Author: Associated Press

A private consulting report calls for improved organization at the Chattanooga Zoo to create better accountability and efficiency after the deaths of 10 animals last winter. The report was presented to the Chattanooga City Council on Tuesday by consultant David…

Tennessee tax collections in July exceeded state budget estimates for the 12th straight month. State officials said Tuesday that July revenue was $843 million, or $19.9 million more than budgeted. Finance and Administration Commissioner Mark Emkes said sales tax collections…

Opponents of the Tennessee Valley Authority reviving its mothballed Bellefonte Nuclear Plant in northeastern Alabama say building a reactor is a safety risk and could drive up rates. A report released Tuesday by the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy says…

A log mansion that once provided an investor with views of the Smoky Mountains will again be auctioned after its previous sale failed to close. The structure in Gatlinburg is the most visible remainder of day trader Dennis Bolze's former…

A man charged with attacking his brother and sister-in-law with a machete had to be rescued from a river when he bolted from the Whitley County Courthouse and jumped into the water handcuffed. James Fields was being returned to the…

A Jackson County couple has been charged with felony child deprivation. The Mississippi Press reported that 23-year-old Jimmy Russell McLallen and 22-year-old Jessica Elaine McLallen were arrested Friday. Bond was set Monday at $10,000 each. Sheriff Mike Byrd said a…

Storm shelters may qualify for state sales tax savings under recently passed legislation. The Tennessee Department of Revenue says Tennessee taxpayers who purchase qualifying building supplies to construct storm shelters between July 1 and Dec. 31 can save up to…

A federal judge has ruled that the merger between Memphis City Schools and its surrounding county school district is legal. It paves the way to create a school system with 150,000 students in 2013. District Judge Samuel Mays' Monday ruling…

A longtime member of country music superstar Johnny Cash's original band - the Tennessee Two - has died in a Jonesboro hospital. Memorial Park Funeral Home and Cemetery in Memphis, Tenn., says 83-year-old Marshall Grant died Sunday. A spokeswoman at…

When state lawmakers passed an ordinance creating a pilot program for communities to write golf-cart-friendly ordinances, the initial eight towns registered just three carts. And then came Eagleville. The farm town of about 600 an hour south of Nashville was…

A teen climbing a tower in eastern Kentucky suffered fatal injuries when the structure broke and he fell. A group of six or seven boys were in a rural area in Morgan County early Saturday morning when two began climbing…

As the school year begins, teachers in Memphis know they will be evaluated four times during the school year. The results will determine whether they have their job next year. Many of the teachers have previously been evaluated as seldom…

A new requirement that Tennessee voters must have photo identification is putting more pressure on driver's license examining stations to cut wait times. The administration of Gov. Bill Haslam is moving to improve the efficiency of the Driver Services Division…

Tennessee's Division of Consumer Affairs is warning job seekers to be wary of employment service firms that charge a fee to help clients find a job. A news release from the division advises job seekers to reject firms that guarantee…

University of Tennessee officials hope slashing the price of an historic mansion that was once home to several UT presidents will make it more palatable for purchase. The price of the 11,400-square-foot Georgian-style mansion was cut from $2.9 million to…

A federal jury has convicted five current or former police officers of civil rights violations in the deadly shootings on a New Orleans bridge after Hurricane Katrina. All five officers were convicted Friday of charges stemming from the cover-up of…

Police in southern Kentucky have arrested two men who investigators say stole aluminum gutter downspouts from a half-dozen local churches. On Wednesday, Pulaski County Sheriff's officials got a break when someone spotted a pickup truck full of downspouts and called…

The Internal Revenue Service is auditing a high school booster club's books to find out why it has as much as $480,000 in funds that are unaccounted for. Fern Creek booster club president Tim Fries says the IRS has been…

Fort Campbell is starting a weeklong annual celebration called Week of the Eagles that will culminate with a new commander taking over the famed 101st Airborne Division. The events begin on Friday morning with more than 15,000 soldiers participating in…

More than 150 Tennessee schools will get fresh fruit and vegetables for their students through grants provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. A total of $3.15 million was provided to give students healthy options at low income elementary schools,…

Memphis police believe the hot weather contributed to the death of a police officer and the heat might be linked to the death of a city sanitation worker. Officer Anthony Rahming became ill while on duty Wednesday evening and went…

The Coast Guard says a section of the Mississippi River in north Louisiana has been closed after 35 barges pushed by a towboat broke free and a coal barge sank in the river channel. The towing vessel Sally Bromfield lost…

When the Tennessee River sweats, it's bad news for Tennessee Valley Authority ratepayers. With the river at 90 degrees in north Alabama, the utility Wednesday had to reduce a third reactor at Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant to 50 percent power.…

The Mississippi State Department of Health reports that two new cases of West Nile virus bring the state total for 2011 to nine. The cases are the second this year in Hinds County, and the first in Forrest county. Cases…

General sessions court judges in Shelby County have suspended Court Clerk Otis Jackson, who has been indicted on felony misconduct charges. The 15 judges of the sessions courts met last Friday and all but three of them voted to suspend…

The World's Longest Yardsale just keeps growing. The event - also known as the 127 Corridor Sale - runs Thursday through Sunday along a now-675-mile route. The sale was the brainchild of Mike Walker, the Fentress County, Tenn., Executive in…

The University of Tennessee bookstore has quit selling packages of breath mints that satirize President Barack Obama. Officials pulled the product, which were called "dissapointmints," after state Rep. Joe Armstrong, who is a Democrat, visited the bookstore and told the…

The Krystal Co. based in Chattanooga is seeking a buyer. The chief executive of the 79-year-old restaurant chain known for its small square burgers said in a Wednesday statement that the brand is "well positioned to continue its momentum." Krystal…

Former Memphis mayor Willie Herenton has filed letters of intent with the state to open nine charter schools in Memphis and Shelby County by next year. Herenton, who served as the superintendent for city schools before being elected mayor, is…

A spokesman with federal Bureau of Prisons says James Ford Seale, a reputed Ku Klux Klansman imprisoned for his role in the segregation-era abduction and killing of two black men in rural Mississippi, has died. Bureau of Prisons spokesman Edmond…

The owner of a guardrail company has sued the Tennessee Department of Transportation, arguing his company's suspension violates a 2006 agreement in a separate case. Novice "Joey" Cole's lawsuit also claims TDOT's suspension of his Lu Inc., company relies on…

A federal judge has further limited damage lawsuits against the Tennessee Valley Authority for the huge coal ash spill at TVA's Kingston Plant west of Knoxville. In an order Tuesday, with the first of two bench trials on the suits…

The historic Bethesda Presbyterian Church and six Civil War grave markers at its cemetery have been vandalized. According to the Citizen Tribune of Morristown vandals spray painted vaguely paranormal terms and symbols all over the cemetery in the Russellville community…

Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant of Brandon has won the five-man Republican primary for Mississippi governor. Hattiesburg Mayor Johnnie DuPree and Clarksdale attorney and businessman Bill Luckett are headed to an Aug. 23 runoff for the Democratic nomination. Construction executive Dave…

A corporation says it will offer 1,000 tablet computers to students in an honors program at the University of Southern Mississippi. Samsung Mobile says the 1,000 Galaxy Tab tablets will be offered to students participating in a pilot program in…

A dozen people, most of them children, have been taken to hospitals after a tear gas grenade exploded in southeastern Kentucky. The incident occurred Monday evening in Lynch, which is in Harlan County. Several children were playing with a Vietnam-era…

A man has been killed by a train near the Tennessee-Kentucky state line north of Nashville. The man was apparently sleeping on railroad tracks in Portland and was run over by a train early Tuesday, according to WSMV-TV The incident…

The state wants to make sure parents are aware of Tennessee's low-cost, comprehensive health insurance plan for children. Information about CoverKids will be going home with school children throughout the state in their back-to-school packets. The program provides coverage for…

The Obama administration is challenging Alabama's new immigration law that allows police to detain people they suspect of being illegal immigrants after a traffic stop. The Justice Department says the Alabama law conflicts with federal law and undermines federal immigration…

Lottery officials say Powerball sales in Kentucky fell more than 27 percent for fiscal year 2011, amounting to a $72 million drop. Lottery chief financial officer Howard Kline says the reason is mainly the lack of large jackpots. The lottery…

The Mississippi Department of Archives and History is providing $152,000 to restore a 1950s gas station in Money as part of the story of Emmett Till - a black 14-year-old from Chicago who was lynched in 1955 for whistling at…

A weekend thunderstorm caused a church wall to collapse in Nicholasville. The stone veneer on the back wall of the Episcopal Church of the Resurrection fell into a garden where the cremated remains of some former parishioners are interred. The…

The public Monday gets a first look, and listen, at Belmont University's newly renovated concert hall in Nashville. The venue is at the university-owned Belmont Heights Baptist Church sanctuary, which is in the midst of a $7 million construction project.…

The Tennessee Department of Children's Services is looking into allegations that boys were sexually abused at a youth camp used by Baptist churches. Rob Johnson, a spokesman for the department, said Friday that a team of investigators is looking into…

The Kentucky Office of Employment and Training says jobless rates have fallen in 96 counties between June 2010 and June 2011. In the same time period, unemployment increased in 19 of Kentucky's 120 counties while five counties reported no change.…

The public works director for the West Tennessee city of Millington says he's been subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury. Jack Huffman told The Commercial Appeal he received a summons to appear before a grand jury sometime next month.…

Internal Revenue Service officials are encouraging taxpayers to be on guard for people trying to persuade them to file false claims for tax credits or rebates. The IRS said in a statement Thursday that officials have noticed an increase in…

One person was killed and several injured Thursday morning when a van belonging to a Middle Tennessee church overturned on an off-ramp of Interstate 40 about 55 miles west of Nashville. The gray van landed on its top, which was…

Building permits for a transmission shop were among items seized in a raid on Millington city government offices. The Commercial Appeal reports that Transmission Doctors and the home of Millington Mayor Richard Hodges were also raided on Wednesday. District attorney…