Ben Benton is a news reporter at the Chattanooga Times Free Press. He covers Southeast Tennessee and previously covered North Georgia education.
Ben has worked at the Times Free Press since November 2005, first covering Bledsoe and Sequatchie counties and later adding Marion, Grundy and other counties in the northern and western edges of the region to his coverage.
He was born and raised in Cleveland, Tenn., a graduate of Bradley Central High School.
Benton has a bachelor’s degree in communications from the the University of Tennessee.
In 2003, he won first place for Best New Photograph in Group III of the Tennessee Press Association contest. He also placed fourth for Best News Story the same year.
Ben previously worked at The Daily Post-Athenian in Athens, Tenn., The Herald-News, in Dayton, Tenn., and at the Knoxville Journal, in Knoxville.
Ben lives in Chattanooga with his wife, son and father. He has been a Chattanooga resident since 1988.
Contact Ben at 423-757-6569 and at bbenton@timesfreepress.com.
Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/BenBenton.
Recent Stories »
Sequatchie County Veterans Service officer Charles Tiede says intensive training and more room mean better service for area veterans at the new office now open on Church Street in Dunlap.
When I joined the group of writers who review restaurants for Current, my real motivation was to try food I’d never eaten.
Two area school systems were among 10 in Tennessee that got part of $50,000 in grants awarded by a national cellphone company foundation to enhance teacher development and pay for training so they can boost student performance.
A 42-year-old Polk County, Tenn., man whose body was found Saturday inside a steel garage building had been hit on the head in what is being called a homicide, authorities said.
Brenda Brown, accused last August in the slayings of two elderly sisters in Bledsoe County, Tenn., has been sent to a Nashville prison after her probation was revoked in an unrelated 2010 conviction, according to court officials and records.
While lawmakers in Nashville and Gov. Bill Haslam's office wrestle over numbers and the proposed closure of Taft Youth Development Center, a judge in Rhea County says closing the facility is a "smoke screen" for eventual privatization of juvenile justice in Tennessee.
State and local authorities were drawn into the arrest of a Guild, Tenn., man in a shooting incident on Interstate 24 near the Jasper exit Thursday night, authorities said.
A Guild, Tenn., man was jailed Thursday night after authorities say he fired shots at another vehicle on Interstate 24 near Jasper, Tenn.
The 1 cent education special purpose local option sales tax Dade County voters have approved every election cycle since 1997 will appear again on the March 6 ballot, according to officials.
ALTAMONT, Tenn. -- Grundy County Mayor Lonnie Cleek doesn't dispute findings in a state comptroller's report released last week, but he takes issue with an assertion that county officials don't care about record-keeping.
