It’s shaping up to be an exciting year for water-lovers in Western North Carolina.

After more than a decade of hydropower relicensing negotiations and years more of permitting and construction, Duke Energy is finishing a slate of river accesses that will make the Tuckasegee one of the most accessible rivers in the Southeast. At the same time, a collective effort to create an interactive map showing where and how to recreate on Western North Carolina waterways — using a tool called Smoky Mountain Blueways — is wrapping up, further boosting WNC’s future as a Mecca for outdoors lovers of all skill levels.

The new wastewater treatment facility in Franklin cost the town more than $5 million to build, but within months of its summer 2013 opening, superintendent Wayne Price noticed a problem. 

“Within six months of putting that into operation, we had fats build up on the walls,” Price said. “It was already getting 2 inches, 3 or 4 inches of fat all around, and there’s no way for us to treat it. We had to do something.”

Western North Carolina won big in the newest round of grants from the N.C. Clean Water Management Trust Fund. The fund, whose goal is to conserve environmentally important land and waterways, gave out $12.7 million total to fund 38 projects state-wide. 

A rural sewer system in Jackson County is headed toward bankruptcy unless it can drum up 200 customers in the sparsely populated Whittier area. 

It’s a tough sell though, witnessed by the paltry 40 customers along the sewer line now.

Jackson County commissioners questioned the wisdom of a last-ditch effort to find more customers for the Whittier sewer system at a county meeting Monday.

Commissioner also signaled reluctance to put up county money for a plan they saw as less than ideal. 

Repairs to the dam at Balsam Lake in the Nantahala National Forest have been delayed because of high creek levels, leaving the popular lake drained as the Western North Carolina tourist season gets under way.

Waynesville officials are looking under a different couch cushion for additional revenue after losing income from sweepstakes operations and its ABC store.

We are attracted to water. Mountain paths always wind down to water. Water is the essence of our very being ... especially here in the mountains.   

Joyce Porter had just finished cleaning her house in Jonathan Creek and was planning to hop in the shower, but when she turned on the faucet, no water came out.