National Public Lands Day dawned crisp and cool Saturday, Sept. 24, a celebration of everything most beloved about fall in Western North Carolina — sunrise pinks and oranges streaking the skies above the ridgeline; clear, dry air carrying an invigorating early-morning chill; bright sunshine focusing the world beneath warm rays as the sky brightened, revealing mountainsides tinged with hints of red and yellow, rogue branches overly eager for the autumnal wardrobe change.

Starting in March, members of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians may have the chance to sign up for a program that will let them receive casino distributions without reporting them as income on federal taxes.

Term limits could be on the chopping block in Cherokee’s updated election ordinance due to legal advice arguing that the current law, which restricts chiefs and vice chiefs to two consecutive four-year terms, conflicts with the tribe’s Charter and Governing Document.

Navigating the darkened exhibit halls at the Museum of the Cherokee Indian is slow work on Wednesday evening, Sept. 7. Cherokee people — many wearing traditional ribbon skirts and beadwork — throng the halls, cluster around exhibit cases, and point proudly at the displays of brightly colored artwork that pop alongside the neutral color palette of the archeological objects surrounding them.

On Oct. 1, the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians will start a new fiscal year with $732.5 million in the budget after Tribal Council unanimously approved the document Thursday, Sept. 2. Of the total, $241.3 million will go to the operating fund, up from $196 million last year.

A  $39 million hotel project  at the Sequoyah National Golf Course in Cherokee will move forward after Tribal Council overrode a veto from Principal Chief Richard Sneed Thursday, Sept. 1 — by the narrowest of margins.

A unanimous vote from the Cherokee Tribal Council puts the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians on track to start prosecuting a range of offenses by non-Indians that it had previously been powerless to punish, beginning Oct. 1.

Less than three months after being named interim chief of police, Carla Neadeau has been sworn in as the first female chief of the Cherokee Indian Police Department.

Christine Cole Proctor was home alone with her big sister at the family cabin on Forney Creek when she heard an unfamiliar rumble climbing the isolated mountain road. It was a car — the first they’d ever seen scale the rugged route. 

New housing will soon be available for Cherokee tribal members in Whittier following a unanimous vote from Tribal Council Aug. 4.