When meetings moved to Zoom and schools shut down last March, Zach Sorrells kept on reporting to work. As a maintenance worker with the Town of Sylva, he’s responsible for jobs that simply must get done, pandemic or no — like trash collection, for instance.

For more than a decade, groups serving Jackson County’s homeless population have done so on a shoestring and a thin supply of hotel rooms, but the nonprofit currently providing homeless services says the time has come for a dedicated shelter facility. 

Despite the dire predictions of spring 2020, Jackson County’s budget prognosis for the 2021-2022 fiscal year is looking downright positive, commissioners learned during a Feb. 23 budget retreat. 

A group of Western North Carolina mountain biking enthusiasts has unveiled plans to bring the highest-elevation mountain bike trail on the East Coast to Jackson County, and after receiving a thumbs up from leaders in Cherokee and Sylva last month they’ll start seeking grants to make it a reality. 

A plan that will guide the county’s economic development strategy for the next five years received unanimous support Feb. 16 from the Jackson County Board of Commissioners.

Jackson County will close its phone-based vaccine appointment registration system on Friday, Feb. 26, as the county prepares to offer the vaccine to additional groups.

When I read that Annie McCord-Wilson was among those leading the charge to have the rebel removed as the mascot of her daughter’s elementary school — Cullowhee Valley — I almost couldn’t believe it. 

In 2002 when The Smoky Mountain News was only three years old and trying to establish itself as an information source for the region, I read a fantastic letter to the editor in the Sylva Herald. It was written by then-eighth-grader Annie McCord, and I was astonished at her maturity. Here’s an excerpt from that letter discussing the use of the rebel as a mascot:

Jackson County is still lagging behind surrounding counties when it comes to the percentage of its population that’s received a first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, but it will have the chance to catch up after the health department received an allotment of 1,200 first doses this week — quadruple the number provided last week. 

Jackson County Commissioners unanimously passed a policy change last week that makes it clear that sitting commissioners are expected to show up at board meetings. 

A new vaccine pre-registration process is in effect at the Jackson County Department of Public Health, which is currently vaccinating Group 1 and 2 — healthcare workers and those 65 and older.