Oak Ridge Today





History of death penalty in Tennessee to be discussed today

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Hemant Sharma

The history of the death penalty in Tennessee will be discussed in a lunchtime meeting today (Tuesday, May 4).

The meeting is hosted by the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge. It will be virtual (online). The speaker will be University of Tennessee Lecturer Hemant Sharma.

Along with John M. Scheb, head of the Political Science Department at the University of Tennessee/Knoxville, and others, Sharma authored the 2013 study “Race and the Death Penalty: An Empirical Assessment of First Degree Murder Convictions in Tennessee after Gregg v. Georgia,” a press release said. Published in the Tennessee Journal of Race, Gender and Social Justice, the study analyzed 1,068 first-degree murder convictions in the state following the 1976 Supreme Court decision that ended the four-year court moratorium on the death penalty across the nation.

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Final Breakfast with the Legislators of the year is Monday

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The final Breakfast with the Legislators of this year is on Monday. The meeting will be virtual, meaning you can access it online.

The meeting is scheduled from 7:30 to 8:30 a.m. Monday, April 26. It is sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge.

Tennessee senators Randy McNally and Ken Yager and representatives John Ragan and Kent Calfee have been invited to share an update about the current session of the Tennessee General Assembly, a press release said.

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Political redistricting to be discussed at Lunch with League

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Debby Gould

Political redistricting will be discussed at Lunch with the League in Oak Ridge on Tuesday, April 20.

The virtual meeting is scheduled to start at noon April 20. It is hosted by the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge.

The featured speaker will be Debby Gould, first vice president of the League of Women Voters of Tennessee.

She will “share information on the League’s efforts to facilitate fair and equitable redistricting in our state and nation through its People Powered Fair Maps national redistricting program, which aims to create fair political maps nationwide in all 50 states and the District of Columbia,” a press release said.

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Death penalty to be discussed at Lunch with League

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Marshall Jensen

The death penalty in America will be discussed during a Lunch with the League meeting at noon today (Tuesday, April 6).

The virtual meeting is hosted by the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge. It will feature Marshall Jensen, a federal public defender for the Middle District of Tennessee. His talk is titled “‘Spaces of Sorrow Only God Can Touch’: The Death Penalty in Modern America.”

“Most people think that those on death row must be the worst of the worst,” Jensen said in a press release. “But when we examine who ends up on death row in America, what they share is they almost uniformly tend to be poor, mentally ill, intellectually disabled, or suffer from some form of organic brain damage.”

Having served as a federal public defender for the Middle District of Tennessee in the Capital Habeas Unit since January 2020, Jensen represents people sentenced to death in their final, federal appeals before execution, the press release said. Prior to this work, he served as an assistant public defender at the Knox County Public Defender’s Community Law Office, where he represented indigent individuals in Knox County criminal courts.

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Breakfast with Legislators next Monday

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The Oak Ridge League of Women Voters will have its second Breakfast with the Legislators of the year on Monday.

The breakfast is scheduled from 7:30 to 8:30 a.m. Monday, March 22. The meeting will be virtual, and it’s open to the public.

Tennessee senators Randy McNally and Ken Yager and representatives John Ragan and Kent Calfee have been invited to share an update about the current session of the Tennessee General Assembly, a press release said.

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Blasius to discuss Downtown Oak Ridge on Tuesday

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Wayne Blasius

Wayne Blasius, community development director for the City of Oak Ridge, will discuss the current status of Downtown Oak Ridge during a lunchtime meeting on Tuesday.

The meeting will be hosted by the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge, and it will be online. League members and nonmembers receiving this announcement will receive the zoom link before March 2, a press release said.

For instructions on how to access the presentation on Tuesday, send an email to [email protected]. A couple of days following the presentation, you may view the recorded session on the League’s website at https://my.lwv.org/tennessee/oak-ridge.

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Breakfast with Legislators resumes Monday

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The first Breakfast with the Legislators of this year will be Monday morning, and it will be an online meeting.

The meeting, sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge, is scheduled to start at 7:30 a.m. Monday, February 22.

Tennessee senators Randy McNally and Ken Yager and representatives John Ragan and Kent Calfee have been invited to speak about the legislative outlook for the current session of the Tennessee General Assembly, a press release said.

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CASA coordinator to discuss programs to help children

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Amanda Brackett

A CASA coordinator will discuss programs to help children during an online meeting at noon today (Tuesday, February 16).

The speaker will be Amanda Brackett, Program Coordinator for CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) of Anderson County.

She will speak during the lunchtime meeting of the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge. To watch the presentation, send an email to [email protected]. Later, you will be able to watch the recorded session on the League’s website at https://my.lwv.org/tennessee/oak-ridge.

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Police chief to speak to League of Women Voters on Tuesday

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Robin Smith

Oak Ridge Police Chief Robin Smith will speak to the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge on Tuesday.

The meeting will be virtual, conducted online, because of COVID-19. It is scheduled to start at noon Tuesday, January 19.

Smith has served with the Oak Ridge Police Department since 2012. He served as a lieutenant for two years before being promoted to captain and then deputy chief, a press release said. He was appointed ORPD chief in October 2018.

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UT professor to discuss impact of COVID-19 on ecology, evolution

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Nina Fefferman

A University of Tennessee professor will discuss the effects of COVID-19 on ecology and evolution during an online presentation on Tuesday.

Nina Fefferman will be the speaker at the League of Women Voters event. Fefferman is a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and the Department of Mathematics at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.

Fefferman is the associate director of UT’s One Health Initiative, and she is a member of the Covid-19 Outbreak Response Experts (CORE-19) at UT.

The principle investigator at the Fefferman Lab at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville since 2008, Fefferman focuses on disease in the human population and how disease and disease-related behavioral ecology can affect the short-term survival and long-term evolutionary success of a population during and after a pandemic, a press release said. She has done extensive work with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on pandemic preparedness and has drawn on her expertise to develop models to shape policy to keep populations safe during and after pandemics.

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Voting rights to be discussed Tuesday

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Katie A. Cahill
Katie A. Cahill

Voting rights will be discussed in Oak Ridge on Tuesday.

The speaker will be Katie A. Cahill, associate director of the Howard H. Baker Jr. Center for Public Policy and director of the Leadership and Governance Program. Cahill has a courtesy post as an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.

Her Tuesday talk will be to the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge. Her talk is titled “Voting Rights, Laws and Trends: A Look Ahead to 2020,” a press release said.

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Cannabis in Tennessee to be discussed Tuesday

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Cannabis in Tennessee will be discussed at “Lunch with the League” in Oak Ridge on Tuesday.

The speaker will be Patricia K. Freeland, professor and associate head of the Department of Political Science at the University of Tennessee, a press release said.

The meeting will be held from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. Tuesday in the Social Hall of the Oak Ridge Unitarian Universalist Church, which is located at 809 Oak Ridge Turnpike.

A long-time educator, Freeland has had an extensive and interesting career in all aspects of public administration and public policy, the press release said. She has written numerous books and articles on public administration, food policy, technology policy (drones), religion, and politics.

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