Rally to bring King’s dream to Sylva
The Moral Monday protests that started in Raleigh and made national headlines are now making the rounds in North Carolina with a stop scheduled in Sylva next Wednesday, Aug. 28.
You can’t take a ‘pig in a poke’ to the bank
It’s difficult for me to believe that the new leadership in Raleigh would purposely sacrifice development in the state’s rural areas at the altar of political ideology. On purpose or not, however, that’s the way it looks to many of us who live in places not named Raleigh, Charlotte, Greensboro or Winston-Salem.
Everyone braced for change when Gov. Pat McCrory and Republicans in both the House and Senate were duly elected to govern North Carolina. That’s the natural order of politics — to the winner goes the spoils. However, even many long-time observers were caught unawares by the speed, the ideological bent, and the reliance on unproven economic principals that infused the legislation passed during the first session in which the GOP had total control of the state.
N.C. reverts to paper ballots at big cost to counties
North Carolina is reverting back to paper ballots, forcing Haywood, Jackson and 29 other counties in the state to purchase completely new voting equipment by 2018.
Specialty license plates rescued
Colorful specialty license plates have been spared the gallows thanks to a bill passed in the final hours of the General Assembly last week.
N.C. should take politics out of redistricting
By Martin Dyckman
Blackbeard, North Carolina's most famous pirate, was a fitting precursor to the modern brigands at Raleigh. As Scott McLeod's column pointed out last week (www.smokymountainnews.com/opinion/item/11167), there’s no apparent limit to their ruthlessness or to their scorn for the Old North State’s progressive traditions.
Their new tax deal — rhymes with steal — will save the richest of their constituents $10,000 on the average while raising rates on the poor and eventually shorting education and health care by some $700 million a year.
Police help push new laws through legislature
The Waynesville Police Department helped craft and then usher four bills, or some version of them, through the N.C. General Assembly this year, giving law enforcement officers statewide new tools in the fight against drugs.
Legislature leading us down to new depths
“Thank you sir, may I have another.”
The line by Kevin Bacon from the now-classic film “Animal House” kept popping into my head as I went down the list of what this year’s GOP-led General Assembly is doing to North Carolina. In the movie, Bacon is being hazed as part of a fraternity initiation, and every time he is hit with a paddle he asks for another painful blow. Here in the Tar Heel state, you think legislative leaders are done pushing the state toward the likes of Mississippi or South Carolina, and then something else almost ridiculous hits the news that they have passed or seriously considered passing.
WNC residents travel to Raleigh for moral Monday rally
When moral Monday protestors gathered this week in front of the legislature in Raleigh to decrying the policies of conservative lawmakers, among them were a contingent of demonstrators from Western North Carolina.
Democrats organize Waynesville protest against General Assembly’s actions
More than 150 protestors marched in downtown Waynesville Monday to oppose what they characterize as egregious policies by Republican state lawmakers that will take North Carolina back to the Dark Ages.
State teaching center in Cullowhee could be shuttered by budget cuts
The North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching in Jackson County had its funding slashed in half in 2011, and this year, Raleigh may finish the job.