Nearly a year to the day since a standing-room-only crowd filled Sylva Town Hall for a forum on the proposed N.C. 107 project, a town meeting Thursday, Aug. 8, drew a full house of folks determined to speak out against the road during the meeting’s public comment section. 

If you want the opportunity to have knowledge about and input on actions, policies and/or decisions affecting property you own, you need to speak up now. The present administration and the USDA Forest Service announced, in June, plans to “streamline” the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) protocols when it comes to actions receiving federal funding on federal lands, which the public owns.

Editor’s note: This is the seventh in a series of stories on Haywood County’s public charter school, Shining Rock Classical Academy, which has been beset by a host of academic and organizational problems since opening in 2015.

Since 2015, Haywood County’s first public charter school, Shining Rock Classical Academy, has used more than $2.75 million in local taxpayer money to educate children to a level far below the county average, and also below the state average.

His is the face that provoked untold millions of posts on social media, the teenage boy from Kentucky face-to-face with an aging Native American man playing a drum, the two of them surrounded by a group of shouting boys, many of them in those red “Make America Great Again” hats.

We see the boy smiling. Is that a smug smirk, or the smile of a boy who has no idea how to react to what is happening in this moment? What does it “mean,” what does it “say?” The imagery itself is so fraught that it is all but impossible to view the photograph without experiencing waves of emotion, immediate and visceral, but also deeply embedded in a painful and resonant history.

A Sylva town meeting this month drew a crowd of people to speak against the N.C. 107 road plan, but before the public comment period began Nov. 8 Mayor Lynda Sossamon reminded attendees of a few ground rules. 

The upcoming remodel of N.C. 107 through Sylva will be the focus of a special meeting and public hearing planned for 5:30 p.m. Monday, Aug. 6, at Sylva Town Hall.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders got asked to leave a restaurant because the owner can’t stand her boss’ politics. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Neilsen was heckled at a Mexican restaurant over the administrations policy of illegal immigrant children from their parents. A Democratic lawmaker encourages those opposed to Trump policies to continue to publicly calling out Trump advisers and supporters. 

For months, town officials have been hard at work creating the framework and the process for updating the Town of Waynesville’s 16-year-old comprehensive plan. Now, it’s time for residents to have their say. 

Residents in North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District will soon have a few opportunities to reach out to their congressman and his staff on the health care issue.

Revenues are down, costs are up and local conservative factions haven’t been silent in their criticism of the Democratic-majority Haywood County Board of Commissioners, which is about to approve a budget utilizing fund balance for the first time in around a decade.