.” After moving to Chattanooga to escape Atlanta, O’Donnell found work as a staff attorney at Legal Aid of East Tennessee. ere, she advocated for clients who were in danger of being evicted, represented victims of domestic violence and resolved other sundry dilemmas for the indigent. Like O’Donnell, becoming an attorney was the farthest thing from Hoff ecker’s mind as she started college. Instead, she intended to become a forensic pathologist. A class on organic chemistry at Maryville College crushed Hoff ecker’s as- piration. “It was the weed-out class – and Photograph by David Laprad Heidi Hoffecker, formerly a litigator with Baker Donelson, is now development director of Orange Grove, a private nonprofit that See CAREERS, page 3 serves adults and children with intellectual disabilities. Executive Committee John C. Harrison Board of Governors Ex-Officio Member TREASURER William G. Colvin Barret S. Albritton The Honorable Pamela PRESIDENT Honorable Christie M. Sheri Fox Fleenor Sell Marc Harwell JUDICIAL REPRESENTATIVE Lee Davis PAST PRESIDENT PRESIDENT-ELECT George G. Hixson Jeffrey W. Maddux Steven M. Jacoway Jimmy Rodgers SECRETARY Linda Minks Hood Brittany T. Faith EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR YLD REPRESENTATIVE Chattanooga Bar Association | The Pioneer Building | Suite 420 | 801 Broad Street | Chattanooga, TN 37402 | 423-756-3222 | Fax: 423-265-6602 |www.chattanoogabar.org www.hamiltoncountyherald.com Hamilton County Herald September 15 – 21, 2017 | 3 PEF boasted upon hiring O’Don- nell that she served on the board of e Women’s Fund of Greater Chat- tanooga, a nonprofi t that advocates on a state and local level for policies that aff ect women and girls. Passion- ate about the issues, O’Donnell was a long-time member of the organiza- tion. Two months ago, O’Donnell left the PEF to become the executive director of e Women’s Fund. Whereas O’Donnell left the prac- tice of law to have more impact in her community, a desire to be present with a much smaller but no less important group of people motivat- ed Hoff ecker’s departure from the profession. In 2002, Hoff ecker transferred to Baker Donelson to handle nursing home litigation. But the demands of the practice – 16-hour days and regular road trips – did not mesh well with her responsibilities at home, especially after she and her second husband added a son to the mix. “ e situation was untenable,” she says. “ I couldn’t continue to give my fi rm, clients and family what they all deserved.” A change needed to be made but Hoff ecker didn’t know what to do. When she learned that Orange Photograph by David Laprad Grove Center, a private nonprofi t BAR ASSOCIATION CHATTANOOGA Virginia Anne Sharber, who served on and led a variety of boards in the Chattanooga area while with Miller & Martin, is now executive director that serves adults and children with of Hunter Museum of American Art. intellectual disabilities, was hiring a desperately needed, if the educa- development director, her uncertain- CAREERS From page 2 loved her cases. tion system allows you to leave high ty transformed into resolve and she “It was terrifi c fun. I loved learn- school and you can’t read a lease, applied for the job. it weeded me out,” she says, laughing. ing about the medicine for each new you’re going to be evicted over and Hoff ecker had been on the orga- Hoff ecker graduated with an case, and interacting with the doc- over and over again.” nization’s board since 2009. Her vol- English degree in 1989, but unlike tors, witnesses and opposing counsel To begin focusing on systemic unteer service as well as her personal O’Donnell didn’t look for work.