The praise for outgoing Waynesville Mayor Henry Foy has been plentiful. Both of the other newspapers in Haywood County have beat me to the punch, publishing glowing articles and laudatory editorials.

But I’ll still add my voice to the chorus. Foy’s tenure as mayor has just about mirrored my own career as a Western North Carolina journalist. He was elected in 1991, and I moved to the mountains in the summer of 1992. I’ve gotten to know these mountain communities at the same time I’ve gotten to know Henry Foy and watched him in public life.

Setting an example

Each year I spend covering politics and local governments, my appreciation grows for those who conduct themselves with class. It’s a trait that we all recognize when we see it but perhaps have difficulty describing. And that’s exactly the point. Someone who has class earns it by cumulative action over time. It’s not something one can sum up nicely in a campaign slogan or some pithy speech.

I distinctly remember meeting Foy’s old architectural partner, Tai Lee, soon after I moved to Waynesville. Lee had this absolutely wonderful sense of humor, and his outgoing nature endeared him to many. Foy, as many well know, is much more quiet and workmanlike.

Sometime in those first few weeks in the mountains I was introduced to Foy. Ken Wilson, then publisher of The Mountaineer — I was the editor — had the very helpful habit of giving me the background on those I met. He let me know right away that Foy and Lee were prominent town fathers who were well-liked, powerful in their own right, and just good people. Ken’s instincts were usually right on.

As time passed what I learned to respect about Foy more than anything else was his dogged pursuit of those issues he felt strongly about. Though he has always been congenial and, as I said earlier, a person with class, he is also a fighter. His position as mayor was both a job and a passion, and he worked hard at it.

Old Asheville Road

Here’s a comparison that reflects absolutely positively on Foy’s influence on Waynesville. Consider the difference between driving into Waynesville on Russ Avenue from Lake Junaluska and driving from Lowe’s on the Old Asheville Highway.

Russ Avenue is a wide ribbon of asphalt with absolutely no attention to landscaping or pedestrian amenities. Its design encourages drivers to just fly along. Nearly every time I’m on that road my instinct is to go faster than the posted speed limit.

On Old Asheville Highway, the opposite is true. Its landscaped medians, sidewalks, traffic circle and other design elements encourage drivers to slow down and be careful. It also looks pretty darn nice for what it is — a road.

Foy and the rest of the Waynesville aldermen and staff fought hard to get that road, and they wanted even more pedestrian amenities. The county commissioners at the time wanted a road exactly like Russ Avenue. As editor of the community paper, that was one of the first issues I took on. We editorialized time and again for more planning, re-thinking design plans, viewing this roadway as an entrance to Waynesville and not just another highway.

It was a long time coming, but the state Department of Transportation for the most part came around to the town’s vision. A series of work sessions in which the public took part with experts led to a process that had community buy-in and resulted in what we now have.

Foy played a critical role, and by my estimation it was the first time a community in this region forced DOT to re-design a road and come up with something better. Now, towns in the region stand up to DOT all the time.

Recreation for all

The second great fight I remember Foy taking center stage in was for the recreation center that opened about eight years ago in Waynesville.

Haywood Regional Medical Center had only just opened its beautiful fitness center, and there was a general consensus among many in Haywood County that if Waynesville built its own it would fail. Not enough people in the county, they said.

Foy, however, did not waver. I remember hearing him speak about the need to build a place where children could go, a recreation center versus a fitness center. He had help on this one from the likes of Bob Brannon, who also knows how to stand up for what he believes in, and many others. Again, I was editor at The Mountaineer at the time and we believed just as strongly in the need to build a place for children that would provide an anchor for the town’s Vance Street Park.

Foy and the recreations supporters succeeded, and now Waynesville has a park complex that is the envy of much larger towns.

A regional influence

Part of why I admired Foy so much is that our views were very similar on many of the important issues that have faced Waynesville and other mountain communities. He saw the wisdom in building the county justice center downtown, in preserving the town’s watershed, in developing a groundbreaking land-use plan and in supporting Waynesville’s Main Street program.

These are not political beliefs but quality-of-life values. Because of the stance Waynesville took on many of these issues — and Foy had plenty of support from other elected officials, town staff and many in the community — this is a great place to live.

And other mountain towns and communities have looked at Waynesville as a leader and emulated it in many ways. In other words, the influence of a well-run town reaches beyond its borders. I travel to public hearings and town and county meetings throughout the region, and without fail I’ll hear these other leaders mention Waynesville’s successes.

Foy left his mark, and it’s one that will endure for some time in Western North Carolina.

(Scott McLeod can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..)

(Editor’s note: Smoky Mountain News columnist Chris Cox delivered this address to the graduating class at Southwestern Community College this past weekend.)

A couple of days after I was asked to deliver this address, I asked my creative writing students if they had any ideas about what I should say. One of them said, “You should say something funny. Definitely funny.” But then one of them said, pausing for effect, “What if you try to say something funny and no one laughs?”

By David Curtis

Trees are making the news again in Haywood County as two commissioners are debating the sugar maples in front of the historical courthouse. To cut or not to cut is the question, but, as usual, the answer is not always black or white, chainsaw or shovel, tree hugger or developer.

Things are changing in Canton. That in itself is somewhat newsworthy.

By David Rice • Guest Columnist

The results of a survey of nearly 5,000 hospitals nationwide indicate Haywood Regional Medical Center provides better care in several procedures than most hospitals. The hospital received 25 five-star ratings in addition to being ranked best in North Carolina for overall critical care and best in the state for gastrointestinal services.

As you know, the Christmas season these days begins about 20 minutes after the last of the trick or treaters have collected their candy, and lasts until the last college bowl game is over, which used to be on New Year’s Day, but is now closer to Valentine’s Day. In other words, it goes on forever, no doubt driven more by the greed of consumerism than the true spirit of Christmas.

Too often debates about immigration veer way off course, inhabiting some netherland of hysteria that is so far from reality it borders on the ridiculous. In the past couple of weeks we in North Carolina have witnessed just such a situation as the decision that community colleges should admit illegal immigrants exploded into newspapers and radio talk shows.

By David Curtis

Wool socks, silk long johns, cotton turtleneck, boots, down vest, wool jacket, Gortex insulated camo gloves. Deer hunting? No, Friday night high school football in late November, expected temperature at game time — 27 degrees.

Rumors have been circulating for years about the proposed mega-development in the Jonathan Creek area, the one with a thousand houses and a huge retail center that would take advantage of the area’s proximity to Interstate 40 and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Well, now that those plans are out of the bag, so to speak, the one thing people in the affected area should be reminded of is this: it’s going to take a grassroots effort that pulls out all the stops to prevent a development like this from getting under way.

I was 22 years old in 1967. Although it’s become fashionable to downgrade the sweeping changes brought about by my generation to the meaningless antics of a bunch of spaced-out druggies and naive idealists, history confirms that we really shook things up in the 1960s. We advanced civil rights, women’s liberation, gay rights, and free speech; we became environmentally aware; we exposed and brought down the dark reign of Nixonian evil, we said no to an imbecilic war, blind conformity and government censorship. Yes we had our nut cases and, yes, we made our mistakes, but overall we made a real and positive difference. This great worldwide birth contraction was spearheaded by young people.