Nickels

Frost Brown Todd has added two new attorneys to its Nashville office.

Richard (Rick) J. Nickels has joined the firm’s Estates, Trusts and Wills practice group. For nearly 20 years, Nickels’ legal focus has been to represent privately held companies, families and individuals in corporate and estate planning matters. He advises on federal transfer and income taxes, and drafts wills and a range of other estate planning documents. On the corporate side, Nickels advises owners, directors and executives of closely held companies in matters such as early-stage structure and funding, mid-stage buyouts and divorces, and late-stage exits.

Eppler

Carl Eppler has joined the firm’s Intellectual Property Law and Litigation practice group, where he advises clients on trademark and copyright issues and assists in negotiating and drafting intellectual property licensing and protection agreements. He also provides counsel on advertising review and clearance, sweepstakes and promotions, social media and compliance with various Federal Trade Commission (FTC) requirements. Eppler also counsels clients in the entertainment industry on transactional and litigation matters.

Legal Aid Society hires 3 new attorneys

Barbeauld

Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the Cumberlands, Tennessee’s largest non-profit law firm, has hired three attorneys to their firm.

Paige Hamby Barbeauld joins the Clarksville office after having volunteered there for over a year. Prior to this, she served as in-house counsel for Environmental Research Center in Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia.

During law school, where she was an Ellen Ewing Fellow, as well as an Academic Fellow, she did work with the Oldfather Law Firm, Brandeis Law Clinic, Jefferson County Attorney’s Office and Legal Aid Society, all in Louisville.

Barbeauld earned her JD from the University of Louisville Brandeis School of Law and her undergraduate degree in History and Political Science from the University of Tennessee.

Baylor

Edward Means Baylor IV is the newest attorney in the Family Law Section of the Nashville office of Legal Aid Society.

In addition to practicing general family law, he will spend half his time working with the Civil-Legal Advocate Program. Through a grant from the City of Nashville, Legal Aid Society recruits and trains volunteer attorneys to represent survivors of domestic violence on the Order of Protection dockets in Davidson County courts. Baylor most recently worked as a staff attorney for Child Support Services of Tennessee where he represented the State of Tennessee in pursuing child support.

Prior to that, he worked as an attorney in private practice, focusing on criminal and civil contempts, divorces, visitation and custody, neglect and dependency, as well as other areas of law.

Baylor earned his JD from Nashville School of Law and his undergraduate degree in Criminal Justice from Tennessee State University.

Bellafant

Sonya G. Bellafant is the newest staff attorney for Legal Aid Society in Columbia. She has extensive experience with legal aid programs, having worked for three different nonprofit law firms in Michigan.

Bellafant also has experience with several corporate legal departments. She will have a general caseload, with some concentration on health and benefits.

Bellafant is a graduate of Michigan State University College of Law and Oakland University, where she earned a degree in Journalism.

Former Lowe’s executive joins Edgenet team

Jess

Edgenet, a Nashville-based software as a service company, has hired former Lowe’s Companies, Inc. merchandising executive Rick Jess as customer experience executive, a new role for Edgenet.

Jess, who joins Edgenet as a contract employee, spent 17 years with Lowe’s, where he served as merchandising vice president for the company’s lawn and garden, international business development, hardware, paint and millwork divisions. During his tenure with Lowe’s, Jess was instrumental in recalibrating the company’s sales platform by implementing Edgenet’s Made-to-Order.

F&M names Bell, Andrews to bank board

Bell

Steve Bell and Dan Andrews, Jr. have been named to the F&M Bank board of directors.

Bell began his banking career in 1973 with Piggott State Bank in Piggott, Arkansas. In 1993, he was named a vice president in Farmers Bank and Trust in Blytheville, Arkansas, and in 1998 was named president and COO there. In 2003 he moved to Franklin to begin the start-up operations for Tennessee Bank & Trust. In 2006, he was named chairman and CEO of the parent company there.

He attended Arkansas State University and is a graduate of the Banking School of the South at Louisiana State University. He has served on the Williamson County Library Foundation Board and is a 2006 graduate of Leadership Franklin.

Andrews

Andrews ’s banking career began in 1979 with Nashville City Bank. He later joined Commerce Union Bank, where he was named a vice president and commercial lender for their Middle Market Lending area. In 1988, AmSouth named him a corporate loan office and later named him head of commercial lending.

In 2005, he was named executive vice president of Tennessee Bank & Trust and named president of the Tennessee Market in 2006.

Commerce Union adds Gammon as director

Shumaker

Commerce Union Bancshares, Inc. has hired Eddie Gammon as executive vice president and director of operations for Reliant Bank, its wholly-owned subsidiary.

Gammon, a Certified Treasury Professional, is a graduate of the University of New Orleans with a degree management. He started his banking career at Whitney Bank in New Orleans and later served in senior management roles at Iberiabank (Lafayette, Louisiana), Home Bank (Lafayette, Louisiana) and most recently at Avenue Bank, where he served as senior vice president – director of deposit operations.

Shumaker to be second female TMA president

Nita Wall Shumaker, MD, of Chattanooga has been named president-elect for the Tennessee Medical Association, effective in April. Shumaker is a pediatrician at Galen North Pediatrics in Hixson.

When she takes office as the 2017-2018 TMA president, she will be the second female president in TMA history. Phyllis Miller, MD, of Hixson served as TMA’s first female president in 1998.

Shumaker is a member of the TMA Board of Trustees and former president of the Chattanooga & Hamilton County Medical Society. She was one of only two female chiefs of staff at Erlanger Health System, the ninth-largest public hospital in the country.

Also, James H. Batson, MD of Cookeville was re-elected to the Board of Trustees.

New members are:

Kirk Stone, MD, Union City

Rodney Lewis, MD, Nashville

Elise Denneny, MD, Knoxville

Four new members were elected to the TMA Judicial Council:

Justin Monroe, MD, Memphis

Omar Hamada, MD, Brentwood

James C. Gray, MD, Cookeville

Richard Briggs, MD, Knoxville

Mallory takes new role with Department of Health

Mallory

Tennessee Department of Health Commissioner John Dreyzehner, MD, MPH, has appointed Carl Mallory as deputy commissioner for operations.

Mallory previously served as a director of The United Distribution Group, overseeing strategic development and product management team support throughout the United States and western Canada.

Mallory replaces Eugene Neubert, who left TDH in 2015 to become deputy commissioner with the Tennessee Department of Finance and Administration.

Originally from Greeneville, Mallory holds a degree in communications from East Tennessee State University. He was a 2003 inductee into the school’s Alumni Hall of Fame for his accomplishments in the public relations field.

MP&F promotes 5 to assistant account executive

MP&F Public Relations has promoted Amanda Gambill, Aleah Heinlein, Ashley Heyen, Brooke Kelly and Megan McConnell to assistant account executives. All were previously staff associates.

Gambill, a native of Smyrna, joined MP&F in January 2015. Her experience includes media relations, event planning, nonprofit campaigns and rebranding projects for a variety of national and local clients. She is a graduate of MTSU with a degree in mass communications.

Heinlein, a native of Milwaukee, graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2014 with degrees in communication arts and Spanish. Her experience includes media relations, social media management and event planning.

Heyen is a Gillespie, Illinois, native and a graduate of Belmont University. Her public relations experience includes digital marketing, event planning and media relations.

Kelly, a Jackson, Mississippi, native, graduated Jackson State University with a degree in mass communications.

McConnell, a native of McKinney, Texas, joined MP&F in 2014 after graduating from Abilene Christian University. Her experience includes social media management, Google Analytics, media relations and video editing.

Slater Joins BOHAN as group account director

Advertising industry veteran Fred Slater has joined BOHAN Advertising as group account director.

He most recently was vice president for member relations, growth and communications at the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce.

Slater began his advertising career in 1991 and has been director of account services at three agencies and a vice president at White Thompson and Gish Sherwood & Friends. He has an MBA from Memphis State University and a psychology degree from the University of Tennessee, and he has been an adjunct professor of mass communications at MTSU.