If all goes well, Maggie Valley will soon be known as a place where some of the finest spirits in the world are crafted.

CeCe Hipps is one of the very few people in North Carolina who can say that she was at the epicenter of the two most significant postwar economic expansions in the state. 

A new business or a new family moving to town isn’t solely due to the luck of the draw.

Likewise, a shuttered mill or dilapidated neighborhood isn’t solely due to being dealt a bad hand.

The stakes were as high as the hopes last weekend as competitors from across North America came together at the Haywood County Fairgrounds to see whose luxuriously-locked little rodent would be deemed best in breed by a discerning panel of judges.

Lake Junaluska residents opposed to a new Waynesville Fire District in their neighborhood will get one anyway, after a 2-1 vote by the Haywood County Board of Commissioners May 1.

Haywood County commissioners have set a date for the required public hearing in advance of passing next year’s budget — an especially important one, considering County Manager Ira Dove’s prediction that the county could see itself forced to use over $2 million from the county’s fund balance to keep things in a state of equilibrium.

The recent tug-of-war for control of the Haywood County Republican Party has left many conservatives cringing and embarrassed over the portrayal of petty infighting, but it has played out like a microcosm of the national political landscape.

A Waynesville-based regional social services agency will finally get that new building its been after.

Parking may get easier and safer for Junaluska Elementary School parents if a bill introduced by Rep. Mike Clampitt, R-Bryson City, makes it through committee.

The straightforward Russ Gilliland is a fifth-generation Haywood County resident, but his path to becoming Maggie Valley’s newest police chief has been anything but.