The N.C. Office of Recovery and Resiliency (NCORR) is supporting Haywood County in the April 22 launch of its Homeownership Assistance Program (HAP) to assist homebuyers displaced by Tropical Storm Fred or first-time homebuyers that are income qualified. 

When Canton officials and administrators met for their annual budget retreat last year, Town Manager Nick Scheuer’s presentation was riddled with question marks — signs of uncertainty after widespread flooding caused more than $18 million in damages to town infrastructure and killed six.  

The town that refuses to stay down made another big move toward getting back on its feet last week, selecting architects who will design replacements for municipal buildings that were damaged or destroyed during flooding in August 2021.

Asheville-based McGill Associates will begin work to provide emergency watershed protection in areas affected by Tropical Storm Fred after Haywood commissioners approved an $800,000 contract on Jan. 17, but at least one commissioner thinks it may not be enough.

The truth, even when it’s staring you down Clint Eastwood style, is easier to ignore than to act on. Just human nature, I guess, but something has to give.

Almost immediately after deadly flooding swamped downtown Canton for the second time in less than 20 years, town officials began talking about building back smarter. Last week, the town took a big step — two, actually — toward that goal.

When Gary Griffith woke up a rainy Tuesday on Aug. 17, 2021, he never imagined that by the next morning, the 12 acres of green peppers he’d grown along the Pigeon River in Bethel would rest in drifts miles downstream, the unofficial symbol  of the catastrophic tragedy that was Tropical Storm Fred.  

Sitting on a barstool at The Water’n Hole in Waynesville last Monday afternoon, I took a pull from the cold Budweiser bottle and let out a slight sigh. Stories and tales were being exchanged all along the bar counter about where folks were and what they were doing during “The Great Flood of 2021.” 

Earlier this week, I had started writing a column about the progress made in the year since the flooding from Tropical Storm devastated parts of Haywood County. Then, as I started talking to our writers about the stories they were preparing for this week’s edition — one year after the flood — I could tell they had the recovery efforts well covered. 

Hours earlier, Natasha Bright had been trapped atop a bunk bed in a barricaded bedroom with her dogs, her cats and her brother, watching the floodwaters from the furious Pigeon River rising through the floorboards beneath them, but after a long, cold, wet night the waters finally receded so with an armful of children’s clothing and mud squishing between her toes, Bright headed out of Cruso on foot into the pale sunshine looking for a shower.