The woman with a master’s degree in alternative medicine fidgets as she waits to talk to a lawyer at Legal Aid of East Tennessee on McCallie Avenue.

Three local lawyers are competing for the job of Chancery Court judge in Hamilton County’s only contested judicial race.

A GOP candidate is challenging Hamilton County Juvenile Court Clerk Ron Swafford for the first time since Swafford first was elected 12 years ago.

A former city worker who lied about having cancer for five years and received thousands of dollars in cash and gifts said it never was about the money but about “the need to be loved.”

City Judge Sherry Paty has recused herself in the case against a local pet store, calling an e-mail she received from Mayor Ron Littlefield an attempt to sway her and an “an improper, unethical and perhaps contemptible disregard for the separation of powers.”

For almost nine years, the Hamilton County Juvenile Court unwittingly paid a total of $41,227 in monthly electric bills for a building it hasn’t used since 2001.

Chattanooga Mayor Ron Littlefield said he would “gladly wave good-bye” to The Pet Company at Hamilton Place if he had any say in the matter.

The Tennessee Department of Agriculture has sent a letter to the Pet Company in Hamilton Place mall setting forth strict guidelines the business must agree to comply with if it wants to keep its state operating license.

Chattanooga has spent $40,000 housing animals seized from a local pet store, and now it wants its money back.

A Hamilton Place mall pet store will find out in a matter of days if the Tennessee Department of Agriculture will allow it to keep selling pets or if violations to the state code of animal care could lead to the suspension of the store’s license.