Commissioner Hilliard was appointed to the Tennessee Public Utility Commission in 2012 by Governor Bill Haslam and reappointed in 2023.

Commissioner Hilliard served as Executive Vice President and Chief Government Relations Officer for First Horizon National Corporation. In this role, he was responsible for the corporation’s lobbying activities at the federal and state levels. He is a forty-three-year veteran of the company, having joined First Horizon in 1969 after earning a BBA in Personnel Administration and Industrial Relations from the University of Memphis. Prior to his current role, he was Executive Vice President and Chief Risk Officer. Hilliard retired from First Horizon National Corporation on September 26, 2012.

Commissioner Hilliard is active in the community, currently serving as Chairman of the Board of Directors of The National Civil Rights Museum. He was Chairman of the Memphis Housing Authority Board from 1992-1993, Chairman of the United Way General Fund Drive in 1987, and Chairman of the Annual NAACP Freedom Fund Dinner in 1988. He is a past member of the Memphis Park Commission, the University of Memphis National Alumni Board, the University of Memphis Foundation Board, and the Boards of Directors for the Chickasaw Council of the Boy Scouts of America and
the Memphis Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Commissioner Hilliard has completed additional studies at the Southwestern Graduate School of Banking at Southern Methodist University, the Tennessee Executive Development Program at the University of Tennessee Knoxville, Cornell
University’s Executive Development Program, and Crosby Quality College

Executive Administrative Assistant: Ashlee Hatfield

Contact Chairman Hilliard via e-mail at ashlee.hatfield@tn.gov