Miles ahead, miles to go: despite a year of progress, post-mill challenges remain in Canton
Not a lot of people remember the date the whistle last blew or the date the last workers put their well-worn tools down and took their shiny plastic helmets off for the final time, but everyone seems to remember the date of Pactiv Evergreen’s shocking announcement — the date that marked the end of one era, and the beginning of another.
Haywood commissioners support tax hike to fund school resource officers
Absent any meaningful gun legislation by the North Carolina General Assembly or by Congress, the cost of protecting Haywood County’s children from being gunned down at their desks will now fall squarely upon county taxpayers, once a tax increase in next year’s proposed budget gets the final OK from commissioners.
Haywood commissioners issue joint statement on Ramey
Republican Commissioner Terry Ramey should pay his taxes and stop threatening the media for reporting on the issue, according to a rare joint statement issued by the other four Republicans on the Haywood County Board of Commissioners.
Haywood County commission goes fully Republican
Just four years after gaining their first-ever majority on the Haywood County Board of Commissioners, Republicans succeeded in booting the last remaining Democrat, to put the commission at 5-0.
The ‘strong right arm’ of the Republican Party flexes its muscles in Maggie Valley
Energized by recent Supreme Court rulings and eager to remake North Carolina in their own image, members of the N.C. House Freedom Caucus held a “rally in the Valley” last week, issuing local endorsements and looking to gain support for their forthcoming legislative agenda.
Finally, Haywood gets an offer on a troublesome parcel
Haywood County may have found a buyer for a county-owned 22-acre plot off Jonathan Creek, as long as everything goes smoothly during the lengthy due diligence period.
Insurrection: WNC leaders react
In the interest of transparency, all responses from local officials regarding the Jan. 6 insurrection have been published online, in their entirety. Some submissions may have been lightly edited for grammar, spelling and punctuation or to conform with AP style.
NAACP mulls lynching monument in Haywood County
Last month, members of the Haywood Branch of the NAACP took a trip to Montgomery, Alabama to visit a museum honoring more than 800 Americans who were lynched between 1877 and 1950.
There’s a monument there for each one of them — a long, steel box resembling a coffin, engraved with their names and places of death. One bears the inscription, “George Ratcliff, Haywood County.”
Local officials weigh in on legal marijuana
On Jan. 15, The Smoky Mountain News contacted almost every elected official in Haywood County for whom an email address was listed with the county’s board of elections. Around half failed to respond, but those who did were sometimes too verbose for print, so an excerpt from their response was used in the Jan. 23 edition of The Smoky Mountain News. In the interest of transparency, their full responses are included here.
