Holly Kays
If Garrett Fisher had his way, he’d live on the side of a mountain with a glacier as his next-door neighbor.
Some people might consider his Wyoming home, located at 5,633 feet above sea level, to be close enough, but Fisher craves more elevation than that. So, he satisfies his thirst for altitude with aviation.
Joe Martin had never worked for a newspaper or owned a handgun when he took the reins of the tribally owned Cherokee One Feather in 1995.
But when the first changed, so did the second. Then a 26-year-old whose only job experience since graduation from college was as a cage cashier at the casino, Martin found himself fast-tracked to a steep, steep learning curve.
With elections a week away and threat of a lawsuit still hanging, the Cherokee Tribal Council is considering a proposed budget that includes a pay raise of nearly 5 percent for its members.
Two years after the planning board first began reviewing the document, Jackson County has adopted a revised ordinance governing cell tower placement.
Jackson became the first North Carolina county to take landslide mapping into its own hands when the board of commissioners voted unanimously to fund the $143,000 project last week.
While most kids are just getting their new backpacks stocked or suffering through the first days of shift from summertime sleep schedules, students at Blue Ridge School in Cashiers are in the midst of their third week of the new school year.
If Patrick Lambert wins his bid for principal chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, he expects to be looking a monstrous political version of a honey-do list when Election Day is over.
Mary Crowe isn’t a councilmember, but when a Tribal Council session starts up in Cherokee, hers is one face you might expect to see — whether in the audience, at the podium or back in the TV room watching the proceedings from a distance.
The future is looking bright for plans to build a sidewalk along U.S. 441 where Jackson County meets Cherokee, with funding recently approved from state contingency funds.
Nearly 30 people have put their names in the hat for election to Cherokee’s 12-member Tribal Council this fall, and depending who you ask, a lot is at stake.
Plans are in the works to open a 24-hour emergency clinic at Junaluska Animal Hospital in Waynesville next year, a first for the mountains west of Asheville.
The Charlotte developer behind a 488-bed student apartment complex planned for Cullowhee could face criminal charges, pending the outcome of an Aug. 27 hearing.
Jackson County’s steep slope ordinance made one last stop at the planning board before heading to a public hearing, but it went out with a bang as some members took issue with the version commissioners would ultimately consider for adoption.
Doris Mager returned from her most recent doctor appointment with some grim marching orders. Her instructions didn’t have anything to do with blood pressure problems, cardiac health, nutritional deficiencies or an impending diagnosis. In fact, the doctor said, for 89 years old she was in amazing health.
But something had to change.
“My doctor said, ‘Doris you really need to sleep in your house,’” Mager recounted. “I said, ‘But I don’t want to.’ She said, ‘But you really do. It just can’t be good sleeping with the birds.’”
Whether from a seat in the auditorium or at home on the couch, more than 1,000 Cherokee people blocked out Thursday night (Aug. 6) to see the people vying for their vote as the tribe’s principal chief talk about everything from alcohol laws to government transparency to free press.
Summer’s not quite over, but emergency responders in Haywood County are already practicing their skills in preparation for rescue season, known to most simply as “fall.”
“That time of year is when our beautiful forest has people, by the hundreds and by the thousands,” said Greg Shuping, Haywood County’s director of emergency management. “The more people we get up there, the more likelihood of a missing or injured person.”
After more than four years as Jackson County’s attorney, Jay Coward will soon yield his spot as the county’s legal face. But commissioners aren’t replacing him with another contract attorney. Rather, they’ve opted to create a new staff position.
A longtime Sylva business owner was arrested on federal charges after agents from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms surrounded his Main Street store Friday morning.
What in most courts would have been a simple case of violating a domestic violence protective order was a landmark moment for the Cherokee Tribal Court.
It’s been more than 10 years since Alen Baker decided, while recuperating from surgery, to pass the time by writing about what his Trout Unlimited chapter had been up to that year. Those 15 pages turned into a book, which turned into something even bigger — the idea that somebody should take it upon themselves to memorialize the Southern Appalachians’ fly fishing legacy in a museum somewhere.
SEE ALSO: A look inside the museum
Step inside Cherokee’s newest museum, and the scent of freshly cut wood and tranquil lighting will immediately greet you with the knowledge that you’ve made the right choice.
To build a fence or to not build a fence?
It might not seem like such a portentous question, but as Sylva Town Commissioner Mary Gelbaugh found out when she asked her Facebook friends whether the town should look at putting a fence along Scotts Creek through Bridge Park, it kind of is. The comments came so thick and fast that Facebook contacted her to see if someone had hacked her account.
A new casino under construction outside of Murphy is coming along on schedule and on budget, according to General Manager Lumpy Lambert.
It’s been 10 years since the Lake Logan Triathlon made its debut in Haywood County, drawing a field of 162 people to tackle the 1,500-meter swim, 24-mile bike ride and 10K run.
Reintroductions of endangered red wolves in eastern North Carolina will cease for the rest of 2015 following a decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to put a hold on the program.
An algal bloom on Waterville Lake in northern parts of Haywood County has tested positive for a toxin with potential to cause skin rashes and affect liver function.
It’s been two-and-a-half years since cash flow problems forced Jackson County’s domestic violence and sexual abuse resource center to close its doors, and REACH of Jackson County has remained a dead organization ever since.
Sunday hunting with firearms will now be legal on private property following passage of the Outdoor Heritage Act by the N.C. General Assembly and governor’s concurrance.
“Hey buddy, you about ready to come out?” Michael Skinner asks the juvenile broadwing hawk standing in the back of a plastic carrying case.
Skinner, executive director of the Balsam Mountain Trust and jack of all environmental trades, slowly reaches his gloved hands inside and pulls the raptor out. The bird flaps its brown-and-white wings for a moment but quickly settles down. Skinner sets him atop the cage for a moment, where he sits untethered, surveying the small storage room where Skinner keeps supplies for the nature center’s diverse charges — everything from box turtles to an opossum to a bald eagle.
Lisa Preston Clark wasn’t surprised to see the CD amid the items recovered from Cole Preston’s crashed car. The disc was all about living life from the heart, and that’s just how Clark’s 22-year-old nephew lived.
There’s talk in Cherokee of making the chief of police’s job an elected position following a resolution introduced by Travis Smith, a Birdtown resident who’s also a candidate for Tribal Council.
With election sign-ups now closed, it looks like Sylva’s guaranteed to get some younger membership on its board after November’s elections.
Mountain dog owners may have started hearing rumor of a devastating canine flu strain coming their way, but according to area veterinarians there’s no cause for hysteria.
Western Carolina University’s chapter of Pi Kappa Alpha has had its share of troubles this year, and a recent decision from the national fraternity’s board of directors adds suspension — and a recommendation to eventually revoke the chapter’s charter — to the list.
For veterinarian Brian Birthright, what would become a lifelong passion for biking began in the most fitting of ways — with a dog.
Then living in New England, Birthright was the owner of an overactive puppy who just wouldn’t tire. That’s what led him to take up mountain biking.
There’s one more in the race to become Sylva’s next mayor following Alderman Danny Allen’s decision to run for the seat.
It’s official: Harris Regional Hospital is getting a new emergency department.
Though commissioners were scheduled to vote on whether to adopt a new set of rules for cell towers in the county last week, they opted to put the final decision off till August after a public hearing drew a variety of specific critiques of the document.
Landing the grant is turning out to be far from the end of the road in an effort to bring a cattle loading facility to Jackson County.
Howell Mill Road won’t be an option for those planning to drive the length of the Waynesville route for the rest of the summer.
It’s day four of the Family Nature Summit, and the troops are working hard on a wooded piece of land behind the Lambuth Inn at Lake Junaluska.
“I’ve planted trees before in a lot softer ground than this,” says Eden Lehr, 10, leaning on her shovel. “This ground is really tough.”
Begonias are blooming and umbrella-shadowed tables awaiting lunchtime as the finishing touches go into the newly renovated Depot Park in Sylva.
Jackson County’s getting closer to having a director in place to handle the day-to-day needs of its tourism agency with the deadline to apply for the job closing last week.
Building a footbridge over the Tuckasegee River will likely wind up costing more than twice the $641,000 it was originally supposed to, Jackson County Commissioners learned when bids for the project came in this summer.
A riverside petroleum leak in Cherokee has had cleanup crews scrambling since contamination was first discovered in April — and feeling flummoxed the further they’ve probed into the leak’s potential cause.
Webster may be just a little town of fewer than 400 people, but its buildings tell the tale of a proud history. Though the town, which used to be the county seat, is a scanty 1.6 square miles, it holds six buildings on the National Register of Historic Places. The town’s launching a new initiative to show them off.
A plan to create a homeless shelter next to Mark Watson Park in Sylva is dead, but Jackson Neighbors in Need isn’t giving up on having a shelter in place by the time cold weather hits again.
Ben Kniceley’s pretty sure his dad had a good laugh after the Haywood Community College graduate came away with a national title in the June 20 STIHL Timbersports Collegiate Series.
“I grew up splitting wood and stuff like that with my dad, and he’d always have to force me to go out there,” said Kniceley, who’s from Shelby.
Jackson County’s tourism association has had a lot of things to figure out since its formation in 2012. Not least of those is how to divvy up the grant fund it keeps to help the county’s festivals and events promote these happenings outside the local area.
Ask around downtown Sylva, and it’s not hard to find someone with an opinion about traffic. Main Street should be two-way. It should remain one-way. There’s not enough parking. The new parking area on Mill Street is a godsend. The recently installed posts and left-turn lanes are obnoxious and confusing to visitors, or they are a great way to slow the speed of traffic and prevent accidents.
