Jacob Baggett, most recently senior legislative adviser to state Sen. Ken Yager, R-Kingston, has joined the Nashville office of Bass, Berry & Sims, the Nashville Post reports. He will serve as a senior public policy counsel at the firm, representing clients before the legislature and executive branch on legislative and regulatory matters. Prior to joining Yager’s staff, Baggett was campaign manager for former House Speaker Beth Harwell’s 2018 gubernatorial campaign and a legal and legislative staffer at the state Department of the Treasury. He earned his law degree from the Duncan School of Law.

The Brentwood office of Georgia-based law firm Moore Ingram Johnson & Steele is being accused of wrongfully terminating one of its legal assistants with a COVID-related disability, the Nashville Post reports. Julia Russo, who worked at the firm from 2018 to 2020, is suing under the Family and Medical Leave Act and the Families First Coronavirus Response Act. Russo took a prolonged leave of absence during the pandemic due to her alleged susceptibility to the Guillain-Barre syndrome, making her more likely to die if she contracted the coronavirus. Her doctor substantiated the claim and qualified the condition as a disability. When Russo requested to work remotely, the firm said that arrangement would be an undue hardship on other workers and terminated her employment. Russo is seeking to prove she was fired because of her disability.

A plethora of mental health apps are flooding the market, but there is little evidence to support many of their claims of effectiveness, Harvard Medical School assistant professor John Torous writes in the Harvard Business Journal. As employers look for ways to support employees’ mental health, he and his co-author Elena Rodriguez-Villa, a global researcher at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, outline three points to keep in mind. (1) Apps will not cure anyone and are not an alternative to robust health care coverage at a reasonable price. (2) With hundreds of apps on the market, thorough research is needed. To help evaluate options, the free M-Health Index and Navigation Database offers information on 400 apps across 105 dimensions. (3) If an app is offered, be sure to track impact by checking in with employees on how they're doing — and if they are actually using the tool.

The TBA Real Estate Section in conjunction with the Tennessee Land Title Association will host Hot Topics in Real Estate 2021 virtually on Nov. 5 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. CDT. The hot topics forum will include programming on legislative updates, cyber security, housing discrimination, consumer protection, elder abuse and more. Be sure to register for this event prior to 7:30 a.m. CDT the morning of the program to receive the link to join the webinar.

The TBA Real Estate Section in conjunction with the Tennessee Land Title Association will host Hot Topics in Real Estate 2021 virtually on Nov. 5 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. CDT. Sign up now or watch for updates coming soon on presenters and topics. Be sure to register for this event prior to 7:30 a.m. CDT the morning of the program to receive the link to join the webinar.

The Tennessee Justice Center (TJC) today announced plans for a new home in South Nashville. The public service law firm, now celebrating its 25th anniversary, will be housed in Nashville’s Cameron-Trimble neighborhood, now called Chestnut Hill. “The neighborhood has a proud 150-year history of struggle for racial and economic justice,” TJC Executive Director and co-founder Michelle Johnson said. “We will be near the original site of Meharry Medical College and a law school that trained the first Black lawyers in the South.” Johnson said TJC has raised 82% of the cost of the project, and is still accepting donations to its capital campaign.

President Joe Biden and his administration yesterday nominated eight lawyers to serve as U.S. attorneys, many of them marking the first Black or female prosecutors to lead their districts, the ABA Journal reports. Six lawyers would be the first Black or female Black attorneys in their districts. They are: Erek L. Barron for the District of Maryland; Rachael S. Rollins for the District of Massachusetts; Zachary A. Myers for the Southern District of Indiana; Clifford D. Johnson for the Northern District of Indiana; Nicholas W. Brown for the Western District of Washington; and Trini E. Ross for the Western District of New York. Vanessa Waldref is nominated to be the first female U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Washington. Matthew M. Graves was nominated for U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia and would be responsible for supervising the U.S. Capitol riot prosecutions.

Dr. Jason Martin, a pulmonary and critical care specialist in Nashville, is considering running for the Democratic nomination for governor in 2022, the Nashville Post reports. Martin has never run for office but, after working in a COVID-19 unit at Sumner Regional Medical Center, has become more outspoken about health care and critical of Gov. Bill Lee’s response to the pandemic. Carnita Atwater of Memphis is the only other Democrat in the race thus far, with Memphis City Councilmember J.B. Smiley also reportedly considering a run for the nomination. Martin has filed paperwork to establish a fundraising committee, but it has not yet been posted to the state campaign finance website.

Shelby County commissioners on Monday voted to appoint Judicial Commissioner Danielle Mitchell-Sims as the new Division 3 General Sessions Court Judge, the Daily Memphian reports. Mitchell-Sims will complete the term of retiring Judge John Donald, but has indicated that she’ll run for a full eight-year term in the 2022 county elections. She was selected by the County Commission on the third round of voting with a majority of seven required. Seven other applicants have announced they will also run for the post in 2022.

Metro Council last week voted unanimously to eliminate a monthly $35 probation supervision fee billed to those on probation, the Tennessean reports. The vote is part of a series of reform measures Metro Nashville is implementing to relieve financial burden on criminal defendants and to reduce recidivism. Councilman Brandon Taylor says the Council wanted to help those “already down on their luck” and “give people a chance to get back to society without being financially burdened.” Taylor chairs Metro’s 37208 special committee, which was created in 2019 to tackle the high incarceration rate in the neighborhood. The committee has recommended reducing fines and fees, a strategy that a 2020 study from the PFM’s Center for Justice and Safety Finance says is vital to reform. The probation supervision fee was established in 1991 at $20 a month before being increased to $25 in 2006 and to $35 in 2008. Revenue collected from the fee went into the city’s general fund. Metro has set aside $662,500 in the fiscal 2022 budget to make up for the revenue.