Don Lepard named UTC Distinguished Alumnus; Max Bahner to receive Outstanding Service Award

IF YOU GOWhat: Legends and Leaders Banquet.When: 6 p.m. Friday, April 25.Where: Chattanooga Golf and Country Club, 1512 Riverview Road.Tickets: $30 per person, reservations due Monday.For more information: 423-425-5277.

photo Don Lepard
photo Max Bahner

Entrepreneur Don Lepard will be honored as the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga's Distinguished Alumnus during the annual Legends and Leaders Banquet on Friday night, April 25, at the Chattanooga Golf and Country Club. Lepard is founder and chief executive officer of Global Green Lighting.

Also during the banquet, attorney Max Bahner will receive the 2014 Outstanding Service Award. This award recognizes outstanding service to the community and university, and its recipient does not have to be a UTC alum.

Lepard, class of 1982, attended UTC on a football scholarship, where he roomed with current Mocs football coach Russ Huesman. After receiving a business degree from UTC, he served as director of manufacturing and director of domestic and international sales and operations for Steward Co.

Over a 30-year career, he developed and managed more than six national and international sales organizations. He also developed and managed manufacturing facilities in this country as well as Mexico, Taiwan, Singapore and China.

The entrepreneur founded and managed Global Green Lighting, named Global Manufacturing Alliance Group in 1997. The company, which has a 180,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Hixson, is known for wireless, solid-state lighting products that reduce energy consumption and provide energy savings of up to 75 percent. The company has a contract for streetlights with the city of Chattanooga and a contract for lighting on the campus of the University of Alabama.

Lepard is a member of the UTC Alumni Council, serves on the Ivy Academy Board of Directors and served on the UTC Athletic Director search committee.

He and wife Kim have two children.

Bahner's law career spans more than 40 years. He is senior member of the litigation section of Chambliss, Bahner & Stophel and is an arbitrator with the American Arbitration Association.

He is a Founding Fellow and past president of the Chattanooga Bar Association and a Founding Fellow of the Tennessee Bar Foundation. He is a past president and served on the board of governors of the Tennessee Bar Association. Bahner is a founding member and past chairman of the Tennessee Supreme Court Historical Society and the Historical Society for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee.

He is a Life Fellow of the American Bar Foundation and served in the House of Delegates and Board of Governors of the American Bar Association, as well as in five other capacities of the ABA. He holds membership in eight state and national legal organizations.

Bahner has served on the board of the University of Chattanooga Foundation and its executive committee. He served as a trustee of his alma mater, Carson-Newman College, for 39 years, chairing its board five times. He is a past president of the Chattanooga Rotary Club.

He has been the recipient of nearly 20 local, state and national awards, including Carson-Newman's 1984 Distinguished Alumnus and the 1997 Ralph Kelley Humanitarian Award. He has served on the boards of Chattanooga Symphony & Opera, United Way of Greater Chattanooga, Community Foundation of Greater Chattanooga, Orange Grove Center and Tennesseans for Fair and Impartial Courts.

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