Smoky Mountain News | August 12, 2020

Page 12

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STAFF

On the Cover:

In recognition of the 19th Amendment’s centennial anniversary this month, The Smoky Mountain News highlights the historic events leading up to the amendment’s ratification in August 1920, perhaps WNC’s most influential suffragette and the importance of the women’s vote in today’s political climate. (Page 6) Members of the League of Women Voters take their campaign to the streets — literally — when they copy and hand out news releases before the 1920 Democratic National Convention. Getty Images

News

WCU Faculty Senate opposes reopening ..................................................................4 University employees sue UNC System, Gov. Cooper ........................................12 Jackson allows student athletes to resume practices ..........................................13 Resistance to harm reduction grows in Haywood ................................................14 Sylva Sam will stay, with modifications ......................................................................18 More COVID-19 related deaths in Haywood ..........................................................21 Community Almanac ........................................................................................................23

Opinion

WCU ready for these unprecedented times

A&E

Outdoors

Duke

Overlooks are special places in the southern

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S UBSCRIPTIONS

In narrow vote, WCU Faculty Senate opposes reopening

BY HOLLY KAYS STAFF WRITER

In a nearly split vote held during a specialcalled meeting Aug. 10, the Western Carolina University Faculty Senate passed a resolution opposing a residential opening for fall 2020 and calling on the state to guarantee funding for the university system should future outbreaks force its institutions to return to online-only instruction.

The resolution ultimately passed by a narrow margin, with 15 people voting in favor and 13 opposed, with one abstention.

“Western Carolina University values the voice of its faculty and the role of shared governance,” said Chancellor Kelli R. Brown and Interim Provost Richard Starnes in a joint statement following the meeting. “The vote today during a special-called Faculty Senate meeting to discuss a resolution related to the residential opening of the fall semester reflects the complexity of the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on higher education.”

WCU, like other UNC institutions, is preparing to deliver a hybrid form of instruction aimed at maximizing online learning opportunities while still offering residential living and in-person instruction, with classes beginning Monday, Aug. 17. This year, students will not have a fall break, and in-person instruction will end on Nov. 20, with final exams held online after Thanksgiving.

REASONS FOR A RESOLUTION

“After 20 years in the academy serving as an administrator, as a staff member, as a faculty and certainly as a student, those voices are all important to what we do,” said Associate Professor in the College of Education and Allied Professions Yancey Gulley, who introduced the resolution. “I did feel that our voice was missing a bit in this conversation from this standpoint, so thank you all for taking the time to give that voice that you have to the bigger conversation of higher education to the state of North Carolina and to our own institution.”

The decision to return to in-person instruction this fall unduly prioritizes the institution’s financial concerns and personal liberties for students over the collective good, Gulley said. While WCU and the UNC system ostensibly operate under a shared governance model, he said, none of the meetings and discussions he’d been part of asked faculty members to weigh in on the basic question of whether or not it’s a good idea to reopen the campus at this time.

“It is a dangerous thing to open WCU and other institutions in the UNC system amid the current pandemic, as there is currently no vaccine and positive cases continue to appear,” he said, with the resolution adding that Jackson County’s health care systems could be easily overrun by a spike in cases originating from WCU students arriving from other areas of the state and country.

However, other Faculty Senate members were concerned about both the timing and content of the resolution.

“I commend any thoughtful attempt to

improve societal wellbeing, which I am sure is the goal of Yancey (Gulley) and everyone else who is supporting this resolution,” said Assistant Professor of Psychology David de Jong. “I also take it as a given that the issue of residential opening is a ship that has sailed. Students have already moved to campus. They have already paid their fees. Those fees are nonrefundable.”

Classes don’t start until Monday, Aug. 17, but move-in started Saturday, Aug. 1. Tuition and fees are charged at the beginning of the semester, and students will not receive any refunds due to changes in instructional format as the semester continues unless the UNC System receives financial relief from the state or federal government, according to information on the university website.

version during its next meeting Aug. 26. That motion failed, with about three-quarters of the body opposed.

“I’m not sure why we need to table it, particularly when it is a fluid situation,” said Professor of English Laura Wright. “It’s going to be changing constantly, but we have this point before us now.”

The original resolution Gulley introduced did not include the clause calling on the General Assembly to guarantee funding for UNC schools, and stated that in opposing residential opening, the Faculty Senate “stand(s) in solidarity with School Systems, Faculty Senates, County Health Departments and The Governor of North Carolina.”

Associate Professor of World Languages Will Lehman introduced an amendment that

grocery stores have had for months; cleaning supplies have yet to arrive in the classrooms.

“I want this discussion raised simply to highlight the practical aspects of what we’re about to do next week,” she said. “I want to be in the classroom, and I think everybody else here does too, but we want to do so safely. And with months of planning behind us, it’s unnerving that we don’t yet have those basic safety measures in place.”

Leigh Odom, who is an associate professor of communication sciences and disorders as well as a practicing speech pathologist, reminded the body that not all classes are adaptable to an online format. In health care disciplines especially, hands-on clinical skills are just as important as academic knowledge.

Should the need arise, campus officials will make decisions about refunds for housing and dining services consistent with UNC System guidance. The “optics” of calling for a reversal of the decision to begin in-person instruction this late in the game are “just terrible,” said de Jong.

“This resolution conveys a sense of privilege and entitlement,” he said. “Consider the people that I interact with on a regular basis who are not going to be as fortunate as many of us in terms of exposure to the coronavirus — healthcare workers, the person at the grocery store who’s checking out my groceries. Those people do not have a lot of flexibility.”

de Jong said that the resolution could be “greatly improved” to “flesh out what our moral imperatives are,” focus on empirical data and the collective wellbeing, and call for transparency in decision-making surrounding any criteria developed for switching back to remote learning. He moved that it be deferred to a smaller group for discussion so that the entire body could vote on a revised

added the call for state funding and amended the final sentence of the resolution, taking out the reference to the governor — there is no evidence the governor would support the ideas contained in the resolution, said Lehman —  and adjusting the remaining portion of the sentence to remove the implication that all school systems, faculty senates and health departments are opposed to face-to-face instruction. Gulley agreed to absorb those amendments into his proposed resolution.

A MIXED RESPONSE

Faculty Senate members were forthright about their concerns regarding the semester ahead, but they were also far from unified in their opposition to opening the campus.

Associate Professor of History Vicki Szabo said she plans to vote against the resolution but thanked Gulley for bringing it forward. With the first day of classes just a week away, Szabo said, university buildings lack many of the basic safety measures that most

“If we don’t have (clinical opportunities), there are students who will not graduate,” she said.

“They cannot move forward in their programs. They are lacking in what they need for certification, licensure. There’s accreditation stuff we have to think about. That’s a big thing for us to think about in our college. Really it’s not feasible to just put everything online.”

Staff Senate President Ben Pendry, who works as executive director of advancement services, told the Faculty Senate that staff are in favor of the residential opening.

“In many cases we believe and what we are hearing from our constituents is that our staff are ready to get to work and they’re ready to be here,” he said. “One of the things that obviously is under consideration is the employment and the economic impact of what a residential opening or nonopening means to those staff members, so that becomes part of the arithmetic in a very real way.”

“We’re dealing with a lot of unknowns,” added Assistant Professor of Integrated Health Sciences Patrick Baron. “The health and safety concerns are certainly real. I think that we need to be able to be flexible and adaptable, and I think we’ve come up with a plan that is as good as it can be in the face of so much uncertainty.”

Student Government Association President Dawson Spencer, meanwhile, said he was hardpressed to deliver an opinion on behalf of the student body. Responses to a survey released last month were split down the middle, he said, with 156 students saying they did not wish to return to campus and 159 saying they did — anything he would say could speak only to about half of the student population.

“Most of them are eager to return to normalcy at campus and want to have whatever they can have as consistent as it was last semester, but they also are still concerned, and rightfully so,” he said.

The Anthony Amendment

Women’s suffrage in NC and beyond

BY C ORY VAILLANCOURT STAFF W RITER

When the United States Constitution was adopted in 1787, left to the states was the power to determine who should be allowed to vote in elections. While several states indeed permitted some women to vote in various elections, the right of suffrage was far from universal.

Changing that would require an amendment to the Constitution — a lengthy and onerous process. After a seven-decade fight, universal suffrage for women was finally within reach when on Aug. 17, 1920, eyes across the country trained on North Carolina as the state that might make it so.

Events leading up to that August day in Raleigh a century ago are complex but can be traced back to an 1848 gathering in New York.

The Seneca Falls Convention is widely acknowledged as the first organized effort to discuss “the social, civil and religious condition and rights of woman.”

Organized by activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the convention resulted in the issuance of The Declaration of Sentiments. It mirrors the Declaration of Independence in structure, style and strength.

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one portion of the family of man to assume among the people of the earth a position different from that which they have hitherto occupied, but one to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes that impel them to such a course …

Women’s Suffrage Timeline —

1840-1920

Source: National Women’s History Museum

1840 — Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton are barred from attending the World Anti-Slavery Convention held in London, which prompts them to hold a Women’s Convention in the U.S.

1848 — Seneca Falls, New York is the location for the first Women’s Rights Convention. Elizabeth Cady Stanton writes “The Declaration of Sentiments” creating the

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted, deriving their powers from the consent of the governed. Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these rights, it is the right of those who suffer from it to refuse allegiance to it, and to insist upon the institution of a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness …

Now, in view of this entire disfranchisement of one-half the people of this country, their social and religious degradation, - in view of the unjust laws above mentioned, and because women do feel themselves aggrieved, oppressed, and fraudulently deprived of their most sacred rights, we insist that they have immediate admission to all the rights and privileges which belong to them as citizens of these United States.

The movement languished during the Civil War, but in 1866 was formalized when the American Equal Rights Association was founded by Stanton, along with abolitionist Frederick Douglass and social reformers

Susan B. Anthony and Lucretia Mott.

The AERA split in 1870 over the 15th Amendment, which doesn’t mention women’s suffrage but does say that “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”

Stanton and Anthony were opposed to Black male suffrage, and the 15th

agenda of women’s activism for decades to come.

1849 — The first state constitution in California extends property rights to women.

1850 — Worcester, Massachusetts, is the site of the first National Women’s Rights Convention. Frederick Douglass, Paulina Wright Davis, Abby Kelley Foster, William Lloyd Garrison, Lucy Stone and Sojourner Truth are in attendance. A strong alliance is formed with the Abolitionist Movement.

1851 — At a women’s rights convention in Akron, Ohio, Sojourner Truth, a former slave, delivers her now memorable speech, “Ain’t I a woman?”

1852 — The issue of women’s property rights is presented to the Vermont Senate by Clara Howard Nichols. This is a major issue for the Suffragists. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” by Harriet

Suffragists Elizabeth Cady Stanton (left) and Susan B. Anthony played a pivotal role in passage of the 19th Amendment. Wikimedia photo

Amendment, and the male immigrants it would also empower. They formed the National Women’s Suffrage Association.

Another group, called the American Women’s Suffrage Association and led by suffragist Lucy Stone and poet Julia Ward Howe, supported the 15th Amendment while still pursuing universal suffrage for women.

An 1878 women’s suffrage amendment introduced by a U.S. Senator from California

Beecher Stowe, is published and quickly becomes a bestseller.

1853 — Women delegates, Antoinette Brown and Susan B. Anthony, are not allowed to speak at The World’s Temperance Convention held in New York City.

1861-1865 — During the Civil War, efforts for the suffrage movement comes to a halt. Women put their energies toward the war effort.

1866 — Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony form the American Equal Rights Association, an organization dedicated to the goal of suffrage for all regardless of gender or race.

1868 — Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Parker Pillsbury publish the first edition of The Revolution. This periodical carries the motto “Men, their rights and

was “indefinitely postponed,” but not before 30,000 people had signed petitions of support. That led to the establishment of a Senate committee in 1882, which in turn led to a floor vote on women’s suffrage in 1887.

The “Susan B. Anthony Amendment,” as it was called, was defeated 34 to 16, far below the two-thirds majority needed for passage.

Perhaps a blessing in disguise, the defeat was quickly followed in 1890 by a merger of the

nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less!”

1868 — In Vineland, New Jersey, 172 women cast ballots in a separate box during the presidential election.

1868 — Senator S.C. Pomeroy of Kansas introduces the federal Women’s Suffrage amendment in Congress.

1868 — The Fourteenth Amendment is ratified. “Citizens” and “voters” are defined exclusively as male.

1869 — The American Equal Rights Association is wrecked by disagreements over the Fourteenth Amendment and the question of whether to support the proposed Fifteenth Amendment, which would enfranchise Black American males while avoiding the question of Women’s Suffrage entirely.

two competing suffrage organizations into a new one — the National American Women’s Suffrage Association (NAWSA), led by Stanton. Activism continued through the turn of the century on both sides; a Dec. 11, 1894 letter to the editor of the Asheville Daily Citizen written anonymously by “A North Carolina Woman” points out that the issue of suffrage was also intertwined with that of race.

“Whilst the ripple of Women’s Suffrage is stirring the stagnant pool of prejudices in our dear old State of North Carolina I feel moved to express utterances that occur in my vicinity,” she wrote. “Some of our men are only opposed to a Women’s Suffrage on the grounds that ‘in our Southern country it would put a great power in the hands of negro women.’”

NAWSA would again see a floor vote of the Anthony Amendment in the Senate in 1914, but it was defeated soundly.

By this time universal women’s suffrage was also tied closely to auxiliary causes espoused by its supporters, including trade unionists and the temperance movement. This made the decision on suffrage much more difficult for everyone, including the antilabor south and the anti-prohibition north.

Once again war intervened, but this time, the suffrage movement continued unabated. More than a dozen states had already granted suffrage to women, North Carolina not among them.

In advance of a January 1918 House vote on the Anthony Amendment, a story in the Carolina Mountaineer-Waynesville Courier detailed Western North Carolina Democratic Congressman Zebulon Weaver’s stance on the issue.

Weaver was perhaps a man ahead of his time; born in 1872 in (of course) Weaverville, he studied law at UNC-Chapel Hill and began practicing in Asheville in 1894. After a term in both the N.C. House and Senate, he served as Western North Carolina’s congressman from 1917 to 1919, and then from 1921 to 1928, and then again from 1930 to 1943.

During the 1920s, Weaver corresponded by letter with prominent Appalachian naturalist Horace Kephart and was credited for his advocacy on behalf of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the Blue Ridge Parkway.

1869 — Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony found the National Women’s Suffrage Association (NWSA), a more radical institution, to achieve the vote through a Constitutional amendment as well as push for other women’s rights issues.

1869 — Lucy Stone, Henry Blackwell, Julia Ward Howe and other more conservative activists form the American Women’s Suffrage Association (AWSA) to work for Women’s Suffrage through amending individual state constitutions.

1870 — The Fifteenth Amendment gave black men the right to vote. NWSA refused to work for its ratification and instead the members advocate for a Sixteenth Amendment that would dictate universal suffrage. Frederick Douglass broke with Stanton and Anthony over the position of NWSA.

He also benefitted from the support of Dillsboro civic leader Gertrude Dills McKee who went on to become a groundbreaking politician in her own right.

Near the end of his first term, Weaver was the only North Carolina congressman to support the Anthony Amendment.

“I am going to cast my vote for suffrage. I see no reason why the women of the United States and the South should not vote,”

Weaver told the Mountaineer-Courier in January, 1918. “That is, those that desire the ballot should not be denied the privilege; there are vast numbers of women who are large property holders and I feel that it is just to them that they shall decide how they are to be governed and taxed.”

The Anthony Amendment passed the House of Representatives that very month, by one vote.

On Sept. 30, 1918, with the end of World War I just weeks away, President Woodrow Wilson likewise asked the Senate to pass the Anthony Amendment. It failed the next day by two votes.

Three months later, in February 1919, it again failed, this time by one vote.

Not everyone was disappointed. On Feb. 20, 1919, the Mountaineer-Courier reprinted a letter sent by Newton, N.C., woman Kitty Ruskin to the Charlotte Observer.

“It is sickening and disgusting to me as a Southern woman. Why should I want to vote? Do we not have the best government on God’s green earth the way it is?” she wrote. “… I have only one desire, or two. … First, that from now until the gates of eternity are unlocked, the Women’s Suffrage movement

1870 — The Woman’s Journal is founded and edited by Mary Livermore, Lucy Stone, and Henry Blackwell.

1871 — Victoria Woodhull addresses the House Judiciary Committee, arguing women’s rights to vote under the Fourteenth Amendment. The Anti-Suffrage Party is founded.

1872 — Susan B. Anthony casts her ballot for Ulysses S. Grant in the presidential election and is arrested and brought to trial in Rochester, New York. Fifteen other women are arrested for illegally voting. Sojourner Truth appears at a polling booth in Battle Creek, Michigan, demanding a ballot to vote; she is turned away.

1872 — Abigail Scott Duniway convinces Oregon lawmakers to pass laws granting a married woman’s rights such as starting and operating her own business, controlling the

THE 19TH AMMENDMENT

will be defeated and persecuted; and secondly, that the women of the dear old southland will forever stand out nobly against this pest, this menace, and defeat it.”

Mountaineer-Courier Editor Jesse Daniel Boone, who was given to printing his poems on the front page of his paper, may have seen the writing on the wall two months later when he penned the following:

Our women long have been kept down, And were denied both place and crown; But soon a nation-wide decree Will let them vote and set them free.

Less than two months after Boone’s April 10, 1919 verse the Anthony Amendment passed the Senate by a comfortable margin, on June 4. But that wasn’t the end of it.

There are a couple of ways to amend the Constitution but only one of them has ever been pursued. A proposed amendment can be introduced in either the House or the Senate but must eventually pass both by a two-thirds majority.

After repeated attempts over 41 years, the Susan B. Anthony Amendment had finally accomplished that feat in 1919, but a proposed amendment must thereafter be ratified by legislatures in three-fourths of the existing states, at that time numbering 48.

Less than a week after clearing the Senate, the Anthony Amendment was first ratified by

money she earns, and the right to protect her property if her husband leaves.

1874 — The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) is founded by Annie Wittenmyer. With Frances Willard at its head (1876), the WCTU became an important proponent in the fight for women’s suffrage. As a result, one of the strongest opponents to women’s enfranchisement was the liquor lobby, which feared women might use their vote to prohibit the sale of liquor.

1876 — Susan B. Anthony and Matilda Joslyn Gage disrupt the official Centennial program at Independence Hall in Philadelphia, presenting a “Declaration of Rights for Women” to the Vice President.

1878 — A Women’s Suffrage Amendment is proposed in the U.S. Congress. When the 19th Amendment passes 41 years later, it is

Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan, all on the same day.

Local advocacy surrounding the issue ramped up, especially in North Carolina. Esteemed Democrat and three-time presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan addressed a suffrage meeting in Raleigh, and on June 30, prominent early feminist Mary Elizabeth Pidgeon of Winchester, Virginia, traveled to Waynesville to speak.

Six more states ratified the Anthony Amendment that month, and four more followed in July.

By the end of 1919, 22 states had ratified the Anthony Amendment. Opinion pieces in Western North Carolina newspapers began to reveal more and more support for ratification.

“When the legislature meets in extraordinary session next July it will be confronted with the question of ratification of the amendment to the federal constitution granting the suffrage to the women,” reads one such editorial in the Nov. 28, 1919 issue of the Sylva-based Jackson County Journal. “Personally we can see no reason why the women citizens and taxpayers of the country should not be given the privilege of voting if they want to do so.”

In March 1920, Washington became the 35th state to ratify the Anthony Amendment — one short of the 36 required.

Legislatures went into summer recess but as some reconvened early, the Old North State was poised to vote on Aug. 17, 1920.

Front-page headlines in the Aug. 17 issue of the Hickory Daily Record proclaim “Women’s Suffrage Battle is Begun in State Senate Today,” and “Senate is Scene of Vigorous Battle.”

In the end, ratification of the Anthony Amendment in North Carolina’s legislature failed by two votes.

The very next day, the main headline in the Daily Record read, “Tennessee Has Ratified U.S. Suffrage Amendment,” noting that the Volunteer State had forever taken its rightful place in history as the state that pushed women’s suffrage over the top.

Although the Anthony Amendment became the law of the land at that time, North Carolina went on to become the second-to-last state — ahead of only Mississippi — to ratify it in 1971.

worded exactly the same as this 1878 Amendment.

1887 — The first vote on Women’s Suffrage is taken in the Senate and is defeated.

1888 — The National Council of Women in the United States is established to promote the advancement of women in society.

1890 — NWSA and AWSA merge and the National American Women’s Suffrage Association is formed. Stanton is the first president. The Movement focuses efforts on securing suffrage at the state level.

1890 — Wyoming is admitted to the Union with a state constitution granting Women’s Suffrage.

1890 — The American Federation of Labor declares support for Women’s Suffrage. 1890 — The South Dakota campaign for Women’s Suffrage loses.

‘We believe in democracy’

For

commissioner’s

wife, winding road leads to citizenship, voting rights

BY HOLLY KAYS STAFF WRITER

With the 19th Amendment’s passage now 100 years in the rearview, most American women alive today have been eligible to vote since the age of 18, or 21 for those who came of age before 1971. Balsam resident Luisa Teran de McMahan, however, was 40 years old before she was allowed to cast an American ballot.

“We take it for granted, but not all countries have the right to vote for their leaders, and the fact that in this country we can vote for our local leaders and vote for our government and vote for our president, that’s important,” she said. “You want to choose who is going to guide you or who is going to be the leader. You want to have someone who you believe is capable of handling situations and problems.”

Originally from Venezuela, McMahan moved to the United States in July 2006 on a J1 visa, teaching second grade math and science at a bilingual school in Greenville, South Carolina. The Venezuela of McMahan’s childhood was an affluent, democratic, stable country, but by the time she left that was already beginning to change. Hugo Chavez would be elected to this third term in December of that year, and in the seven years since he’d first gained power the country had already seen a string of violent conflicts between the government and its opposition in response to Chavez’ dictatorial bent.

“I came for the ‘American Dream,’ if you want to call it that,” she said. “I came with the hope of being able to stay one way or another.”

Single at the time, she began to explore the world of online dating and ended up

Women’s Suffrage

meeting a man named Brian McMahan, who was chairman of the commission for a rural county whose population was smaller than that of the entire city where she now lived. Luisa grew up in the city of Barquisimeto, which at the time had a population of about 1 million, and went to college in the capital city of Caracas. Greenville was by far the smallest town she’d ever called home.

But the two fell in love, and in 2008 they married. The following year, Luisa secured her green card and left Greenville for Jackson County. Marrying an American citizen had made her eligible to apply for the green card, but earning it was still a process.

“We had to prove to the U.S. government that he really loved me, and I really loved him and that the marriage was legitimate,” she said.

THE 19TH AMMENDMENT

They gathered together an enormous file of documents to prove this claim, including copies of all the emails they’d sent each other before meeting in person and the telephone bills that showed how many times they’d talked on the phone and how long the conversations were.

“It was a lot of money we had to pay in fees to change my status,” she said. “We did what we had to do.”

The green card allowed her to remain in the United States as a permanent resident. She could hold a job, travel freely and enjoy many of the same right that U.S. citizens enjoy — but she couldn’t vote. Only citizens are allowed to vote, and the McMahans had to make it through three years of marriage before Luisa could apply for citizenship. By the time that date rolled around in 2012, she wasn’t in a hurry to make the move. It was an expensive process, for one thing, and family life was busy. The McMahans had their first child, and then their second one, plus work and church and all the other responsibilities that come with being part of a community. It was really the election of President Donald Trump in 2016 — and the ensuing uncertainty as to what immigration policies his administration might enact — that spurred her to start the citizenship process.

In February, Luisa went to Atlanta to get fingerprints and biometrics taken at the immigration office. She was given an appointment in Charlotte several months later to complete the second step, which included a citizenship exam and a test to prove that she could read and write in English. The stakes were high.

“If you don’t pass, you have to start over again,” she said. “They don’t reimburse you anything.”

But, she did pass, and on Aug. 15, 2017, she was naturalized as a citizen of the United States.

Luisa voted for the first time the following year, in 2018, a milestone that would have been a big deal for anybody. But for her it was especially important, because her husband was on the ballot. Brian is currently serving his fourth term on the Jackson County Board of Commissioners after winning re-election in 2018. One of the 8,589 votes cast to elect him was his wife’s.

“When my first time to vote came, we all went together,” she said. “We made it a family

affair, and we took pictures. It was meaningful because I was voting for my husband for the first time.”

While Luisa and Brian didn’t yet know each other during his first two political campaigns in 2002 and 2006, they were married when he won his contest in 2014, and in 2010, when he lost by just 68 votes.

It was “a little awkward,” said Luisa, knowing that she could have helped narrow that gap were she eligible to vote.

“Especially in a small election like the county election, one or two or 10 votes makes a big difference,” she said. “I felt a little frustrated, but then maybe it was for the best because those first four years of (our son) Henry’s life, he was home way more than after he was elected again.”

Now, as a full citizen of the U.S., Luisa loves knowing that this country is her home, and that she will always have a voice at the ballot box.

“We believe in democracy here, and voting is a big part of it,” she said.

1890-1925 — The Progressive Era begins. Women from all classes and backgrounds enter public life. Women’s roles expand and result in an increasing politicization of women. Consequently the issue of Women’s Suffrage becomes part of mainstream politics.

1892 — Olympia Brown founds the Federal Suffrage Association to campaign for women’s suffrage.

1893 — Colorado adopts Women’s Suffrage.

1894 — 600,000 signatures are presented to the New York State Constitutional Convention

in a failed effort to bring a Women’s Suffrage amendment to the voters.

1895 — Elizabeth Cady Stanton publishes The Woman’s Bible. After its publication, NAWSA moves to distance itself from Stanton because many conservative suffragists considered her to be too radical and, thus, potentially damaging to the suffrage campaign.

1896 — Mary Church Terrell, Ida B. WellsBarnett, and Frances E.W. Harper among others found the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs.

1896 — Utah joins the Union with full suffrage for women.

1896 — Idaho adopts Women’s Suffrage.

1903 — Mary Dreier, Rheta Childe Dorr, Leonora O’Reilly, and others form the Women’s Trade Union League of New York, an

organization of middle- and working-class women dedicated to unionization for working women and to Women’s Suffrage.

1910 — Washington State adopts Women’s Suffrage.

1910 — The Women’s Political Union organizes the first suffrage parade in New York City.

1911 — The National Association Opposed to Women’s Suffrage (NAOWS) is organized. Led by Mrs. Arthur Dodge, its members included wealthy, influential women, some Catholic clergymen, distillers and brewers, urban political machines, Southern congressmen, and corporate capitalists.

1911 — The elaborate California suffrage campaign succeeds by a small margin.

1912 — Women’s Suffrage is supported for the first time at the national level by a major

political party, Theodore Roosevelt’s Bull Moose Party.

1912 — 20,000 suffrage supporters join a New York City suffrage parade.

1912 — Oregon, Kansas, and Arizona adopt Women’s Suffrage.

1913 — In 1913, suffragists organized a parade down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C. The parade was the first major suffrage spectacle organized by the National American Women’s Suffrage Association (NAWSA).

1913 — The two women then organized the Congressional Union, later known at the National Women’s Party (1916). They borrowed strategies from the radical Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) in England.

Lassie Kelly

BY J ESSI STONE N EWS E DITOR

It’s fun to imagine what the people of Macon County must have thought of Lassie Kelly. Born in 1881, she was regarded as a “vivid leader” in Franklin and an actively engaged community member until her death in 1963.

Kelly served in World War I, was one of the first women in North Carolina to pass the bar exam and practice law, the first women in the state to be appointed as a U.S. District Attorney and was the first woman in the nation to serve as commander over an American Legion Post.

Those are pretty hefty credentials for a woman living today in Western North Carolina, let alone during a time when women just gained the right to vote.

“I think probably it was kind of weird for some people at first who had never been exposed to that — a woman having a law license and serving in the Navy. Maybe some thought it’s not her place, but at the same time other people probably looked up to her and took a lot of pride in her being local. She came from the mountains and did so much to help this area,” said Sydney Giaquinto, a 2019 Franklin High School graduate.

Giaquinto had the opportunity to learn more about Lassie Kelly and even portray the historic figure when she became involved in the

Before WWI, women were not allowed to serve in the military — some dressed as men to serve while others served as nurses on the frontlines — but as progressive social movements moved women’s rights forward, women had more opportunities to serve their country. Kelly enlisted as a female Yeoman in the U.S. Navy in April 1918.

“Yeomanettes” helped the Navy meet a severe clerical shortage and primarily did secretarial duties — translating, fingerprinting, recruiting and drafting. Kelly served in prominent roles in the offices of Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels, Assistant Secretary Franklin D. Roosevelt and Admiral William Sims.

“I felt so much pride wearing that uniform and being saluted by veterans at the American Legion,” Giaquinto said. “I was treated like a celebrity even though I’m only 5’4” and Lassie was over 6 feet tall. Everyone wanted to take a picture with her.”

of Chief Yeoman

Macon County Women’s History Trail project. A committee formed out of the Folk Heritage Association of Macon County, the Women’s History Trail aims to bring more attention to the forgotten contributions of women.

Kelly

and Yeoman

Fort in New York May 1919. They were part of a contingent of 250 Yeomen (F) who were sent to New York from Washington, D.C., to take part in the Victory Loan drive. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph

Kelly’s contributions are honored with a plaque placed at the American Legion Post 108 in Franklin — a post she helped organize and where she served as commander. During the plaque dedication ceremony in 2019, Giaquinto was the guest of honor dressed up as Lassie Kelly during WWI. The authentic Chief Yeoman uniform she donned was made by Women’s History Trail member Kathryn Sellers.

“When I was asked to portray Lassie, it was fun doing the research and finding out more about her,” she said. “She served in World War I as a Chief Yeoman — I didn’t even know what that meant and had to go look it up.”

Kelly’s contributions did not end after the war; she came back home to Macon County and helped form the American Legion and represented the Franklin post at the Legion’s national convention held in New Orleans in 1922.

In August 1917, Kelly was one of two women licensed to practice law in the state out of a group of 40 successful applicants. According to a December 1918 announcement in The Mountaineer, Kelly was appointed as an Assistant U.S. District Attorney at a salary of $2,000 a year — adjusted for inflation that would be about $38,000 in 2020.

“She left Saturday to take up her duties

Zebulon Weaver was North Carolina’s only congressman in support of universal women’s suffrage. Wikimedia photo

After Anthony: NC women still struggle for representation

BY C ORY VAILLANCOURT STAFF W RITER

It’s been almost exactly 100 years since the 19th Amendment — often called the Anthony Amendment — was ratified on Aug. 18, 1920.

Despite comprising more than 50 percent of the population of North Carolina, the women of the Old North State continue to fight for some semblance of equal representation on the state’s various governing bodies.

Voter registration statistics show they’re actually losing ground.

“Maybe the perception that ‘my vote doesn’t matter’ is still pretty strong, sadly,” said Myrna Campbell, chair of the Haywood County Democratic Party. “Maybe it’s that when they vote, they don’t see anyone that looks like them. Certainly, that could be a factor.”

To their credit, N.C.’s voters do have a history of putting women in high office. Republican Elizabeth Dole was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2003 but after one term was defeated by another woman, Democrat Kay Hagan.

N.C. is one of only 30 states to ever have a female governor, Democrat Bev Perdue from 2009 to 2013. Perdue also served as lieutenant governor from 2001 to 2009, breaking both glass ceilings in the process.

Most council of state offices have seen women elected as well, according to Dr. Michael Bitzer, a Catawba College professor and frequent contributor to preeminent NC political blog www.oldnorthstatepolitics.com.

“The attorney general and commissioner of insurance have not had women elected to those positions in the council of state, but everything else has,” said Bitzer. “On the judicial side, we’ve got our first female chief justice in Cheri Beasley. On the legislative side, I can’t recall a House speaker or president protemp of the Senate being a woman.”

Although Perdue served as president of the Senate in her role as lieutenant governor,

Percentage of female voters in NC11 by county

Jan. 1, 2004Aug. 8, 2020

Avery.....................51.8%..............50.8% Buncombe.............54.8%..............51.2%

Cherokee...............53.6%..............52.2%

Clay.......................52.8%..............50.7%

Graham.................51.8%..............51.0%

Haywood................53.7%..............52.2% Henderson.............54.3%..............51.9%

Jackson.................52.7%..............50.6%

Macon...................53.8%..............52.8%

Madison................52.4%..............48.7%

McDowell...............54.0%..............52.0% Mitchell.................53.2%..............50.1% Polk.......................55.9%..............52.6%

Rutherford*...........54.1%..............51.3%

Statewide..............54.8%..............51.2%

Swain....................52.8%..............51.8% Transylvania..........52.7%..............51.4% Yancey...................52.3%..............50.0%

Source: NC State Board of Elections *Only half of Rutherford County lies within NC11. Numbers reported here are for the full county.

THE 19TH AMMENDMENT

it’s the president pro-temp — a senator from the majority party — that wields most of the power.

As of Jan. 1, 2020, there were just 43 women in the North Carolina General Assembly — 10 in the Senate, and 33 in the House. Compared to the 170 seats in both bodies, that’s good for about 25.3 percent.

Across the country, 2,145 women currently serve as state legislators, making up 29 percent of all legislators, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Only one state, Nevada, has a female-majority legislature.

Although that 29 percent is up from 2018’s average of 25.3 percent there’s still a long way to go until those numbers begin to approach 50-50.

In the Western North Carolina counties of Cherokee, Clay, Graham, Haywood, Jackson, Macon and Swain, only two of a possible 35 county commission seats are held by women, including Connie Orr in Graham and Gayle Woody in Jackson.

In Haywood County, there hasn’t been a female commissioner since two-term incumbent Mary Ann Enloe was defeated in 2008. Enloe, who was actually the second female Haywood commissioner, told The Smoky Mountain News back in 2018 that there are a number of reasons for the dearth of local women in politics.

“I think one thing, and I won’t put them in order, is it’s hard to put yourself out there when you realize that you’re not entitled to one minute’s privacy. You can find out and tell everything you can find out and tell about me,” she said. “And of course, the bias against women anyway — we’re at least a generation away, in my opinion, from fixing that, and I think that’s what we’re seeing nationally is

Democrat Robin Greene Black finished fourth of four in the 2016 General Election.

Libertarian Windy McKinney finished sixth of six in the 2014 General. Democrat Rhonda Cole Schandevel finished fourth of seven and Republican Jeanne Sturges Holbrook finished fourth out of five in their respective 2010 party primaries, with neither placing high enough to advance to the General.

“In 2016, I went to a conference where the speaker was a consultant working with female candidates. He said several things that struck me,” Campbell said. “First of all, a lot of women don’t feel qualified to run. It’s a cultural thing. Women feel like before they do something, they need to have some knowledge about it, whereas men are willing to jump in and do ‘on-the-job training.’ Plus, according to the research he’d done, women have to be asked, or rather convinced to run.

They will generally say no the first time they’re asked. That has been my experience. One of my goals when I became party chair was get women elected to county commission. I know I’ve talked to at least a dozen women. The typical female paradigm is not viewing themselves as candidate material.”

Makeup of NC county boards, 1974-2018

Total seatsFemalesPercent

This November, Haywood County voters will have a chance to break that streak; uncontested in the March 3 Primary Election, Waynesville Democrat Leah Hampton will appear on ballots alongside fellow Democrat David Young and incumbent Republicans Kevin Ensley and Brandon Rogers. Only two of them will win.

“The vast majority of teachers, medical staff, and service industry workers are women, and those are huge employers in Haywood County, so it’s crucial that they have representation on the county commission. That’s why I’m running,” said Hampton. “I hope voters will remember me and other women in November. Governments should reflect who the people really are, and right now Haywood County isn’t hearing from half of us.”

Across the state and the region, the playing field is clearly tilted against women running for office — from any political party — but if a disturbing trend in voter registration continues, the slant could become more severe.

Over the past 16 years, the percentage of the North Carolina electorate that is female has steadily diminished, according to voter registration statistics from the North Carolina State Board of Elections.

2010.............578..............93............16.1% 2012.............580..............93............16.0% 2014.............583..............93............16.0% 2016.............583..............91............15.6% 2018.............587..............98............16.7%

Source: NC Association of County Commissioners

that women have their place, and [politics] isn’t their place. That’s a generational thing, and it’s wrong. It’s as wrong as can be.”

It’s not as though women are competing en masse in Haywood County and experiencing defeat; in the five elections subsequent to Enloe’s last term, only four women have run for commission seats.

On Jan. 1, 2004, women made up 54.8 percent of the state’s registered voters, but as of Aug. 8 of this year had dwindled to 51.2 percent.

North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District has fared little better. In each of the 17 counties that make up the 11th (actually, 16 and half of Rutherford) the percentage of women in the electorate declined, with the biggest losses coming in Mitchell, Polk, Buncombe and Madison counties.

Over that 16-year period, the decline in Madison County means that today, women make up just 48.7 percent of registered voters — lowest in the 11th.

“We’ve got to do a better job of nurturing women, and encouraging them to vote and to run,” Campbell said.

Women’s Suffrage

1914 — Nevada and Montana adopt Women’s Suffrage.

1914 — The National Federation of Women’s Clubs, which had over two million women members throughout the U.S., formally endorses the suffrage campaign.

1915 — Mabel Vernon and Sara Bard Field are involved in a transcontinental tour which gathers over a half-million signatures on petitions to Congress.

1915 — 40,000 march in a NYC suffrage parade. Many women are dressed in white and carry placards with the names of the states they represent.

1915 — Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and Massachusetts continue to reject Women’s Suffrage.

1916 — Jeannette Rankin of Montana is the first woman elected to the House of Representatives. Woodrow Wilson states that the Democratic Party platform will support suffrage.

1917 — New York women gain suffrage. Arkansas women are allowed to vote in primary elections.

1917 — National Woman’s Party picketers appear in front of the White House holding two banners, “Mr. President, What Will You Do For Women’s Suffrage?” and “How Long Must Women Wait for Liberty?”

1917 — Jeannette Rankin of Montana, the first woman elected to Congress, is formally seated in the U.S. House of Representatives.

1917 — Alice Paul, leader of the National Woman’s Party, was put in solitary confinement in the mental ward of the prison as a way to “break” her will and to undermine her credibility with the public.

1917 — In June, arrests of the National Woman’s party picketers begin on charges of obstructing sidewalk traffic. Subsequent picketers are sentenced to up to six months in jail. In November, the government unconditionally releases the picketers in response to public outcry and an inability to stop National Woman’s Party picketers’ hunger strike.

1918 — Representative Rankin opens debate on a suffrage amendment in the House. The amendment passes. The amendment fails to win the required two thirds majority in the Senate.

1918 — Michigan, South Dakota, and Oklahoma adopt Women’s Suffrage.

1918 — President Wilson states his support for a federal Women’s Suffrage amendment. Wilson addresses the Senate about adopting Women’s Suffrage at the end of World War I.

1919 — The Senate finally passes the Nineteenth Amendment and the ratification process begins.

Aug. 18, 1920 — Tennessee adopts Women’s Suffrage.

Aug. 26, 1920 — Three quarters of the state legislatures ratify the Nineteenth Amendment. American women win full voting rights.

and her headquarters will possibly be in Asheboro, N.C. This is the first woman we have any knowledge of being appointed to a position of this kind, which speaks well for Miss Kelly,” the announcement read.

She also opened Kelly’s Tea Room on Main Street in Franklin in 1929. Looking through newspaper announcements from that time, it’s clear the tea room was well utilized in the community for meetings, speakers and other special events. She also served as a court reporter in the western district for 45 years.

As a writer and an avid reader, Giaquinto said she was also impressed with Kelly’s efforts as a teenager to get a library started in Macon County. Then in 1955, she raised $10,000 to build a new Franklin Library on Phillips Street.

“She was very instrumental in getting the library started here and expanding reading opportunities to mountain people,” she said. “As a writer myself, I appreciate that, knowing it was a huge problem that she stood up for at the time.”

As for her direct participation in the Women’s Suffrage Movement, Kelly was a charter member and the recording secretary for the N.C. League of Women Voters.

When she passed away in 1963, the tribute to her in The Franklin Press called her “honest and fiercely loyal; her faults were exaggerations of her virtues.”

Meanwhile, a young Giaquinto, who is

now a sophomore at Western Carolina University, is excited about casting her first ballot in a presidential election this fall.

“The upcoming election will be the first presidential election I’ve been able to vote in, and I’m excited. The 19th Amendment for me, personally, it means women finally had a voice,” she said. “I was talking to my mom recently and wondering if I’d been born in the 18th century and if I’d wanted to speak before Congress or do the things I’ve already done at this point in my life, would I have been able to. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t have been able to do that.”

BY HANNAH MCLEOD STAFF WRITER

As of Tuesday, Aug. 4, Jackson County Schools entered phase two for school athletics. The North Carolina High School Athletic Association laid out phase two guidelines for summer conditioning and workout activities in late July. The guidelines for phase two went into effect Aug. 3.

According to Dr. Kevin Bailey, executive director of human resources for Jackson County Schools, a soccer player in the school district tested positive for COVID-19 a few weeks ago. Bailey said parents were notified promptly, and because students were working out in pods of 10, JCPS was able to send that pod home immediately and the virus did not spread. Previously in phase one, students could only do exercise and conditioning during workouts, outside, without any shared equipment. Now in phase two, students will be able to use balls and do small group practices. Students and coaches can

also use athletic training rooms, with proper sanitation, during phase two.

Jackson County currently has nine students participating in workouts at Blue Ridge Early College and 207 students participating in workouts at Smoky Mountain High School. At the Jackson County School Board meeting Aug.4, Bailey said there were 20 high schools in Western North Carolina that had moved into phase two for athletics and recommended that Jackson County Schools do the same.

There will be a school board meeting on Tuesday, Aug. 12, to discuss athletics further. Until that date Jackson County Schools has moved into phase two for athletics.

Asheville City Schools recently suspended workouts after four athletes tested positive for COVID-19. Haywood County Schools moved into phase two for athletics on Monday, Aug. 3.

University employees sue UNC System, Gov. Cooper

BY HOLLY KAYS STAFF WRITER

Seventeen employees at University of North Carolina System schools — including two from Western Carolina University — are suing the university system and Gov. Roy Cooper in a class-action lawsuit demanding a halt to plans to resume residential instruction until such instruction can take place safely.

“Plaintiffs seek to prevent UNC and its constituent institutions from violating their clearly established right to a safe work place; their right to conditions and a place of work free from recognized hazards and/or dangerous activities that are likely to cause them injury or death; their constitutionally protected property rights to work and earn a livelihood, and their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; and to forbid the continuance of any wrongful acts or the doing of some threatened or anticipated injury,” reads the complaint.

Plaintiffs in the case include Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy Enrique Gomez and Associate Professor of Inorganic Biochemistry Jack Summers. The complaint was filed Aug. 10 in Wake County Superior Court.

The complaint alleges that neither Cooper nor the UNC Board of Governors have done “anything” to ensure that university faculty and staff aren’t placed at increased risk of exposure to COVID-19 due to returning to work on campus alongside tens of thousands of students. The lawsuit cites an executive order from Cooper’s office stating that despite the many benefits of inperson school at all levels, such gatherings “will increase the risk of COVID-19 spread, even after all health and safety measures are put in place.”

ing masking requirements on the thousands of students who will soon return to campus will be nigh impossible.

The universities’ plans to prevent spread on campus are insufficient, the suit charges. Students will not be tested prior to arrival on campus, and no tests will be required for employees either. Schools will rely on students to self-report any symptoms or exposure. The suit cited a July 2020 study published in JAMA Network Open that modeled transmission in a hypothetical cohort of 4,990 college-age students without COVID19 and 10 students with undetected asymptomatic COVID-19. The study concluded

The universities’ plans to prevent spread on campus are insufficient, the suit charges. Students will not be tested prior to arrival on campus, and no tests will be required for employees either.

that “We identified no circumstance in this modeling study under which symptombased screen alone would be sufficient to contain an outbreak.”

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“No office, dormitory, classroom space, common area, recreational area or any other space located on the UNC System campuses where Plaintiffs and the Sub-Classes they seek to represent will work were designed and constructed with the idea of COVID-19 in mind, and specifically, the ventilation of those spaces,” reads the complaint.

When the pandemic began in March, students were sent home and in-person instruction was halted. However, in April UNC announced that in-person classes would resume that fall. Since that announcement, the complaint points out, case numbers have surged.

A return to in-person classes will likely amplify the spread, the suit alleges. Employees have been instructed to return to their workplaces, and while they are required to selfreport any symptoms or COVID-19 exposure, they are not required to provide that information to their coworkers. Additionally, enforc-

Furthermore, the kits that UNC institutions had planned to provide to incoming students — they would contain, among other things, face masks, hand sanitizer and a thermometer — were supposed to be available Aug. 8-14 but have been delayed and are now expected to arrive Aug. 20 at the earliest, the complaint states. At WCU, move-in started Aug. 1 and classes begin Aug. 17.

The virus presents a risk to students but an even greater one to university employees, said the lawsuit, as risk increases significantly with age. Existing sick leave policies are not nearly sufficient to compensate employees for the kind of extended illness or medical expense that could result from a severe case of COVID-19. Under the Federal Families First Coronavirus Response Act, employees can receive up to 100 percent of regular pay, but with a cap of $511 daily and $5,110 total. In case of sickness, the loss of pay could well exceed this benefit amount, the complaint states.

“Plaintiffs and the Sub-Classes they seek to represent are now faced with a false dichotomy: go to work and risk exposure to COVID-19 or not go to work and risk termination from their jobs,” the complaint states.

Woman sentenced for stealing Lake Junaluska vehicle

A Waynesville woman must serve in prison a minimum of six months to a maximum of 17 months for stealing a Lake Junaluska security vehicle earlier this summer.

Stopping Kendyll Unterreiner, 28, required Sgt. Doug Carver of the Haywood County Sheriff’s Office to ram his patrol vehicle into the stolen vehicle, sending both vehicles into the lake. Unterreiner stole the security vehicle at 9:50 a.m. on June 2. At the time, Lake Junaluska’s popular around-the-lake path was in heavy use. To forestall anyone from being injured — or worse — a Sheriff’s Office supervisor authorized Carver to perform pursuit intervention technique, or PIT. Using this maneuver, the pursuing car forces a fleeing car to turn sideways abruptly, causing the fleeing driver to lose control and stop.

Unterreiner pleaded guilty to felony flee/elude with motor vehicle and felony larceny. Along with an active prison sentence for felony flee/elude with motor vehicle of six months to 17 months, Senior Resident Superior Court Judge Bradley B. Letts ordered her to serve a suspended sentence of six months to 17 months for felony larceny, undergo 24 months of supervised probation and pay almost $7,000 restitution.

On June 2, Security Officer Lynda Hyatt went to Lake Junaluska’s boat ramp, then the Welcome Center parking lot, after a guest reported someone tried to steal a dog. The failed dognapper, later identified as Unterreiner, told the security office her name was Ace Ventura, the name of a pet detective in a movie.

Unterreiner sprinted to Hyatt’s security vehicle. She climbed into the driver’s seat, turned right onto U.S. 19 and sped off.

Carver watched as the stolen vehicle turned. He pursued Unterreiner in his patrol vehicle. She turned left into a church parking lot. Carver drove his patrol car in front of the security vehicle, but the woman stopped, backed and turned left.

“I pulled up beside the security vehicle, and I made a decision to ram the vehicle,” Carver said in an incident report. “I felt the driver was a danger to others.”

Instead, Unterreiner hit the patrol vehicle with the security vehicle. She turned right, leaving the parking lot and returning to U.S. 19. Next, Unterreiner sped through a traffic light and turned right into the Hot Tub Store parking lot.

Carver followed, again driving his patrol vehicle in front of the stolen vehicle, and again Unterreiner hit the patrol vehicle. She fled the parking lot and went toward the intersection of Russ Avenue and U.S. 19, driving more than 85 mph in a zone designated 45 mph. She went through another traffic light, heading south on U.S. 19.

At speeds topping 100 mph, Unterreiner drove in an oncoming, northbound lane of the four-lane highway. She turned left on Southlake Shore Drive and headed back into Lake Junaluska.

“I checked for any pedestrians and other vehicles. The area was clear,” Carver said in his incident report.

Carver rammed his vehicle into the security vehicle, ending the chase.

Resistance to harm reduction grows in Haywood

Chairman points critics toward the facts

BY J ESSI STONE N EWS E DITOR

Tensions ran high at the Aug. 3 Haywood County Board of Commissioners meeting as harm reduction critics become more vocal in their opposition and community health advocates become more frustrated over a lack of facts and understanding surrounding substance use disorder.

About 10 people spoke to commissioners during public comment regarding the county’s partnership with the North Carolina Harm Reduction Coalition, which supports a number of programs to help people experiencing homelessness and/or dealing with substance use disorder in Haywood County. Half of them were supportive of the coalition while the other half were opposed and wanted the county to end its partnership with the organization.

Jean Parris, a community advocate who started the Drugs in Our Midst education program in 2011, spoke in favor of the many harm reduction programs that have been implemented in Haywood County in the last eight years. She said she and then Waynesville Police Chief Bill Hollingsed first heard about harm reduction models in 2012 when N.C. Harm Reduction Coalition Director Robert Childs came to speak to them about the use of NARCAN, a medication that assists in stopping or reversing the effects of a drug overdose.

“Bill and I were skeptical, but his talk and his stories turned us around,” Parris said. “Immediately we said we want to do that.”

Not long after that, Waynesville Police Department became one of the first agencies to start carrying the lifesaving drug in every patrol vehicle. She said the Harm Reduction Coalition has helped supply the NARCAN at no cost to taxpayers and has also saved many lives since that time.

“We never paid a dime for NARCAN and I don’t want us to ruin that relationship. (The coalition) furnished us with syringes — we don’t want to ruin that but we do want to do a better job at keeping the numbers,” Parris said.

Parris was speaking directly to Commissioner Mark Pless. Pless has been questioning the information the coalition provides to the county and has been demanding more data and accountability from the organization for several months. Parris told Pless it wasn’t his responsibility to take calls from people who find improperly disposed needles in the county. She reminded residents to call the proper law enforcement agency if they discover used syringes in their area. Officers are trained and have the necessary tools needed to pick up sharps and properly dispose of them. That way, Parris said, law enforcement and the Harm Reduction Coalition will have a better count of needles picked up in the county.

Peggy Hannah told commissioners she was against harm reduction measures and wanted to see the county get out of the contract agreement it has with the coalition. She said a lot of people were unhappy with the situation surrounding addiction and homelessness — problems they attribute to the coalition’s presence and work in the county.

“Is this the best we can do to help our addicts? Is there a way to make more progress instead of continuously enabling them with clean syringes instead of giving them hope to move forward?” she asked.

Kelly Kashella claimed she’s been trying to get her niece clean for 17 years, but it seems hopeless when the Harm Reduction Coalition gives her 100 clean needles.

“How many addicts are getting this type of supplies,” she said. “And they were handing out NARCAN all over Ninevah the other day… it’s to the point I can’t sit back and be quiet. My kids can’t even walk home from school at Waynesville Middle without seeing needles.”

Jesse-Lee Dunlap and Becca Goldstein — who are both harm reduction workers in Haywood — tried to provide facts about its practices and offer firsthand stories about the impact they’re having in people’s lives.

To clarify, Dunlap said the syringe program is only one piece of a much bigger harm reduction puzzle. Providing NARCAN to first responders is harm reduction, the LEAD (Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion) program adopted by Waynesville and Canton police departments is harm reduction, post overdose visits are harm reduction, providing fentanyl test strips, connecting clients with treatment is harm reduction and CIT (Crisis Intervention Team) training for law enforcement officers is harm reduction.

Haywood County had 209 overdose reversals performed in 2019 and has already surpassed that number in 2020, Dunlap said. But the problems people are encountering in Haywood go far beyond drug use.

“I get calls about housing, food, issues with landlords, people needing rides to doctor’s appointments,” they said.

On March 31, the Balsam Center in Waynesville had to shut down its 24/7 mental health crisis center, which means many of the calls Dunlap now receives are from people experiencing a mental health crisis with nowhere to go.

They also argued that finding people a secure place to live is a barrier to getting people off the streets and into treatment.

“Seventy-nine percent of people coming out of the Haywood jail are homeless … the quickest way to put us out of a job is to put funds toward housing and mental health treatment facilities,” Dunlap said.

Goldstein shared her experience doing post overdose visits in Haywood County and invited commissioners to join her soon.

“I can’t describe to you what it’s like to see a participant access medication-assisted treatment. I can’t describe to you what it looks like when a participant has a severe

mental health diagnosis and I can’t describe what it’s like to show up at someone’s house, knock on their door and talk to them after an overdose,” she said.

While some participants are more than capable of getting resources themselves, Goldstein said a visit from the Harm Reduction Coalition is often the first time they’ve received help with no judgment and no strings attached.

“I’m saying, ‘I care about you, I want you to be safe, I want you not to die,’” she said. “It takes a few times until they trust me and then I start asking about services and the trauma they’ve experienced. Then they tell you about the suffering of their friends, family and community — they are much quicker to tell you the needs of others more than themselves.”

It was through a harm reduction participant that Goldstein learned about a marginalized family that had been living without water and electricity since December. Even though no one in the household used drugs, they didn’t know how to access the help they needed.

Community health worker Kasey Valentine Steffen told commissioners she is exhausted from trying to explain these issues over and over again and trying to

explain that the resources needed to make a difference just aren’t there anymore. As a Haywood County native, she said she’s fortunate to have a number of friends, families, churches and other resources to call upon if she needs help with food, paying bills, child care or anything else. However, she said, many people in the county don’t have those same privileges.

“I try to connect people to the resources I have,” she said. “Since October I’ve been trying to explain to you the resources are going down. People don’t want government involvement but I don’t see support growing anywhere else. Harm Reduction would come pick people up at midnight and take them to the Balsam Center, but now that’s closed.”

While Steffen said she would continue to seek grant funding to meet the growing needs in the community, she said she didn’t understand why Haywood County government refused to take COVID-19 relief money to put toward solving these problems.

“I’m not going to stop fighting for addicts because they have value too,” she said.

Ashley Bradley, who recently started Kaitlynne’s House in Waynesville, a halfway house for recovering mothers, agreed that the county needed to support the nonprofit programs that were F

working, especially if the commissioners refused to put public money toward them. People like Bradley, Dunlap, Goldstein and Steffen are the ones on the frontlines — they have been to drug houses in the middle of the night to pull someone’s loved one out and they have visited them in the hospital to let them know there’s help for them during their most vulnerable moment. However, it’s hard to help people when there is a long wait list to get into a treatment facility.

Following public comment, commissioners were given the chance to talk about harm reduction measures and the contract the county has with the coalition to provide these types of services using federal grant money the county received last year.

Commissioner Brandon Rogers said he’d been researching harm reduction programs the last few months anticipating the board would be discussing whether to extend the grant contract with HRC.

“I believe in programs that work, but if not I want to look at fixing that. I know this program was set up initially to be a good thing, but there’s red flags that have come up recently,” he said.

Commissioner Kirk Kirkpatrick said he hadn’t yet done any research on the issues but agreed that he would get input from all the stakeholders involved before a vote came before the board.

Pless said the issue had been brewing for months and that he’d like to see a more open discussion about it happen before a vote was taken. He claimed the HRC still hadn’t provided him with some informational pieces he had requested.

Commission Chairman Kevin Ensley said he did some research on harm reduction on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website and found that many of the claims people were making were not substantiated through the CDC’s reports. The CDC report, he said, stated HRC participants were five times more likely to enter treatment than others and three times as likely to report a reduction in drug injections, which lessens the spread of infections. The report also stated that syringe programs do not increase the number of discarded needles in public places and do not lead to higher rates of drug use and crime. Lastly, harm reduction measures are cost effective because they decrease health care costs in the long-term.

“I believe they are working in our community. Unfortunately, there’s a stigma out there and people want to say it’s the reason it’s happened. We’re blessed to have this program and Pathways and Ashley’s work with Kaitlynne’s House, The Share project, LEAD — they all work together. They are having success and saving lives,” Ensley said. “And if you think it’s a political problem, it’s a bipartisan issue. Needle exchange programs were allowed in 2016 under Gov. McCrory (Republican) with a superRepublican majority. Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary implemented this program to reduce infections. It’s evidence based — not my opinion and not a Democrat or liberal issue. We need to base our decisions on science and not stigma.”

Harm reduction — enabling people to change their lives

BY J ESSI STONE N EWS E DITOR

Michelle Mathis, chairwoman and interim director of the North Carolina Harm Reduction Coalition, admits the organization does enable drug users.

“We get the accusation of enabling people all the time, but I embrace the moniker of being an enabler,” she said. “I enable people to take a next positive step in their lives. I enable them to have a second, third or 15th chance at life.”

Haywood County is one of the few counties in the state that has Harm Reduction boots on the ground every day and has implemented a number of harm reduction programs in the last eight years, but there are still people in the community who believe HRC is doing more harm than good.

Michelle and Mark Blackmon disagree. If it wasn’t for the couple’s relationship with Jesse-Lee Dunlap and the HRC, they say they’d still be out on the streets doing drugs.

“A couple of years ago I almost OD’d and I went to the hospital. Jesse-Lee came and brought me information and supplies and said I could go to rehab if I wanted it,” Michelle said. “It’s hard to trust anyone new but Jesse-Lee knows how to talk to us. That’s the one person that helped us other than Officer Banks. They got on us so much we were done fighting.”

Mark said he and Officer Keith Banks with the Waynesville Police Department had a “love/hate” relationship — they didn’t really like each other but the one thing they had was respect for one another, which is why they’ve been able to communicate and work together now that Mark is working on his recovery.

“I wanted to get away from the people I was around and it got to the point where Banks told me he’d buy me a ticket to leave,” Mark joked. “I give him all the praise and glory for what he’s done.”

With tough love and support from law enforcement and HRC, the Blackmons now have a roof over their heads, they’re both in recovery, Michelle has reconnected with her children, Mark is giving back to the community and Michelle just got a new job working for the Harm Reduction Coalition in Haywood County. She’s currently in Durham for training.

As regulars in Frog Level, Mark and Michelle are well known to local law enforcement agencies and have been frequently in and out of the Haywood County Detention Center. Both of them have criminal charges pending, but they’re also trying to get their lives together again once and for all.

They’ve struggled with drugs most of their lives. Michelle said she’s been clean

for four months — it’s not the first time she’s gotten clean, but she hopes it’s the last time.

“I’ve gotten clean several times over the last 20 years, but I knew this time was different,” she said. “I quit cold turkey. I knew I could have gotten suboxone but I knew I would just shoot it up, so I went cold turkey.”

Mark grew up in and out of foster homes and then once he was 18, he dealt

work in the community. He said he helped pick up needles on several occasions and would even go visit some of the homeless encampments around town to drop off essentials because it wasn’t a safe place for Dunlap to go. To the best of their knowledge, there are at least nine encampments in the Waynesville area.

As a harm reduction worker, those are the types of things Michelle will be doing soon after her training in Durham. It will be a bit surreal to be on the other side of the issues now and being the one trying to help others, but it will also give her one more reason to stay sober.

“It’s something I've always wanted to do — to help people — and I’m at a point where I’m clean and I can do it now,” she said. “I have a lot of trust from the unhoused and addicts already, so I’m hoping that helps me in this new position.” Mark hopes to help Michelle help others any way he can. Already he’s been working with Waynesville First United Methodist Church with fundraising to help the unhoused population. He also helps cook meals for people in Frog Level and gives free haircuts to those who need one.

drugs and was in and out of prison for many years. Selling drugs led to his own addiction. He’s still working on recovery even through a recent relapse.

“But this is the first time I’ve dropped everything and been clean,” he said.

“We got together on the streets, but now we’re having to learn each other all over again,” Michelle said. “But being with him made me want to get clean — I wanted my relationship more.”

“If someone can survive all that, you can survive anything,” Mark added.

Mark and Michelle are currently living at Michelle’s mother’s home in Haywood County, and Michelle has reconnected with her three children — who are 17, 19 and 24 — and her first grandchild.

“I’ve been in and out of their lives for a long time. My mom has had them for 13 years. My youngest was 3 years old when mom got them,” Michelle recalled.

Since establishing a relationship with HRC, Michelle was encouraged to get tested for infections since she has injected drugs and shared needles in the past. She found out she has Hepatitis C and will begin a treatment soon.

“I never realized anything about it until I received the education through the Harm Reduction coalition. Jesse-Lee helped me with that and now I can get treatment,” she said.

Mark also met Dunlap through their

“My past is pretty dirty, but people have always looked up to me as a leader for some reason,” he said. “They’ve always come to us because they trust us. We can talk to them and we know where the camps are. We still go down there (Frog Level) and check on them. We give out clothes, deodorant, clothes, food, blankets. They go through a lot of those because they get dirty or stolen.”

As they are embarking on a new kind of life, the Blackmons also are setting goals for their future since Michelle now has a fulltime job with benefits.

“Our first goal is to get transportation and a bank account. Then we want to buy a piece of land — somewhere that homeless can have a place to go and set up their tents or whatever and feel safe. But there will be rules and regulations,” Mark said.

“I have a lot of family I want to help straighten up. It’s hard to see,” Michelle said. “And we want to find our own place. My parents need to have some peace and quiet and right now there’s eight of us in the house. I don’t know how they do it.”

Mark said there is so much misunderstanding in the community about substance use disorder and the unhoused. He wishes people would take more time to talk to them and understand what they've been through in their lives.

“Don’t judge the homeless people by their cover. Get to know people. Even if they are addicts, they are people and are nice. Many of them want help and don’t know how to get it,” he said.

In next week’s issue, The Smoky Mountain News will go more in depth about the history of harm reduction and its impact in the U.S.

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Sylva Sam will stay Commissioners vote to keep Confederate solider

statue, with modifications

BY HOLLY KAYS STAFF WRITER

Jackson County Commissioners voted 4-1

Aug. 4 to keep Sylva Sam in his place overlooking downtown Sylva, but according to opponents of the 105-year-old Confederate soldier statue, the fight is far from over.

“We will continue this effort, and we will continue to work to acknowledge that racism is a part of Jackson County and that it just needs to be dismantled,” said Kelly Brown, a leader in the group Reconcile Sylva, which supports relocating the statue.

Sign-bearing Reconcile Sylva members had flocked to the area before commissioners even took the final vote, placing a sign on the statue’s pedestal that read, “White Ppl Say I’m Safe.” As time wore on, statue supporters also made their way to the area, and exchanges between the two groups grew heated. Officers from the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office and Sylva Police Department arrived on the scene and asked the groups to leave the steps. That area has been roped off with police tape ever since.

“Emotions were just getting very intense, so just for everybody’s safety we blocked the steps off, blocked the grass off, so nobody gets hurt,” said Major Shannon Queen of the Jackson County Sheriff Department.

It was nearly 10:30 p.m. when Brown spoke to The Smoky Mountain News, standing by the fountain at the base of the courthouse steps with about 40 other people, many of them chanting and holding signs.

“We’re just going to occupy space and

make our voices known,” said Brown.

“I was very glad for the debate even though I’m not happy about how it turned out,” said Sylva Commissioner Greg McPherson, who stood at the fountain alongside fellow Sylva Commissioner David Nestler. “I’m happy that everybody got their words in and their sentiments. So I hope we can move forward. I’m not sure how that’s going to be, but we’re not going to stop.”

At the top of the courthouse, there were no signs or chants. The approximately 80 pro-statue community members on site at 10:30 p.m. mostly just stood around sharing reactions to the night’s events and keeping an eye on the activity below.

“I get home and get a 911 message saying, ‘They’re at the statue right now,’” said Frank Huguelet, leader of the pro-statue Jackson County Unity Coalition. “So I put a message on Facebook to the Jackson County Unity group. I said, ‘The statue’s under attack. Come on.’ And Jackson County showed up. We have people from literally every single part of Jackson County here tonight.”

While members of the group are glad the statue is going to stay, they — like the antistatue Reconcile Sylva members — expect the fight to continue.

“This is going to get worse way before it gets better,” said Unity Coalition member Chad Jones, who plans to run as a write-in candidate for the District 3 seat on the county commission this fall.

‘THIS IS A TOMBSTONE’

The commissioners’ vote came following nearly two hours of public comment, combined with countless emails, phone calls and texts from constituents. The vote was a response to a resolution the Town of Sylva

passed July 27 formally asking the county to move the statue outside city limits.

During the Aug. 4 meeting, 35 people gave public comment on the statue issue, with 19 imploring the body to leave it in place and 16 pleading with them to move it.

Many of the statue supporters cited specific family ties to the people it was erected to honor — men and women from Jackson County who lived through the Civil War, and those who died before peace was restored.

Sylva native Jacob Jones told commissioners the story of Jehu Jones, his “something or another great uncle” who fought for the Confederate Thomas Legion.

“He died in 1883 in Strawberry Plains, Tennessee, and upon hearing of his death one of his brothers rode to Tennessee, gathered up his dead brother, loaded him on the back of his horse and rode him back across the Smokies and buried him in the old field ceme-

tery in Jackson County,” said Jacob Jones.

Beth James said that to her, the monument represents the sacrifices of the women who were left to care for their families alone when the men left for war, while Nola Brown read a letter that her great-great-grandfather James Watson received from a friend while deployed.

“They wanted 130 men in Jackson County and 240 men in Macon County, and it looks like they’re taking nearly all of our men out of the country, but we must stand the storm of war to defend our country from the stubborn foe to keep them back from our soil,” the letter reads.

“This is a tombstone to me and so many other people in this country,” said Chad Jones, whose great-great-great grandfather and his son both fought in and survived the war. “If you remove that tombstone, you have just desecrated a

grave in my opinion, and to me that is something that is just borderline unforgiveable.”

Other speakers questioned the claims that Sylva struggles with racism and can be an uncomfortable place for non-white people.

Jackson County native Kitti Bradley told commissioners that she never witnessed any “infighting or racial problems” growing up in the community and that the same held true when she moved back to the area to raise her mixed-race children, including a son who has since graduated from Smoky Mountain High School.

“My son didn’t experience any racism in this community,” said Bradley. “In fact, people went the extra mile to lift him up and boost him.”

Mike Parris of Sons of Confederate Veterans reminded commissioners of the 2015 state law that in most cases forbids the removal of such monuments, promising to sue them each should they try and take it away.

The slate of pro-statue speakers also included one African-American person, Jackson County resident Kim Moore. Moore began her comments by quoting author, educator and former slave Booker T. Washington.

“There is a certain class of race problem solvers who do not want the patient to get well because as long as the disease holds out, they have not only an easy means of making a living but also an easy medium through which to make themselves prominent before the public,” she read before adding her own thoughts.

“This is what I see playing out before our eyes,” Moore said. “It’s been over 100 years, and this is still happening. What I would like to see is for it to stop.”

‘RALLYING POINT FOR HATE’

Statue opponents, meanwhile, said that Sylva Sam stands as a reminder and even an endorsement of a time when slavery was both legal and socially acceptable.

“Standing in front of the word ‘courthouse’ which is still prominently visible, that statue looms over and looks down over the town,” said Nathan Mann. “As long as it remains standing in the middle of town, it sends a clear message that Jackson County continues to honor that time and culture when all people were not free and safe.”

Racism is not a problem belonging only to the past, said people of color addressing the commissioners.

“I contribute to this community, and I am treated like a dog by people who believe that statue represents their heritage,” said Sylva resident and business owner Natalie Newman.

“The statue stands for a time when we treated the least of these — the Black and brown people in our communities — with contempt,” added Jo Shonewolf, pastor at Whittier United Methodist Church. “As long as that statue stands, we will all be chained in place by white supremacy and God will have to work miracles with us to free us.”

Lydia See offered her condolences to local families now discovering unwelcome truths about their ancestors.

“I can’t imagine how jarring and uncom-

fortable it might be for those who see themselves and their ancestors represented in Sylva Sam to learn about the unspeakable truths,” she said. “Frankly, it stinks that your ancestors were lied to. Unfortunately, the version of history that Sylva Sam represents has no business on the library steps, on Cherokee land.”

Jonathan Bost offered an economic argument for relocation, citing a 2018 Jackson County Tourism Development Authority report that found only 1 percent of tourists to the county are Black.

“This is in contrast to the 6 to 8 percent Black students at Western Carolina, the 3 and some percent in Sylva and the 2 percent in Jackson overall, and they all lag behind the national average of 13.4 percent,” said Bost. “If you relocate the statue to somewhere else in the county, you’re not only opening up downtown Sylva to new visitors. You’re also sending our old visitors and even locals to different parts of the county.”

Other speakers expressed concern about the potential for violence should the statue stay. It will become “a rallying point for hate,” said Mann.

Multiple speakers questioned the assumption that relocating the statue is impossible under state law. Reconcile Sylva leader Jessica Swinkford said that this year alone more than 20 statues have been moved in North Carolina due to public safety concerns.

“Is it impossible to relocate the statue, or an unwillingness on your part to do the thing that is admittedly a much harder thing to do?” asked Sylva resident Suzanne Saucier.

THE VOTE

The statue will remain where it is, but it won’t remain as it is. The Confederate flag etched into its base will be covered with a plaque describing Jackson County’s involvement in the Civil War, likely including a list of local troops participating. The words “Our Heroes of the Confederacy,” which appear below the flag, will be removed.

The decision was a hard one, said Commissioner Boyce Deitz.

“We’ve lost sleep over it,” he said. “We don’t want to make our friends mad one way or the other, and all of us have a duty here to make a decision. We can make it and we will. But until all of us quit fighting and start holding hands, we won’t solve any of this.”

In Chairman Brian McMahan’s original motion, the only alteration to the statue would be a plaque covering up the Confederate flag. Commissioner Gayle Woody introduced an amendment to also remove the words “Our Heroes of the Confederacy” from the base, and the amendment passed 3-2 with Woody and Deitz joining Commissioner Ron Mau in support while McMahan and Commissioner Mickey Luker voted against it.

Woody said that it would be “unethical” to “pick and choose the laws that I uphold,” so with state law as it is she couldn’t vote for relocation. With the Confederate symbols removed, the community can “repurpose” the

monument as a memorial to Jackson County veterans from all wars, not just the Civil War.

McMahan disagreed with that assessment, pointing out that the county has other monuments to honor veterans of other wars — the monument in question is solely about the Civil War, he said. Later that night, McMahan would address the Unity Coalition group at the courthouse, telling them about his great-greatgrandfather David Dills, who left his wife and infant to fight for the Confederacy only to die of disease in South Carolina.

“I just want to remember him,” McMahan told the group.

With the amendment added, commissioners voted on the overall motion. That vote came down 4-1, with Mau opposed and the remaining commissioners in favor.

“Whether the Confederate flag is or not, there are going to be people that think it symbolizes hate,” said Mau. “Are we going to let something else be put up there, whether it’s permanent or temporary, that is the total opposite of the Confederacy? I don’t even know what symbol it would be. I don’t but that’s something to consider if that element is up there. The other thing too that has come up is that it is a safety issue. It will continue to be a safety issue. It’s costing us money, both the town and the county.”

AN ONGOING ISSUE

In a follow-up interview, David Nestler, who introduced the Town of Sylva resolution,

said he was “very disappointed” with the outcome. While he doesn’t yet know what the next step will be, he does know that there will be a next step.

“I’m definitely acknowledging that it’s not over,” he said. “The vote didn’t change my mind about this statue being wrong. That’s my guiding principle here.”

The main issue — that the statue is hurtful to many community members and stands at an extremely prominent location downtown — has not changed with the commissioners’ decision, Nestler said. Reconcile Sylva has been holding daily protests since the vote. Nestler expects to see the protestors push for protest locations closer to the statue than has previously been allowed.

“They’ve been willing to compromise on protest locations because they have a good relationship with (Sylva Police Chief Chris) Hatton, and he pointed out it’s a public safety issue,” said Nestler. “You can only push that public safety argument to restrict where people protest for so long. Eventually people have the right to protest on public property where they want to protest, and I have the feeling that after this vote they’re going to push on that.”

Nestler added that he’s confused about the commissioners’ decision to alter the statue.

“It’s not the meaning of the statue that’s necessarily wrong,” he said. “It’s OK that people have this connection to ancestors that participate in a war and suffered and died for it. It’s the location that makes it controversial.”

“It’s strange after all the ‘don’t whitewash

history’ arguments, that’s kind of what the county is doing,” added Sylva Commissioner Ben Guiney.

Huguelet, meanwhile, said that the location is an important part of the statue’s meaning, especially given that the entire property is on the National Register of Historic Places.

“I think keeping it in that context is extremely important,” he said, adding that he’s not convinced the planned alterations will end up happening due to restrictions in the 2015 state law.

County Attorney Heather Baker, however, said because the monument is owned by the county, not by the state, commissioners will not need to receive approval from any higher authorities before making the planned changes.

“I feel like it shouldn’t have even been an issue, but since it didn’t get moved, am I happy? Yes. Do I see it as a win? No,” said Huguelet. “The community is divided now.”

COVID-19 deaths in western counties continue to rise

BY C ORY VAILLANCOURT STAFF W RITER

Although the seven-day rolling average of positive COVID-19 tests continues to trend downwards across the state of North Carolina, western counties are beginning to see huge upticks in both cases and deaths.

“If you have symptoms such as headache, fever, cough, shortness of breath or loss of sense of smell don’t wait, get tested,” said Haywood County Public Health Director Patrick Johnson in an Aug. 7 press release. “If your doctor isn’t providing testing, contact one of the local urgent cares. Call first for pre-emptive screening and to find out what the current protocols are for when you arrive. It’s also important to understand that anyone tested for COVID-19, even as a standard pre-operative precaution, needs to stay home and selfquarantine away from other family members as able until test results are received, and then follow instructions according to the test results.”

In that same release, county health officials reported 107 cases for the week, a new high. The prior week, 74 new cases were logged.

NCDHHS was also reporting an outbreak at a Haywood County nursing home; last week, a story in The Smoky Mountain News noted almost 40 cases at Silver Bluff Village. Several of those have now resulted in deaths, including five more in the past week alone, bringing the countywide total to 12.

Three of those deaths list COVID-19 as the underlying cause of death, while two list

It’s time to throw in a towel...

COVID-19 as the primary cause. The individuals were all over the age of 80 and most had underlying medical conditions.

“We extend our deepest sympathy to the families and loved ones,” Johnson said.

“This is a sad reminder that COVID-19 is a serious and sometimes deadly illness. We urge all citizens to do their part by observing social distancing, wear masks and practicing good hygiene.”

In congregate living settings like nursing homes, a COVID-19 outbreak is defined as two or more laboratory-confirmed cases. By that measure, NCDHHS has also logged nursing home outbreaks in Cherokee, Clay, Haywood, Jackson, Macon and Transylvania counties.

As of press time on Aug. 11, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services was reporting 435 total cases for Haywood County, along with 12 deaths. Jackson County had reported 447 cases and five deaths. Macon County reported 463 cases and two deaths. Swain County had 119 cases and two deaths.

Presenting those figures as the number of cases per 1,000 residents, Haywood had seven, Jackson had 10.3, Macon had 13.1 –highest west of Buncombe County – and Swain had 8.4.

To stay up to date on COVID-19 in Haywood County visit www.haywoodcountync.gov/684/Coronavirus-Covid-19Information or call 828.356,2019, Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. through 5 p.m. Information for other counties in North Carolina is also available at the DHHS website, www.covid19.ncdhhs.gov.

Final admin shuffle at Haywood schools

At the Aug. 10 Haywood County Schools Board of Education meeting the school board heard the last round of introductions from new members of HCS administrative staff, and those staff members moving to new positions.

Todd Barbee, previously principal at Waynesville Middle School, has become the grant coach for a $1.5 million Innovative Partnership Grant awarded to Central Haywood High School. He will be working with Central Office staff on the project.

“Thank you for placing me in a position that I really needed, for me and my family. The hardest thing I’ve done is stepping down from Waynesville Middle. My family has been neglected, my wife has been neglected. My family deserves a dad and not a principal,” Barbee said, addressing the board.

Wendy Rogers, previously principal at Hazelwood Elementary, will move to be principal of Central Haywood High School, where Rodney Mashburn has retired.

“To continue to lead with educators in a high school who is willing to serve students and help them transition from high school to the workplace or on to post-secondary experiences, that’s beyond exciting,” said Rogers.

Taking Rogers’ position at Hazelwood is Todd Trantham, previously principal at

Tuscola High School.

“I could not have asked to inherit a better situation. This staff has been so welcoming and I am excited to kick things off,” Trantham said.

Joining Trantham at Hazelwood Elementary School as the new assistant principal is Bridget Brooks, a Haywood County native, returning from employment in Jackson County.

“It is an honor to serve the students, families, faculty and staff, and the community members of Hazelwood. This is coming home for me and I am tremendously grateful, and it would not be possible without your support,” said Brooks.

Heather Blackmen will be the new principal at Tuscola High School. Billy Harrell, a teacher most recently from Buncombe County with a background in high school math, will fill the assistant principal position at Tuscola.

“I am especially thankful to Mrs. Blackmon for giving me this opportunity to advance my career and be an assistant principal. I am very excited to be moving over to Haywood County and to be a Mountaineer,” said Harrell.

Other changes not presented at the meeting include Graham Haynes, previously assistant principal at Tuscola, who will move into the role of Waynesville Middle School principal and Casey Kruk, previously assistant principal at Pisgah, who will fill the role of Canton Middle School principal.

— By Hannah McLeod

Bowling receives Chief Junaluska Award

Long-time Lake Junaluska supporter the Rev. Dr. Robert “Bob” C. Bowling is the 2020 recipient of the Chief Junaluska Award, an honor bestowed annually during Associates Weekend at Lake Junaluska.

The award honors outstanding service, community involvement and financial support of Lake Junaluska.

Mississippi native Bowling, a retired United Methodist pastor and district superintendent, first visited Lake Junaluska as a teenager. The 17year-old youth director at Hattiesburg’s Court Street United Methodist Church, he was asked by the pastor’s wife to drive her and six young women to Youth Week at the Lake.

Years later, Bowling introduced his wife, Robin, to Lake Junaluska on their first wedding anniversary. They returned every year and eventually made it their second home before retiring to Georgia to be closer to family. The couple’s three children spent summers working at the Lake.

Bowling served the North Georgia United Methodist Conference for 40 years and received The Foundation for Evangelism’s Harry Denman Evangelism Award in 2005. One example of his advocacy involves the campground at a time when its future was in doubt. Bowling worked to keep it open to accommodate the many young people who could only afford to visit the lake if they could camp there. Rev. Dr. Robert ‘Bob’ C. Bowling and Robin Bowling. Donated photo

WCU offers emotional intelligence class

with addressing unmet needs of individuals with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities in the western counties.

n Meridian Behavioral Health: $50,000 in continuation funding to support an integrated care pilot program at the Cherokee Health Department; $37,000 to provide crisis intervention services for students in Haywood, Jackson and Macon counties; $39,000 for continued support of the patient assistance program; $50,000 to support the Assertive Community Treatment program; $5,000 to purchase therapeutic training materials and $15,000 in bridge funds to support the Domestic Violence Offender program.

n Eliada Homes: $56,000 to develop and train additional foster care and therapeutic foster care families.

n Haywood Pathways Center: $15,000 toward funding case management services.

n RENEW Bryson City: $2,000 to support the Recovery Rally in Swain County.

n 30th Judicial District DV-SA Alliance: $1,200 to assist with costs of setting up an MDMA Assisted Therapy Clinic for individuals with PTSD.

n Teen Challenge of the Smokies: $3,500 in funding to provide internships for their youth training program.

the North Carolina Harm Reduction Coalition and others to provide emergency shelter during the COVID-19 pandemic to high-risk individuals and families.

n Center for Domestic Peace: $10,000 in bridge funding to support victims of domestic violence in Jackson County.

Applications from not-for-profit organizations are accepted on a rolling basis, with the next award cycle in September. Grant proposals are due by 5 p.m. Aug. 21.

Visit www.evergreenfoundationnc.org.

Haywood foundation awards grants

Western Carolina University’s Office of Professional Growth and Enrichment will be offering an Emotional Intelligence workshop from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 28, online via Zoom.

The workshop will be taught by Betty Farmer, award-winning professor of communication at WCU and owner of Farmer Communications. High EQ in the workplace is essential. Research confirms that individuals who are higher in EQ are more likely to be successful and advance in their careers.

Registration fee for this workshop will be $139. For more information, visit pdp.wcu.edu and click on “For-profit and Nonprofit Professional Development Workshops.”

Grace Church receives $10,000 grant

Resourceful Communities, a program of The Conservation Fund, awarded $10,000 to Grace Church to meet emergent physical and mental health needs of unsheltered people in Haywood County.

Grace Church has been one of the Haywood County churches collaborating with the Open Door,

Resourceful Communities supports rural community organizations that work at the intersection of conservation, social justice and economic wellbeing. Grace Church’s Giving Garden had participated in one of their programs and was eligible to apply.

The grant includes funding for mobile mentalhealth and tele-health services through the purchase of Wi-Fi tablets for caseworkers to connect clients virtually with online health-care providers. Additionally, the grant will support food purchases for those in need served by Open Door and Pathways — $5,000 will go toward extending the motel stays for the previously unsheltered individuals.

Evergreen Foundation awards $300,000

The Evergreen Foundation board of directors recently awarded $300,000 in first quarter funding to eight agencies providing programs and services for individuals with behavioral health, substance use and intellectual/developmental disabilities. Grants were awarded: n Blue Ridge First in Families: $5,000 to assist

Partnership to provide books for the client to read to their children, toys to help the mother work with the child to promote developmental skills, purchase car seats, pack and plays, and diapers. n Haywood Christian Ministry to support a coaching program that gives clients goals and timelines to accomplish as they work toward becoming selfsustaining.

Visit www.haywoodhealthcarefoundation.org or call 828.452.8343.

Community Foundation awards scholarships

The Community Foundation of Western North Carolina recently approved scholarships totaling $510,250 to 94 WNC students in 57 schools in 21 counties. More than 60 volunteers from the community worked to review applications and select recipients, some through Zoom meetings and online interviews.

Ashley Alvarez of Blue Ridge School, Camren Dalton of Highland School, Shawn Byfield and Sydney Rice of Smoky Mountain High School, and homeschooled student Sophie Biaso were awarded. Scholarship endowments can have broad eligibility criteria or can be focused on a particular school or county, offered to students pursuing a degree in a stated field or available to those who will attend a designated college or university.

Learn more at www.cfwnc.org.

Haywood ministry celebrates 50 years

The Haywood Healthcare Foundation Board of Trustees recently awarded $179,800 in grants to 10 agencies for health care needs in Haywood County.

n KARE, Inc. — to support vital needs for programs that KARE provides to the community include victim services, parenting education, safety outreach programs provided to school age children.

n Haywood County Health and Human Services Agency to provide critical dental care to indigent patients.

n The EACH Initiative, Inc. to provide mental health counseling to adults and children in the EACH Program (Ending Area Child Homelessness).

n Haywood Pathways Center to support one-full time family case manager.

n Haywood Regional Medical Center Nurse Navigator Program to provide gas cards to needy patients.

n Autism Society of North Carolina to provide a “Resource Library” so families can request autism resources, at no cost.

n REACH of Haywood County to provide healthy snacks to seventh and eighth graders who are taught the “Safe Dates” Program.

n Blue Ridge Health – Haywood to provide essential medical services for uninsured and underinsured residents.

n Southwestern Child Development Nurse Family

Haywood Christian Ministry is celebrating 50 years of serving the community. Funding HCM is truly a cooperative venture with direct financial resources provided through local churches, businesses, civic organizations, individual donors, fundraising events, estate donations, memorials, and grants. Since 1970, Haywood Christian Ministry has been a sustaining resource organization striving to improve the health, well-being, safety, and spiritual development for residents of Haywood County.

During 2019, HCM served about 25 percent of the Haywood County population, addressing the ever-growing poverty needs of our county, helping to spiritually and physically transform lives in the name of Christ. Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, HCM ceased routine services and became an authorized food pantry for FEMA and Manna Foods. From March through June, food was provided to a total of 26,726 people and 7,869 cars and 254 buses came for food pick-up. HCM also earned the designation of the No. 1 food distributor in Western North Carolina.

HCM has canceled this year’s Annual Charitable Golf Classic and Gala Dinner, but continued support is vital to the organization’s efforts to meet the crisis and daily needs of the less fortunate. For golfers who regularly play in the tournament, HCM is asking a donation of $150, the normal tournament fee. In exchange, donors will receive a non-transferable gift certificate for a round of golf at Laurel Ridge Country Club or Waynesville Inn Golf Resort.

WCU ready for these unprecedented times

These are uncertain and challenging times. Our communities, our state and our nation are grappling with an unprecedented set of issues that affect each and every one of us.

As chancellor of Western Carolina University, I believe that institutions of higher education can help prepare our citizens to live through times like these — how to cope, how to manage and perhaps not just survive, but thrive.

On campus in Cullowhee, we begin fall semester 2020 against a backdrop of conflicting emotions. We look forward with enthusiasm and optimism in welcoming students back to campus to begin their studies Monday, Aug. 17. And yes, in these unprecedented times, we also are feeling cautious and reserved as we work diligently to fulfill our mission and protect the well-being of our communities both on and off campus.

A historic pandemic has brought us to this time and this place, which means taking precautions and acting responsibly. Our decisions about this semester are based on science and data, with guidance from local and state agencies, the governor and the University of North Carolina System. Instruction this fall will be a blend of traditional classes, online instruction and hybrid course delivery.

There will be no fall break, and all final exam week activities will be conducted online or via other alternative formats. Dining halls will have limited seating and provide take-out meals. No outside visitors will be allowed in residence halls and only one guest will be allowed in a residence hall room at a time. Classroom and lab space have been reevaluated, with space between occupants increased and capacity decreased. Incredibly, our diligent staff and faculty have rearranged more than 3,000 pieces of furniture to make this happen.

U.S. Postmaster needs to be fired

To the Editor:

I can’t begin to understand the actions of the new Postmaster of the United States Postal Service as he seriously undermines the operation of one of the oldest and most revered institutions in the U.S. Government for reasons that, to me, appear to be nothing more than a personal tiff between the President and the owner of Amazon, Jeff Bezos.

I have no dog in their fight, but this administration’s insistence on hurting the USPS with intentional mail delivery delays because of a personal vendetta is hurting me and hurting my neighbors. Please consider calling our US Senate representatives daily and objecting to this disgraceful abuse of power that is crippling communication throughout the country using the example below:

Dear Sen. Richard Burr (202.224.3154) and Sen. Thom Tillis (202.224.6342).

I will be calling every day until you and your colleagues have publicly fired Louis DeJoy from his post as the postmaster of the United States Postal Service for malfeasance in office. His intentional and malicious delay of the United States mail has already significantly impacted your constituents in Western

North Carolina remains under Phase 2 restrictions for COVID-19, with advisements for social distancing, frequent hand-washing, avoiding crowds and wearing proper face coverings. Public health is a shared responsibility — and it is one that we take seriously. A total of 15 multi-disciplinary campus committees examined and made recommendations for the start of WCU’s fall semester.

Already, WCU has launched a “Catamounts Care” campaign to assist with acclimating our community to our new normal as we resume campus residential operations. Bags with six reusable cloth face coverings, a large container of sanitizing wipes, a refillable bottle of hand sanitizer, a thermometer and a copy of our expected community standards are being distributed. Our University Health Services has developed protocols, in consultation with the Jackson County Department of Public Health, for diagnostic COVID-19 testing and contact tracing. We have established comfortable living quarters for on-campus student residents to quarantine, should the need arise.

We are providing weekly updates on our fall plans to the campus community and we share those with our community partners, such as Jackson County Public Schools, the Jackson County Manager, Harris Regional Hospital, Southwestern Community College and others. Local media outlets, including The Smoky Mountain News, have played a crucial role in dissemination of factual news and information to the public.

Yet, in light of all our preparation, we also are aware that

LETTERS

North Carolina since the U.S. mail is often the only communication choice for people here in this internet-compromised area. As a wealthy senator, you do not suffer the financial consequence of late payments not of your doing, but the people here are monetarily penalized and are suffering for it. Many critical medications are delivered by USPS here and delay hurts those needing the medication and many times actually affects the efficacy of the medication. Please fire this despicable person immediately before he destroys a service that 90 percent of the citizens of this country favor and, until now, depend on for reliable communication. Thank you.

Roy B. Osborn Cullowhee

Cawthorn doesn’t deserve youth vote

To the Editor: Madison Cawthorn, newly 25 and a GOP candidate for the 11th Congressional District, may be a young voter himself, but he certainly won’t be earning the youth vote this November.

As the WNC Regional Organizing Director for NextGen North Carolina, I’m working with a team of organizers to run the largest

situations can change. If the past months have taught us anything, it is that any response to COVID-19 requires a high level of flexibility and patience. The well-being of students, faculty and staff, and our off-campus neighbors is — and always will be — a primary concern. WCU will take the necessary steps to maintain health and wellness as needed and adjust as circumstances dictate. But we cannot do this alone. Our community partners are essential allies in ensuring that we successfully navigate these unprecedented times.

Throughout this pandemic, WCU has continued to deliver its mission with quality and excellence. I am proud that the pandemic has not stopped the “Catamount Community.” We have continued to teach classes in alternative formats, conduct outreach to our region and state, produce top notch research and, through some really creative and innovative thinking, we have offered the arts and cultural activities for which WCU is known. If anything, there has been a collective, robust and vigorous response here to maintaining vibrancy in spite of COVID-19.

WCU has a mission — a duty — to provide learning opportunities that incorporate teaching, research, service and engagement. We will not abandon that mission even in these challenging times. We will prepare students to be their best as health care providers, teachers, engineers, scientists, musicians and artists, and many other careers. We will prepare leaders to meet the needs of the future in whatever form that may take.

Western Carolina University is ready for the challenges ahead. Together we can honor our promise to our students, our faculty and staff, and our communities.

(Kelli R. Brown is chancellor of Western Carolina University.)

youth voter registration program in the state. A Gen Z’er myself, I love to see my peers voting, getting involved with politics, and running for office — and yet I couldn’t be more excited to cast my ballot for 62-year-old Moe Davis for Congress.

While Cawthorn has been spending his time on the campaign trail making divisive, racist comments and rebuffing CDC guidelines by hosting maskless gatherings, Davis has shown that he’ll make real progress on the issues that young voters care about. He is committed to expanding affordable healthcare access, protecting our environment with a Green New Deal, and raising the minimum wage to $15 — and he has the plans to back it up.

Cawthorn’s scant website doesn’t tell us much about what he stands for or what he’ll do about it, other than he’s got a bone to pick with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the youngest woman elected to Congress and a leader whom I personally look up to. This November, young voters in NC-11 will make sure he doesn’t join her impressive ranks as the youngest man in the House.

Trump trying to end your benefits

To the Editor:

Got Social Security? Got a back-up plan for living without it? Payroll taxes fund Social Security.

Trump, manipulated by right-wing extremist-anarchists trying to destroy Social Security for decades, just issued an “executive action” to “suspend” (kill) the payroll tax.

I’ve paid into it since my first job in high school. Everyone reading this who has ever worked has, too.

Want to save your hard-earned

A strange back-to-school season for everyone

From my earliest memories, the backto-school season has been a flurry of excitement. Both my parents were teachers. I worked in the field for 10 years and have two children who have been in the public education system for seven years. Shopping for new outfits and backpacks, anxiously awaiting supply lists and taking last minute summer trips have been a part of my life forever.

But, not this year.

In 2020, students, parents, teachers, politicians and community members are all fumbling around, trying to navigate this bizarre time in history. Several weeks ago when Gov. Cooper announced plan B, I was hoping Haywood County would opt for a hybrid model where my boys would do virtual learning part of the time and in-person learning the other part of the time.

This was my desire because it’s what my boys need and want. They yearn for normalcy, to see their friends, connect with teachers and coaches and bee-bop down a hallway laughing and catching up. All kids need the vibe of a school atmosphere.

After some thought, my mind shifted. While I would love for my children to have any sense of normalcy right now, it’s hard to figure out what’s safe and what’s not. In states that have gone back to in-person learning, things aren’t going very well. Granted, it’s unclear if that’s because school systems are being too lax with COVID guidelines or because the virus is truly too dangerous to chance traditional learning.

Right now I don’t know what I think. My mind feels simultaneously empty and clogged, like it can’t form a solid opinion on the matter. Damned if we do, damned if we don’t.

As a parent, the hardest part is continually looking my children in the eyes when they ask what’s happening and having to say I don’t know. It’s strange to not reassure them everything will be OK and life will eventually go back to normal. It’s starting to feel like nothing will ever feel normal again. I’m in the throes of significant COVID fatigue, trying to grasp for any semblance of optimism, despite the dark cloud hanging over the entire globe.

I’m not a person who is easily defeated. Even though school will look strange this year, I’m trying to stay positive for my boys.

My older son starts middle school and my younger starts third grade. When they received their schedules and saw the names of their teacher(s) and which friends they have in their classes, they both became elated. In their minds, they envisioned the school year as it’s always been. I have to keep telling them, “Let’s stay hopeful that you go back at some point this year when things feel safer.”

Next Monday, Aug. 17, is the first day of “school.” Even though we’ll be at home watching teachers on a computer, I’m going to wake the boys up at a decent time, cook a healthy breakfast and have them put on nice outfits as if they were going to an actual building with legit human teachers and students. They will hold signs in the front yard that say “First Day of 6th Grade” and “First Day of 3rd Grade.” They may even wear masks as a sign of the times. At some point in the future, I pray we look back on those pictures and think how far we’ve come from the days of the coronavirus. That we can shake our heads in disbelief and say, “Wow, I can’t believe we experienced a pandemic.”

When I watch the news or look around, the world feels heavy with worry, disease and division. In an effort to not slip into a dark space, I’m trying to find a silver lining. Remember the early days of the coronavirus when the shelter in place orders forced us slow down, reconnect with loved ones and enjoy the simple things in life? I’m trying to circle back around to that.

There are a million quotes and quips encouraging people to live for the moment and not worry about what’s to come. One of my favorites from Albert Einstein says, “The best preparation for the future is to live as if there were none.” In a way it sounds morbid, but in another way it sounds practical and relevant.

There is a possibility students won’t go back to school at all this year. They may not play a single sport. There may be no school programs or dances or concerts. We may be virtually learning for all 180 days.

My new perspective is to see the future as water. It could sit calmly and do what we anticipate, or a surprise storm could arrive and produce damaging floods. I may dip my toe in the water. I will watch the water cautiously. I will enjoy the water today for what it offers, but I put no expectation in what the water will do tomorrow.

(Susanna Shetley is a writer, editor and digital media specialist for The Smoky Mountain News, Smoky Mountain Living and Mountain South Media. sussanna.b@smokymountainnews.com)

retirement? Call your Republican senators and Trump enablers Sen. Richard Burr and Sen. Thom Tillis to tell them you oppose stealing your retirement by Trump’s sneaky destruction of payroll taxes: Burr’s Washington office number is 202.224.3154 or his Winston-Salem office is 800.685.8916. Tillis’ Washington office is 202.224.6342. Mary Curry Haywood County

Your trusted source for books, periodicals, gifts, maps, and more. In downtown Sylva since 1985.

3 EAST JACKSON STREET • SYLVA 828/586-9499 • citylightsnc.com

Ingles Nutrition Notes

written by Ingles Dietitian Leah McGrath

FINDING LOCAL AT INGLES MARKETS

What does "local" mean to you? Often when people talk about buying food and beverages one of the top of mind preferences is to support locally grown/made/produced products. Unlike other terms like "certified organic"; local has no legal definition and so it may mean different things to different people.

For some "local" is a geographic designation... from their state, county, region or even within a certain distance (e.g. 100 miles). Some may also attribute local products to being family owned or smaller in size. Others may also think that in order to buy local food products you have to shop at a farm stand, a farmer's market or a tailgate market.

Fortunately at Ingles we offer a variety of locally made, crafted, grown and produced products throughout the store:

Produce in season produce grown in NC, SC, TN and GA. NC kombucha, NC sprouts, NC meat alternatives from No Evil foods and Smiling Hara

Meat/Seafood meat from local (NC) farms, sausage from businesses in NC, SC, TN and GA, NC wild caught shrimp and NC farm-raised (aquaculture) trout

Dairy Laura Lynn milk comes primarily from dairy farms within 150 miles of Asheville, NC

Breads Many of our stores sell local breads from nearby artisan bakeries like Annie's Breads and City Bakery

In addition we have a variety of NC products from companies of different sizes from large and well-known companies like Mt Olive Pickles to smaller businesses like Firewalker Hot Sauce, Sunshine Sammies Ice Cream

Sandwiches and Mimi's Mountain Mixes.

Be sure to look for the LOCAL display when you shop your Ingles Market.

Between midnight and the dawn

Graham Sharp of Steep Canyon Rangers

BY GARRET K. WOODWARD STAFF W RITER

Celebrating two decades together this year, the Steep Canyon Rangers have evolved from a group of budding musicians in a college dorm room at UNC Chapel Hill into one of the marquee string acts in the country.

Proud residents of Brevard and Asheville, the sextet have become cultural ambassadors for Western North Carolina and greater Southern Appalachia. Along the way, the band has not only topped the Billboard charts with hit albums and singles, they’ve also garnered a Grammy and awards from the International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA), including “Entertainer of the Year” (2011) alongside the group’s longtime collaborator, the great Steve Martin.

And yet, accolades and recognitions aside, what really matters to the Rangers is being able to connect, whether it be with a friend, neighbor or stranger alike. It’s about taking the power and magic of live music and using it as a force for positive, tangible change. It isn’t wishful thinking. More so, it’s finding common ground through the universal language, where barriers get broken down and hands are used to help instead of pointing fingers.

For Rangers singer/banjoist Graham Sharp, the current state of affairs — at home and abroad — has brought a lot of things full circle in not only his life, but also in what he chooses to radiate back out into the world through the simple melodic vibration of wire and wood.

Smoky Mountain News: How have you been dealing with the pandemic and shutdown of the music industry, personally and professionally?

Graham Sharp: I’ve literally never been home for this long of a stretch of time since college. You know, it’s taken some adjustment, but it’s been good. I feel this long period of kind of exhaling a little bit, trying to catch my breath, and that’s been really good creatively. And getting in a rhythm with the family and stuff like that. It’s so weird to say right now with how shitty the world is, but with these parts of it, I feel really grateful for it.

SMN: Well, whether consciously or subconsciously, we’re all trying to find silver linings in “this,” whether they appear or not. We know that they’re out there, and they’ve been revealing themselves during this time.

GS: Yes. And this has probably been the case for a lot of people, just thinking through your priorities a little more. I was talking to [my friend] yesterday. We were writing and sit-

“Seeing things through a different lens for a little while is probably good for a lot of people in a lot of ways, you know?”

— Graham Sharp, Steep Canyon Rangers

ting together, just talking about the whole urge to make everything bigger and bigger and more and more, and how that can be kind of distracting from what’s really important in what you’re doing. Seeing things through a different lens for a little while is probably good for a lot of people in a lot of ways, you know?

SMN: The Rangers are a heavy touring band. Has this current reality justified or repurposed what it is you love about music?

GS: We just got back together the other day for our first rehearsal. So, I don’t know if I felt myself approaching the music with the band differently than I remember approaching it four months ago. You know, it’s interesting, for as much music as I’ve been making — by myself and in isolation — when I got back

together with the group, I felt more than anything that I wanted to just settle into the group, to keep time with a group of people, to not stand out and play flashy solos — to be at its most basic, to be part of the music.

SMN: It’s the idea of being present and appreciating the fact that you’re in that realm.

GS: Yeah, exactly. Just being at the very root part of that creation and focusing on the most basic elements of it — keeping time and keeping tone. With having all that time away, I’m looking forward to what that brings to the band.

Want to go?

SMN: With the Rangers album, “Arm in Arm,” coming out in October, the recordings and the title were decided before the pandemic. What does that title mean to you when you apply it where we are in August 2020?

GS: Maybe it’s idealistic merging on foolish. But, I think that’s what music is here for — to throw out possibilities. Like when John Lennon was singing, “imagine all the people.” Sure, he was singing it to a broken, angry world in a broken, angry moment. But, that’s even more reason to get out and say it.

The Steep Canyon Rangers will host its “Drive-In Tour” on Aug. 27 (Brevard), Aug. 28 (Mills River) and Aug. 29 (Burnsville).

Social distancing protocol will be in place to ensure safety. Attendees can enjoy the show from their cars. Live music will be performed onstage, broadcasted in real time on a big screen, and transmitted through a short-range radio station.

The performances are free and open to the public. But, to attend, you must RSVP your vehicle by visiting www.steepcanyon.com and clicking on the “Tour” tab. Donations will be accepted for the Can’d Aid organization, which will gift the funds to the TUNES program that provides musical instruments and education to underserved youth.

As well, Wicked Weed Brewing will donate $10 for every copy of the Rangers’ upcoming “Arm in Arm” album sold through the Yep Roc Store (up to 2,000 albums). Proceeds will go to the Haywood Street Welcome Table, an Asheville nonprofit providing quality dining for those living on the streets. For more information, visit www.yeproc.com.

This must be the place

BY GARRET K. WOODWARD

Wake now, discover that you are the

song that the morning brings

On Aug. 9, 1995, I was 10 years old and living in an old farmhouse on the Canadian Border of Upstate New York.

With my entry into fifth grade just around the corner, I was starting to wind down another curious and carefree North Country summer of swimming, bike riding and backyard shenanigans.

At some point that afternoon, I remember my mother coming into my bedroom and telling me the news: “Jerry Garcia died today.” Lead singer and guitarist for The Grateful Dead, Garcia had finally succumbed to his longtime health issues to pass away at just 53.

I was stunned and saddened, this thought that it couldn’t be true, seeing as I was hoping to finally see the Dead live next summer when they would once again roll through the northeast. Even at 10, I was already deep down the rabbit hole that is the music and culture of the Dead.

The summer before (1994), I was at a family barbecue at my grandparents’ camp on Lake Champlain. Back then, my Aunt Chrissy was dating Al (or “Uncle Al” to me). He worked on the border with my dad and was a huge old-school Dead Head. At the barbecue, he sported this hat with the initials “GD” embroidered on the front, a small teddy bear on the back.

“What does your hat mean?” I asked Al. “It’s the Dead. Have you ever listened to them?” “Nope.” He directed me to his car nearby and turned on the stereo. Soon, the swirling, soothing sounds of “Fire On The Mountain” echoed out of the old Volkswagen Jetta. For some cosmic, serendipitous reason, the tone and feeling just pulled me in — I wanted to hear more.

A few days later, at the now-defunct Ames Department Store, I headed over to

the music section and saw the Dead’s “Skeletons From The Closet” album in the CD section. The cover art was wild, so much so I wondered if my mom would even buy it for me seeing as there was a skeleton smoking a joint plastered across the front. But, she did.

Throwing the album onto my small bedroom stereo, “The Golden Road (To Unlimited Devotion)” erupted out of the speakers. I’d never heard anything like the Dead. It was joyous and mysterious, rollicking and adventurous, welcoming and nurturing. I was a kid, but I felt such a genuine kinship and emotional attachment to the sounds filling my ears. In hindsight, what a song title to kick off the eternal quest that is being a Dead Head, eh?

From there, it was asking for Dead Tshirts for Christmas and my birthday (of which my Catholic school nuns were none the wiser of what I was wearing into the classroom). It was picking up any and all Dead albums that I didn’t own whenever I had some allowance money or when Aunt Chrissy and Al wanted to encourage my love of the Dead by playing some of the band’s live performances when I would visit.

After Jerry died, it sparked this trajectory of my life and aspirations that I’m still riding on to this very day. The music of The Grateful Dead taught me compassion and understanding of others. It exposed me to the lore of the open road and what it means to wake up in the morning and head out the door in search of adventure, whether near or far. When you listen to the Dead, you begin to understand not only the endless possibilities of the universe, but also of yourself and your place in it.

Oh, and the friendships. The countless soul brothers and sisters I’ve crossed paths with that now are beloved fixtures in the landscape of my existence, all coming together from a common love and lifestyle that was, and still is, championed by the Dead and its followers. Simply put, when you meet a Dead Head, you already know

they are inherently a good soul, one of the highest vibrations of love and light.

And now? Exactly 25 years ago Jerry left us, where I’m still discovering things I adore and admire about the Dead. I’m still wandering and pondering this wide, wondrous world, happily interacting with folks from all walks of life and never once losing my childlike wonder of anything that catch my eye — isn’t that what “it’s” all about anyhow?

At age 35, I’ve crisscrossed the country not only in search of new horizons, but also chasing down the next Dead show (in whatever form the band has taken on over the years) — from Maine to California,

Michigan to Tennessee, and seemingly everywhere in-between. With the Dead, it’s about connecting with that next experience, which, like clockwork, fills up your spiritual tank to once again enter society with an overflowing sense of gratitude.

It’s been a quarter-century since we lost you, Jerry. But, your legacy and that of the music itself is stronger than ever — this message of hope and connectivity that’s seemingly at a premium these days when one gazes out the window. And to you reading this right now, throw on some “Eyes of the World” (Hartford, 10/14/1983) and just let the music play.

Life is beautiful, grasp for it, y’all.

On the street

Open call for artist grants

Artists in all disciplines are eligible to apply for grants to support their professional and artistic development through a partnership of the North Carolina Arts Council and Cowee School Arts & Heritage Center.

Artist Support Grants will be distributed to eligible applicants by Cowee School Arts & Heritage Center in the following counties: Cherokee, Clay, Graham, Jackson, Macon, Swain, and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.

Applications for the grants are available at www.coweeschool.org. The deadline is Sept. 30. Grants will range in awards from $500 to $1,000.

Emerging or established artists are encouraged to apply to support a range of professional and artistic development including the creation of work, improvement of business operations, or expanding capacity to bring work to new audiences. Artist fees are also allowable expenses. Artists in all disciplines are eligible to apply.

Informational online workshops with the N.C. Arts Council will be held via Zoom at 6 p.m. Monday, Aug. 17, and at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 19. To learn more, visit www.coweeschool.org/nc-arts-council.

Artist grants now available

Artists in all disciplines are eligible to apply for grants to support their professional and artistic development through a partnership of the North Carolina Arts Council and Asheville Area Arts Council, Haywood County Arts Council, Arts Council of Henderson County, Tryon Fine Arts Center, Rutherford County Recreation, Cultural,

and Heritage Commission, and the Transylvania Community Arts Council.

Artist Support Grants will be distributed to eligible applicants by Haywood County Arts Council in the following counties: Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson, Polk, Rutherford and Transylvania.

Applications for the grants are available www.haywoodarts.org/grants-funding. The deadline is Sept. 30. Grants will range in awards from $500 to $1,000.

Emerging or established artists are encouraged to apply to support a range of professional and artistic development including the creation of work, improvement of business operations, or expanding capacity to bring work to new audiences. Artist fees are also allowable expenses.

For information, visit www.haywoodarts.org or call 828.452.0593.

Cashiers Designer Showhouse

The annual Cashiers Designer Showhouse will run through Sept. 5 at 144 Cove Drive in Highlands.

Interior designers representing the Southeastern region will not only bring trending design to Cashiers, but will again create the magic that is the Cashiers Designer Showhouse.

Leading area landscapers are involved in redefining the areas surrounding the home and in turn creating serene and evocative late summer mountain gardens for showhouse strolling.

Throughout the week, showhouse attendees will admire the work of the talented designers; enjoy a variety of workshops, book signings and panel discussions from beloved creatives across the country.

Admission is $30. For more information, visit www.cashiershistoricalsociety.org/ showhouse.

‘Kids at HART’ online classes

Part of the Haywood Arts Regional Theatre in Waynesville, the Kids at HART program will offer classes in acting, directing and musical theatre dance.

Registration is currently underway. Classes will run Sept. 14 through Nov. 16. In November, HART will hold registration for spring classes.

Classes will begin virtually via Zoom and will transfer to the theatre as soon as it is deemed safe to return to face-to-face instruction. Classes have a minimum number, so tell your friends.

To register, visit www.harttheatre.org or visit the Kids at HART Facebook page. If you need further information, email Kids at HART at kidsathartwvl@gmail.com.

Haywood Arts annual meeting

The Haywood County Arts Council will hold its annual meeting at 5 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 20, online utilizing Zoom.

Attendees will be asked to complete a survey, so that the organization may have the necessary feedback for planning of the upcoming year’s activities. The annual meeting will also celebrate the 2019-2020 successes and kickoff the new fiscal year’s initiatives. The meeting is open to the public and an RSVP is required. Please RSVP by emailing director@haywoodarts.org or by calling 828.452.0593 to provide your email address.

Shelton House receives grant

Located in Waynesville, The Shelton House has received a $7,154 NC CARES Humanities Relief Grant from the North Carolina Humanities Council.

This emergency grant funding was provided to North Carolina cultural organizations experiencing hardships due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We are grateful to be one of 59 organizations the North Carolina Humanities Council selected for this funding,” said Dannehl Strautz, museum director of The Shelton House.

Sarah Jane League, Shelton House board chair noted that this important funding will support the employment of two Shelton House employees enabling The Shelton House to continue with operations and support the “Blue Ridge Heritage: Weekend Arts and Crafts Fair” scheduled for Aug. 22-23, as well as the continued preservation of the historic home and collection.

• Frog Level Brewing (Waynesville) will host Tyson Leamon 6:30 p.m. Aug. 29. Free and open to the public. www.froglevelbrewing.com.

• Lazy Hiker Brewing (Franklin) will host Tennessee Champagne 1 p.m. Aug. 22 and Silas Reed 7 p.m. Aug. 28. www.lazyhikerbrewing.com.

• Nantahala Brewing (Sylva) will host semiregular live music on the weekends. Free and open to the public. www.nantahalabrewing.com.

• The Haywood County Arts Council “Artist Member Show” will be held through Aug. 29 at the HCAC Gallery & Gifts showroom in Waynesville. Featuring 42 artists, the show is a celebration of our community, allowing locals to share their great work at the height of the summer season. www.haywoodarts.org.

The NC CARES Humanities Relief Grant funding was provided to the North Carolina Humanities Council by the National Endowment for the Humanities through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act passed by Congress in late March.

The $2.2 trillion CARES package included $75 million for the National Endowment for the Humanities, nearly $30 million, or a total of 40 percent, of which was sent to the 56 state and jurisdictional humanities councils, including the North Carolina Humanities Council, to distribute to local cultural nonprofits and programming.

The North Carolina Humanities Council www.nchumanities.org is a statewide nonprofit and affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

For more information on The Shelton House, go to www.sheltonhouse.org.

• The “Haywood County Medical Exhibit: 1870-1950” will be held at The Shelton House in Waynesville. The showcase will run through October. Admission is $7 adults. $5 students. Children ages 5 and under free. Admission includes Shelton House. 828.452.1551 or www.sheltonhouse.org.

• The Great Blue Farms Brunch & Blooms will be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturdays through Sept. 12 at 1101 Briartown Church Road in Nantahala/Topton. Admission is $75, which includes a tour, brunch, all flowers, supplies and container to take home your floral masterpiece. To register, visit www.greatbluefarms.com or call 828.508.1502.

• There will be a free wine tasting from 2 to 5 p.m every Saturday at The Wine Bar & Cellar in Sylva. 828.631.3075.

Two for the price of one

When I find an author I like, I usually get on a roll reading several of their books. Such was and has been the case with Sue Monk Kidd. I started off with her most recent novel The Book of Longings, then went to the Jackson County Public Library in Sylva and borrowed a copy of The Mermaid Chair, another novel. Still wanting more, I branched out into some of her nonfiction as I wanted to get into the author’s head. To do this, I went to the library again and read the book she wrote with her daughter, Ann Kidd Taylor, titled Traveling With Pomegranates. Having already reviewed The Book of Longings in this paper, in this review I’m going to try and flush out two birds with one drone.

author for these two middle-aged lovebirds.

Meanwhile, and while traveling with pomegranates (which is a Greek fruit delicacy and used here as a metaphor for the goddess of harvest and fertility — Persephone — while at the same time being the goddess of the underworld and a lovely girl attracting the attention of many gods), both moth-

Both books deal with the primary subject of mother-daughter relationships, but in very different contexts and environments. The Mermaid Chair is set for the most part in the present day on an imaginary island (Egret Island) off the coast of Charleston, South Carolina, that is inhabited by the Gullah people. Traveling With Pomegranates is really a travel memoir which takes the reader to such distant countries and cultures as France (several locations), Greece (Athens, Delphi, Eleusis, Crete) and Turkey (Ephesus, Patmos). In The Mermaid Chair, Kidd is dealing with an aging mother who is in a state of depression bordering on mental illness. In Traveling With Pomegranates, the mother is trying to understand herself as well as to assist her daughter who is going through the gauntlet of becoming a full-fledged and independent woman. In both books and in both cases, surrounding circumstances play a major role in the unveiling of the mother-daughter theme.

Off the Atlantic coast of Charleston, Jessie has come to stay with her mother who had been the cook for a local Catholic monastery and where she meets Brother Thomas and where the “mermaid chair” is a mythic cultural tradition and a kind of Gullah Mardi Gras. In this environment and while taking over some of the duties at the St. Senara Abbey for her mother, Jessie’s attraction to Brother Thomas grows, as does his for her. Hence the conflict and the moral dilemmas for both parties as this relationship develops and becomes an uncontrollable and yet infectious love. In this sense The Mermaid Chair, as wonderfully written by Kidd, is one of the most compelling love stories I’ve ever read. The fact that it’s set in a beautiful tropical landscape only adds to the luxurious emotions generated by the

relationship. As Kidd so elequently puts it in the mind of Jessie: “I felt amazed at the choosing one had to do, over and over, a million times daily — choosing love, then choosing it again, how loving and being in love could be so different.”

While Jessie is going through this aha moment in The Mermaid Chair, daughter Ann, in Pomegranates, is going through her own moment of clarity and realization. “I wonder, instead of retreating and hiding, instead of pining for the way it was, what if I accept the way it is? This strikes me as both the most obvious thing

er and daughter delve into the mythos of the respective cultures they visit in an attempt to define themselves during new physical and social stages of their lives.

While in Athens, Kidd imagines Persephone in this quote from early in the book: “I think of Persephone eating the fruit in the underworld. How the flesh splits open to reveal a small, secret womb and the seeds spill out like garnets.” Everywhere the two of them go, there are ‘seeds’ spilling out from their subconscious creating a mythical path for them to follow and to understand on their physical and psychological journey to mythic parts of their relationship. As a male, I almost felt like an intruder reading this book, so intimate and revealing are the back and forth journal entries from both mother and daughter.

Back at the ranch on Egret Island, the Shakespearean “food of love” is playing on. And on and on it goes until their love plateaus and both Jessie and Thomas reach a catharsis at the crossroads of their escalating

in the world and the most profound,” she muses. This awareness comes to her while visiting the ancient site of Eleusis and the historic archeological site of the Eleusian Mysteries where female rites and rituals occurred for centuries when Greece was a matriarchy. As mother Sue fixates on and peruses the physical and mythic history of the Virgin Mother Mary to answer her deepest questions, daughter Ann is, little by little, enlightened about her new identity as a grown woman and about the process of ‘letting go’ as we, the readers, enjoy the travelogue and the banter between the two along the way.

In both of these books it’s about meaningful interior dialogues, certainly, but it’s also about “location, location, location” as they say in the cinematic world. And we get plenty of both from Sue Monk Kidd and her daughter as we travel through the rich landscape of their lives and across the physical and cultural landscapes of the planet Earth.

Thomas Crowe is a regular contributor to the Smoky Mountain News and is the author of the award-winning nature memoir Zoro’s Field: My Life in the Appalachian Woods. He lives in the Tuckasegee community in Jackson County and can be reached at newnativepress@hotmail.com .

A helicopter administers herbicide along a transmission line running up the Cowee Mountains.

Donated photo

owners before spraying. Instead, the crew would do a pre-flight over the area to identify hazards or obstacles, reaching out to property owners on an “as needed basis.” This method had some shortcomings, as it relied on the crew’s observations during a single point in time. If they saw livestock or a pet in the area, they’d make a note to call the owner — but if the animal was absent at the time of the flyover, no call would occur.

Of the 100,000 acres of transmission rights-of-way contained in Duke Energy Carolinas’ territory, only about 3,000 are being evaluated for aerial application, said Miles. However, because aerial application is reserved for the most remote, difficult-toaccess areas of the company’s territory, many of those 3,000 acres are located in Western North Carolina. Prior to pausing the applications, Duke Energy had completed aerial application on about 1,800 acres. According to Miles, the majority of these acres were located in upstate South Carolina but aerial applications were conducted in Macon and Jackson counties as well, with plans to apply the spray in areas of Swain County too.

“We recognize Western North Carolina is a treasured part of the state with beautiful trees, but trees and brush near power lines are also the leading cause of power outages and power quality issues,” she said.

Spray from the sky

Duke pauses aerial spray program following complaints

BY HOLLY KAYS STAFF WRITER

Angela Faye Martin’s husband Brent had already left the house to scout a future hike for the guide service they run together when she got a message from a friend. Helicopters were flying the Duke Energy transmission line that goes up the Cowee range, spraying herbicide along the corridor. The friend sent pictures.

Angela Faye knew that Brent’s route would take him along a road that more or less parallels the power line, and she was worried.

“I knew he’d have his windows down, traveling with a friend during this pandemic,” she said.

What if he got misted?

But Brent didn’t learn about the episode until he got home later that day. While he did see the helicopters earlier in the day, he didn’t witness any actual spraying. Still, the whole thing caught them by surprise. In addition to their own safety, they were worried about how the spraying might impact the environmental balance of the area around them, especially the many species of birds that gravitate to the edge habitats that power lines create. In particular, Angela Faye was worried about juve-

nile birds.

“There were a lot of late broods of birds due to the cold spring we had, and I knew that there would be lots of fledglings moving about under those lines,” she said.

PROGRAM PAUSED

The Martins weren’t the only ones to find themselves shocked and angered by the sudden appearance of herbicide-spewing helicopters in Jackson and Macon counties. In fact, Duke Energy received such a strong reaction from the public that it temporarily halted the program.

“We paused the program because we recognized there were opportunities to improve our communication to property owners, and we are now working through this process and evaluating how we can adapt communication moving forward,” said Meghan Miles, spokesperson for Duke Energy. “We will communicate with impacted property owners before we resume work moving forward.”

Duke has no firm plans as to when it will restart the program.

Duke first piloted the aerial application technique in 2017, and after evaluating the

results the company concluded that it was a cost-effective way to keep transmission rightsof-way clear of vegetation in especially rugged, difficult-to-access areas, said Miles.

Additionally, she said, the “targeted nature” of aerial application meant that applications would not have to occur as frequently ground applications, which are conducted every three to four years. None of the areas slated for treatment in 2020 had been previously touched by aerial treatments.

Before pausing the flights, Duke had not made a habit of notifying nearby property

Opt out of spraying

Customers who are concerned about herbicide use can request that Duke Energy not spray lines located on their property. Some requests could be denied due to hazards for ground-based crews, but if approved a no-spray request would apply to both ground and aerial herbicide applications.

To request to be added to the list, call 800.777.9898 and ask to be contacted by a transmission vegetation specialist.

Clearing rights-of-way in this manner is safer for crews and reduces the required frequency of pesticide application. Miles emphasized that the applications do not occur near neighborhoods, schools, community gathering spaces or agricultural areas, and that it is Duke’s goal to stay 100 feet or more away from residences.

GIS data allows workers to accurately place the product at each site as the helicopter flies just above tree-line, with the mix of chemicals tailored to the specific type of vegetation growing at each site, she said. To prevent chemical drift, spraying is limited to conditions when winds blow 10 miles per hour or slower.

“Most importantly, any product is rigorously tested and approved by the EPA,” said Miles.

The primary pesticide used in these aerial sprays is Trycera, a product whose active ingredient is triclopyr. Triclopyr has been registered with the EPA since Nov. 4, 2005. Other herbicides used are Krenite, Escort and Method, with specific product mixes varied across application sites to address the composition of plant species at each location. The sprays contain about 90 percent water and 10 percent product, said Miles.

ENVIRONMENTAL OPPOSITION

Ken Brown, executive director of the Watershed Association of the Tuckaseigee River, said he has no doubt Duke is following all the rules in place governing such spray applications. Nevertheless, he said, these aerial sprays — and the lack of communication with property owners F

Congress passes legislation to fund parks, conservation

President Donald Trump signed the Great American Outdoors Act into law on Tuesday, Aug. 4, guaranteeing funding for much-needed maintenance in the national parks and for future conservation projects nationwide.

In celebration, entrance fees were waived on lands managed by the U.S. Department of the Interior Aug. 5, and every Aug. 4 going forward will be designated “Great American Outdoors Day,” a feefree day to commemorate signing of the Act.

The legislation provides dedicated funding to reduce the National Park Service’s deferred maintenance backlog and fully fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund. For years, the Park Service has experienced chronic underfunding including a reduction in staffing and a growing backlog

before deploying them — are “unconscionable.”

“I am very surprised that Duke Energy has not been more forthcoming with residents who are in the general vicinity of that spraying operation,” he said. “We know there’s a mounting body of evidence that overspray for herbicides and pesticides drifts long distances and can have very, very negative effects on people even miles away.”

While that evidence is growing, much is still unknown. Brown cited a 2018 research paper published in The Journal of

of nearly $12 billion in needed repairs — all while dealing with record visitation. The legislation will dedicate up to $9.5 billion over five years to address the highest-priority repair needs. The bill will also provide $900 million per year to the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which for 50 years has protected land for parks, wildlife refuges and recreation nationwide. The program is funded using a portion of revenues from offshore oil and gas royalty payments but has seen trouble in recent years, with the program lapsing for six months between September 2018 and March 2019 after Congress failed to pass reauthorizing legislation in time. The program was permanently reauthorized last year, but advocates have been working to see the program receiving full funding as well, as revenues had been diverted since the fund’s 1964 creation.

The bipartisan bill passed the Republican-controlled Senate on June 17 and the Democrat-controlled House on July 22.

tions, spray properties and chemical formulation,” reads the paper’s abstract.

“What worries me is the lingering impacts the aerial spray has when it’s absorbed and washes down through the soils into the water table and is carried by stormwater into nearby waterways, then it’s distributed throughout the entire watershed,” said Brown. “That’s just completely unacceptable in my opinion.”

According to a 2017 article from PennState Extension, it’s possible for pesticide and herbicide drift to travel for more than a mile in the air. The risk of drift is greater when winds are high and when nozzles are adjusted to create smaller spray droplets.

“What worries me is the lingering impacts the aerial spray has when it’s absorbed and washes down through the soils into the water table and is carried by stormwater into nearby waterways, then it’s distributed throughout the entire watershed.”

— Ken Brown

Agricultural Science — “Deposition of Pesticide to the Soil and Plant Retention During Crop Spraying: The Art State” by Asma Allagui, et al — that reviewed studies focused on pesticide retention and soil retention during crop spraying in order to give an overview of factors that affect how pesticides enter and contaminate the environment. Duke is deploying herbicides, not pesticides, but the substances move through the environment in similar ways.

“Environment pollution related to pesticides has been confirmed by the scientific community for a long time, but the available information on the impact of this phenomenon on human health and the ecosystem are still insufficient … Plant retention and pesticide deposits during spray is a complex problem depending mainly on physical sprayer parameters, climatic condi-

According to Miles, Duke is quite mindful of these factors when making the applications.

“In addition to GIS data being used to allow workers to more accurately place product at each site and weather conditions being constantly monitored and aerial applications not occurring if wind gusts exceed 10 mph, the setup of the spray rig, length of boom, nozzle type, droplet size and product mix applied also control drift,” she said.

Brown said that, while there are “some rules” governing such applications, he believes them to be “very lax” and in need of rethinking.

“I think generally the application of those aerial sprays and the rules that are applied to that need to be revisited and there needs to be more research done around the areas in which they are applied,” he said.

Love to discuss the Little Tennessee’s plastic problem

Jason Love, associate director of the Highlands Biological Station, will discuss the threat of microplastics in the Little Tennessee River watershed during a virtual lecture at 6 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 20.

Microplastics are an emerging issue that science has only just begun to understand, but Love’s research has indicated high levels of the small plastic pieces in the Little Tennessee watershed. According to the National Ocean Service, microplastics are small plastic pieces that measure less than 5 millimeters long, and they can be harmful to aquatic life. However, we don’t yet know exactly how and at what threshold that harm occurs.

The lecture is offered as one of three webinars scheduled to replace the Highlands Biological Station’s annual Zahner Conservation Lecture Series. Love will give his presentation via Zoom, with registration required at www.highlandsbiological.org or by calling 828.526.2623. The final installment of the lecture series will be held at 6 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 27.

To learn more about Love’s work visit www.smokymountainnews.com/archives/item /28797-research-indicates-high-levels-ofmicroplastics-in-wnc-waters.

Sarge’s Dog Walk goes online

The much-loved annual Sarge’s Dog Walk will be held again this year — but this time using a new, COVID-19-safe format.

During the week of Aug. 15-22, participants are invited to submit photos of themselves with their pet — cats are welcome to participate too — in a variety of online contests. To enter, post photos to social media with the hashtag #sarges2020 or email entries to info@sargeanimals.com. Participants should wear their Sarge’s tshirt in the photos, available at http://bonfire.com/sarges-dogwalk2020.

Planned events are: Sat. Aug. 15, Best Tail Wagging (video suggested); Sunday, Aug. 16, Best Pet Costume; Monday, Aug. 17, Best Pet Trick (video suggested); Tuesday, Aug. 18, Best Pet with Kids; Wednesday, Aug. 19, Best Sarge’s Alum; Thursday, Aug. 20, Photo Caption Contest; Friday, Aug. 21, Cute Pics Collage; Saturday, Aug. 22, Facebook Live parade of dogs at Sarge’s, contest winners announced, Eddie Trophy awarded.

Those who enter the contests Aug. 15-19 should include the contestant’s name, the pet’s name, whether it is a Sarge’s alum and

which contest is being entered. Use hashtags #besttrick, #tailwagging and #costume, #sargealumni or #kids to declare contest. Deadline for contest entry is Friday, Aug. 14.

On the designated day for each contest, Sarge’s will post entries on Facebook. Folks will be asked to vote, by clicking “Like” for

Angler club cancels 2020 events

their favorites. The top 10 vote-getters from each day will be reviewed by Sarge’s Dog Walk judges, Eddie Foxx, Jeanne Naber and Matt Perusi. As head judge, Eddie Foxx will award one lucky entrant the “Eddie trophy,” his award to best in show. Decisions will be announced Saturday, Aug. 22. www.sargeanimals.org or 828.246.9050.

The Cataloochee Chapter of Trout Unlimited will not hold any events through the end of 2020 due to coronavirus concerns. This cancellation includes all regular meetings and speaking programs as well as outdoor events such as trout stockings. Plans for January 2021 and beyond will be announced in December.

Cades Cove race planned for November

Registration for the fourth annual Cades Cove Loop Lope is now open, with plans moving ahead to hold the Great Smoky Mountains National Park’s only footrace on Sunday, Nov. 8.

The event will offer 5K and 10-mile options, with participation limited to 750 people. A virtual race option will be offered as well, allowing runners to complete the mileage at the time and place of their choosing. Organizers will follow CDC guidelines closely to avoid the spread of COVID-19.

A limited number of parking passes are available for purchase with registration.

Hike Mount Pisgah

Free parking is available in Townsend, and shuttles will transport runners who do not have a parking pass. The race typically sells out each year.

Proceeds benefit Friends of the Smokies, a nonprofit partner of the park. The money will help support par programs and projects such as environmental education, historic preservation and wildlife management. The event is possible thanks to sponsors Turner Homes and Bullfish Grill.

Sign up to run or volunteer at www.looplope.org. To learn about business sponsorship opportunities, contact kathryn@friendsofthesmokies.org.

Stand on the summit of Mount Pisgah with a guided hike beginning at 8 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 22. Lisa Cook and Jan Jacobson will lead this easy to moderate exploration along the Blue Ridge Parkway, with a total distance of 2.75 miles and an elevation gain of 958 feet. The hike is part of an ongoing series offered by Haywood County Recreation and Parks to explore some of the county’s most beautiful areas. Free, with registration required at 828.452.6789.

Lake Junaluska cancels 5K

Lake Junaluska’s Friends of the Lake 5K will not take place in 2020.

Originally scheduled for Easter weekend, the popular race was rescheduled for Labor Day but ultimately had to be canceled due to continued restrictions on group gatherings.

“We are disappointed to not have the event this year, but we believe it is the best decision for the safety of our participants and staff,” said Rebecca Mathis, director of advancement at Lake Junaluska.

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People who pre-registered for the event

can contact Melissa Aldridge regarding their registration fee at 828.454.6680 or maldridge@lakejunaluska.com. The 2021 event is scheduled for Saturday, April 3.

WAYNESVILLETIRE,INC.

MONDAY-FRIDAY7:30-5:00•WAYNESVILLEPLAZA

Zahner Conservation series to move online

Despite the pandemic, the annual Zahner Conservation Lectures series at the Highlands Biological Foundation will continue this year, albeit virtually.

The series will be shortened to include three lecture webinars held via Zoom at 6 p.m. Thursdays, Aug. 13, Aug. 20 and Aug. 27.

The Aug. 13 presentation, given by Florida writer Susan Cerulean, is titled “I Have Been Assigned the Single Bird: A Daughter’s Memoir.” Cerulean will share

The plant doctor is in

readings and insights from her just-released memoir, in which she trains a naturalist’s eye and a daughter’s heart on the issues of caregiving and service, both of beloved humans and the natural world. She explores an activist’s lifelong search to steward and advocate for wild shorebirds, particularly in the face of the climate crisis, as she also cares for her father at the end of his life.  Registration is required to attend at www.highlandsbiological.org or by calling 828.526.2623.

Despite the pandemic, the Haywood County Master Gardener Plant Clinic is open for business. Master Gardeners are available to answer questions about lawns, vegetables, flowers, trees and ornamental plants; disease, insect, weed or wildlife problems; soils, including soil test results, and fertilizers; freeze and frost damage; and cultural and chemical solutions to pest problems.

To get help, call 828.456.3575 and describe your home gardening issue to the receptionist. A Master Gardener Volunteer will respond with research-based information.

Help out in the garden

Puzzles can be found on page 38

These are only the answers.

Volunteers are wanted to help out in the Cullowhee and Sylva Community Gardens, with a cap of 10 volunteers per day so that garden members can tend their plots during the same timeframe.

The schedule for the Sylva Community Garden is: 10 a.m. to noon Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; 3 to 5 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

The schedule for the Cullowhee Community Garden is: 3 to 5 p.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; 10 a.m. to noon Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

All volunteers must adhere to public health guidelines listed at www.health.jacksonnc.org/cullowhee-community-garden. To volunteer, contact Community Garden Manager Adam Bigelow at adambigelow@jacksonnc.org.

Hear from a dung beetle researcher

Learn about the vital role that dung beetles play in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park during a Science at Sugarlands presentation offered 1 to 3 p.m. Friday, Aug. 21, via Zoom. Maggie Mamatov of the University of Tennessee’s Department of Ecology and Evolution will speak about dung beetles in general and specific to the Smokies, where she’s studied them for many years. The presentation is offered as part of Discover Life in America’s Science at Sugarlands series that hosts a regional scientist or researcher on the third Friday of each month, May through October. Register at www.dlia.org/sas to receive the Zoom link.

WNC Calendar

COMMUNITY EVENTS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

• Macon County Emergency Management and Macon County Public Health will be hosting a COVID-19 testing clinic for the community in Franklin from 8 to 11 a.m. Thursday, Aug. 13 at Macon Middle School. Persons may get a COVID-19 test regardless of their ability to pay and do not need to schedule an appointment.

• The Jackson County Branch of the NC NAACP will meet at 10 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 15 online. Email jcnaacp54ab@gmail.com to receive instructions to join online. All are welcome.

• The Haywood County Arts Council (HCAC) will hold its Annual Meeting online utilizing Zoom at 5 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 20. The meeting is open to the public and an RSVP is required to receive a Zoom link for use on a computer, smartphone or ipad. Rsvp by email to director@haywoodarts.org or phone 828-452-0593 and provide your email address.

• Sarge’s reimagined 15th Annual Dog Walk is presenting a week of fun Aug. 15 - 22 for animal lovers — online, so no matter where you live, you can watch and participate. Sarge’s Animal Rescue Foundation is at 256 Industrial Park Dr., Waynesville. For more information visit www.sargeanimals.org, ‘Like’ Sarge’s Facebook page or call 828-246-9050.

• The 2020 “Friends of the Lake 5K Road Race, Walk and Fun Run” originally scheduled to take place at Lake Junaluska at Easter and rescheduled for Labor Day, Monday, Sept. 7, has been canceled due to COVID-19 and the restrictions on group gatherings.

• Blue Ridge Books will host a Virtual Author Event with Ron Rash at 3 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 25. The event will highlight Rash’s new book In the Valley: Stories and a Novella Based on Serena. To attend, purchase the book at Blue Ridge Books by Saturday, Aug 23, provide an email address and Blue Ridge Books will email a link to join the event via zoom. There will be time for questions at the end of the reading. For more information call 828.456.6000 or visit blueridgebooksnc.com.

B USINESS & E DUCATION

• Award-winning professor and consultant Dr. Betty Farmer will be offering an online workshop from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 28, focusing on emotional intelligence. This workshop will be offered online via Zoom and taught by award-winning professor of communication at WCU and owner of Farmer Communications, Betty Farmer. Registration fee for this workshop will be $139. For more information or to register contact Julia Duvall at 828.227.7397 or email jduvall@wcu.edu.

• Western Carolina University’s Office of Professional Growth and Enrichment will be offering a live online Digital Marketing & Public Relations Certificate program Sept. 18 – Nov. 6 (6 Fridays) from 9 a.m. – 3:30 p.m. Registration fee for the full program is $640, individual workshops are $119 each. For more information and to register, visit pdp.wcu.edu or email Jill Thompson, WCU’s associate director of professional development at jcthompson@wcu.edu.

• SCC’s Small Business Center will offer expanded counseling opportunities in more than 40 different categories that are uniquely suited for small businesses in Jackson, Macon, Swain Counties and the Qualla Boundary. Interested businesses are encouraged to apply for the program by visiting southwesterncc.edu/sbc. For more info, email Henry at t_henry@southwesterncc.edu. Participants will work confidentially with an expert one-on-one.

• During the month of August, the Marianna Black Library has teamed up with the American Red Cross to

n All phone numbers area code 828 unless otherwise noted.

n To have your item listed email to calendar@smokymountainnews.com

offer several Virtual Red Cross Training's on how to be prepared for a variety of emergency situations. These programs are catered to a variety of ages, though anyone can attend any program. The series of trainings kicks off next week at 3 p.m. Monday, Aug. 10, with Hands Only CPR. The next training will be 2 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 12, called Prepare with Pedro – a program for children grades K-2. Other programs in August will include: The Pillowcase Project (grades 3-6) at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 19; Be Red Cross Ready (adult) at 3 p.m. Monday, Aug. 24; Youth Be Red Cross Ready (grades 7-12) at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 26. For more information call the library at 828.488.3030 or visit www.fontanalib.org/brysoncity.

CLASSES AND PROGRAMS

• The next course offered by Concealed Carry Academy will be held from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 22 at Dellwood Baptist Church, 115 Hall Drive. Cost of the course is $100 per person. For registration or more information call 828.356.5454.

P OLITICAL CORNER

• The Swain County Democratic Party will meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 18 via zoom. The agenda will include information on candidates running for election. Please call for an email link to join the call. All are welcome. For details, call (828) 488-1234 Luke Hyde.

VOLUNTEERS & VENDORS

• Volunteers are wanted to help out in the Cullowhee and Sylva Community Gardens, with a cap of 10 volunteers per day so that garden members can tend their plots during the same timeframe. The schedule for the Sylva Community Garden is: 10 a.m. to noon Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; 3 to 5 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. The schedule for the Cullowhee Community Garden is: 3 to 5 p.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; 10 a.m. to noon Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. All volunteers must adhere to public health guidelines listed at www.health.jacksonnc.org/cullowhee-community-garden. To volunteer, contact Community Garden Manager Adam Bigelow at adambigelow@jacksonnc.org.

28. For more information and a complete schedule of events, click on www.lazyhikerbrewing.com.

• Nantahala Brewing (Sylva) will host live music semiregularly on the weekends. Free and open to the public. www.nantahalabrewing.com.

• Mountaintop Art & Craft Show (previously the Village Square show) will be held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Aug. 29-30 in downtown Highlands at K-H Founders Park (Pine St.) from. The FREE event features regional potters, jewelers, woodworkers, fine artists, etc. For more info call (828) 787-2021. Sponsored by Highlands Mountaintop Rotary. If the event is canceled due to Covid-19, visit www.mountaintopshow.com for a virtual craft show.

• The annual Cashiers Designer Showhouse will be held Aug. 5 - Sept. 5, at 144 Cove Drive in Highlands. Admission is $30. For more information, click on www.cashiershistoricalsociety.org/showhouse.

• The Haywood County Arts Council “Artist Member Show” will be held through Aug. 29 at the HCAC Gallery & Gifts showroom in Waynesville. Featuring 42 artists, the show is a celebration of our community, allowing locals to share their great work at the height of the summer season. www.haywoodarts.org.

• Part of the Haywood Arts Regional Theatre in Waynesville, the Kids at HART program will offer classes in acting, directing and musical theatre dance. Registration is currently underway. Classes will run Sept. 14 through Nov. 16. To register, go to www.harttheatre.org or visit the Kids at HART Facebook page. If you need further information, email Kids at HART at kidsathartwvl@gmail.com.

F OOD & D RINK

• The Great Blue Farms Brunch & Blooms will be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturdays from Aug. 8 through Sept. 12 at 1101 Briartown Church Road in Nantahala/Topton. Admission is $75, which includes a tour, brunch, all flowers, supplies and container to take home your floral masterpiece. To register, click on www.greatbluefarms.com or call 828.508.1502.

• There will be a free wine tasting from 2 to 5 p.m. every Saturday at The Wine Bar & Cellar in Sylva. 828.631.3075.

• Bosu’s Wine Shop in Waynesville is offering lunch on Saturdays, “Lunch with us” from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. featuring fresh seasonal menu with outdoor seating weather permitting. 828.452.0120 or www.waynesvillewine.com.

•Bryson City Wine Market offers a glass of wine and a Market Plate Monday through Saturday as well as special flight tastings from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. every Friday and Saturday.

A&E

• Presented by the Jackson County Chamber of Commerce, the 11th season of Concerts on the Creek will return with Dashboard Blue (classic hits) on Friday, Aug. 7, at Bridge Park in Sylva. Performances will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. unless otherwise noted. The tentative schedule is as follows: 1 to 3 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 8 Bohemian Jean (classic hits/pop), 3 to 5 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 8 Darren Nicholson Band (country/bluegrass), 7 to 9 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 8 - Eleanor Underhill & Friends (Americana).

• Frog Level Brewing (Waynesville) will host Tyson Leamon 6:30 p.m. Aug. 29. Free and open to the public. www.froglevelbrewing.com.

• Lazy Hiker Brewing (Franklin) will host Tennessee Champagne 1 p.m. Aug. 22 and Silas Reed 7 p.m. Aug.

Outdoors

• Alarka Expeditions has launched the Pandemic Blues Series, which features four different outings into the great outdoors along with the option to purchase a T-shirt. Outings included in the series are: Friday, Aug. 7 Alaska Laurel: A Deep map of a Wild place; Tuesday, Aug. 11 Power of Place; Saturday, Aug. 22 A Literary Field Guide to Southern Appalachia: Readings and Explorations; Tuesday, Sept. 1 Five Miles of Silence. For more information or to register, visit www.alarkaexpeditions.com.

• Emmy Award-winning PBS television host and naturalist Patrick McMillan will discuss Panthertown Valley’s rare Southern Appalachian bog during a webinar

Visit www.smokymountainnews.com and click on Calendar for:

n Complete listings of local music scene

n Regional festivals

n Art gallery events and openings

n Complete listings of recreational offerings at health and fitness centers

n Civic and social club gatherings

offered 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 13. The presentation will be followed by a Q&A session. Limited tickets are available and donations are encouraged. The event is sponsored by Marcia and Steve Shawler. Register at panthertown.org/webinar.

• Make the strenuous trek from Waterrock Knob to Black Rock during a hike beginning 8 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 15, in Jackson County. Former Great Smoky Mountains National Park Deputy Superintendent Kevin FitzGerald and Haywood County Emergency Management Director Greg Shuping will lead this 4.75-mile excursion, featuring an elevation gain of 2,464 feet. Free, with registration required at 828.452.6789.

• Jason Love, associate director of the Highlands Biological Station, will discuss the threat of microplastics in the Little Tennessee River watershed during a virtual lecture at 6 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 20. Love will give his presentation via Zoom, with registration required at www.highlandsbiological.org or by calling 828.526.2623.

• Learn about the vital role that dung beetles play in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park during a Science at Sugarlands presentation offered 1 to 3 p.m. Friday, Aug. 21, via Zoom. Register at www.dlia.org/sas to receive the Zoom link.

• Stand on the summit of Mt. Pisgah with a guided hike beginning at 8 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 22. Lisa Cook and Jan Jacobson will lead this easy to moderate exploration along the Blue Ridge Parkway, with a total distance of 2.75 miles and an elevation gain of 958 feet. The hike is part of an ongoing series offered by Haywood County Recreation and Parks to explore some of the county’s most beautiful areas. Free, with registration required at 828.452.6789.

• Registration for the fourth annual Cades Cove Loop Lope is now open, with plans moving ahead to hold the Great Smoky Mountains National Park’s only footrace on Sunday, Nov. 8. The event will offer 5K and 10-mile options, with participation limited to 750 people. A virtual race option will be offered as well, allowing runners to complete the mileage at the time and place of their choosing. Organizers will follow CDC guidelines closely to avoid the spread of COVID-19. Sign up to run or volunteer at www.looplope.org. To learn about business sponsorship opportunities, contact kathryn@friendsofthesmokies.org.

H IKING CLUBS

• The Nantahala Hiking Club will take moderate-tostrenuous 7-mile hike, elevation change 1000 ft., on the Coweeta Hydrological Lab Center Loop. The Club will meet at Smoky Mountain Visitor Center at 8:30 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 15. This hike is limited to six people, with four people per car, wearing masks while driving and congregating. Call leader Katharine Brown, 4214178, for reservations.

• The Nantahala Hiking Club will take a moderate 3.5 mile hike, elevation change 800 ft., on Ramsey Trail in Tellico Valley. The club will meet at 2 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 16 at Westgate Plaza in Franklin. The hike is limited to no more than ten people, with four people per car, wearing masks while driving and congregating. Call leader Jean Hunnicutt, 524-5234, for reservations.

Market PLACE WNC

MarketPlace information:

The Smoky Mountain News Marketplace has a distribution of 16,000 copies across 500 locations in Haywood, Jackson, Macon and Swain counties, including the Qualla Boundary and west Buncombe County. Visit www.wncmarketplace.com to place your ad!

Rates:

• $15 — Classified ads that are 25 words, 25¢ per word after.

• Free — Lost or found pet ads.

• $6 — Residential yard sale ads.*

• $1 — Yard Sale Rain Insurance Yard sale rained out? Call us by 10a.m. Monday for your ad to run again FREE

• Legal N otices — 25¢ per word

• $375 — Statewide classifieds run in 170 participating newspapers with 1.1+ million circulation. (Limit 25 words or less)

• Boost Online — Have your ad featured at top of category online $4

• Boost in Print

• Add Photo $6

• Bold ad $2

• Yellow, Green, Pink or Blue Highlight $4

• Border $4

Note: Highlighted ads automatically generate a border so if you’re placing an ad online and select a highlight color, the “add border” feature will not be available on the screen.

Note: Yard sale ads require an address. This location will be displayed on a map on www.wncmarketplace.com

p: 828.452.4251 · f:828.452.3585 classads@smokymountainnews.com www.wncmarketplace.com

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more details and to apply on-line up to 8/17/20, go

postings/13348 WCU is an Equal Opportunity/

Action/Pro Disabled & Veteran Employer.

TEMPORARY GROUNDS WORKER

Position will be responsible for supporting the Grounds Department Staff in performing tasks

collecting and cleaning garbage and recycle containers on campus grounds; Collecting litter from campus lawns, patios, walks, parking lots, etc.; Providing support on the campus garbage and recycle trucks in carrying out collection schedule/ route and tasks; Providing general grounds maintenance task support and other duties as required. Anticipated hour. For more details and to apply on-line until edu/postings/13736 WCU is an Equal Opportuni-

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BUILDING & ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNICIAN HOUSEKEEPER 2nd Shift Primary duties are physically demanding housekeeping duties in large academic buildings. Areas cleaned/disinfected may include athletic venues, auditoriums, classrooms, laboratorestrooms and stairways. Duties performed include operating heavy cleaning equipment, moving furniture, carrying trash and recyclables, dusting, changing light bulbs, sweeping, mopping, vacuuming, cleaning/disinfecting bathrooms, locker rooms, classrooms,

2nd shift working hours

Monday through Friday including weekend work. This schedule will be

to include working on Saturdays and Sundays depending on workloads and Department needs.

weekend and holiday work, responding to after-hours, weekend and holiday emergencies as needed. Anticipated hir-

and to apply on-line up to 8/17/20, go to the follow-

wcu.edu/postings/13717

WCU is an Equal Oppor-

tive Action/Pro Disabled & Veteran Employer.

TEMPORARY HOUSE-

KEEPER Primary duties are physically demanding housekeeping cleaning and disinfecting duties in large academic, administrative and athletic buildings. Areas cleaned may include athletic venues, auditoriums, classrooms, laboratories,

restrooms and stairways. Duties performed include operating heavy cleaning equipment, cleaning, disinfecting, moving furniture, carrying trash and recyclables, dusting, changing light bulbs, sweeping, mopping, vacuuming, cleaning and disinfecting bathrooms, locker rooms, class-

etc. Currently hiring for temporary Housekeeper

Monday through Friday including weekend work. This schedule will be

to include working other shift hours or days depending on workloads and the needs of the Department and Univer-

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hour. For more details and to apply on-line up to

8/31/20, go to the followwcu.edu/postings/13396b

WCU is an Equal Oppor-tive Action/Pro Disabled & Veteran Employer.

TOWN OF FRANKLIN POLICE OFFICER

The Town of Franklin is accepting applica-cers at the Franklin Police Department. The position will perform a wide variety of services directly and indirectly related to the enforcement of law, maintaining peace and dignity of the community and assisting the public. Work will include patrolling the Town during an assigned shift in a police car or on foot; preventing, detecting, and investigating disturbances and crime; control work; apprehending suspects; and executing related assignments. An her authority shall be responsible for the enforcement of the laws of the State of North Carolina, and the ordinances of the Town. Applicants must have a high or greater, must have completed basic law enforcement training and possess a NC driver’s license, and have completed requirements established by the NC Justice Training and Standards Commis-

A 2- or 4-year degree is preferred. Base salary is $33,521 DOQ.

covered employee health insurance, dental insurance, and life insurance. The TOF utilizes a progressive pay plan while also providing 5% towards the successful candidate’s 401K. (828) 524-2516 ttallent@franklinnc. com

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Furniture

FOR SALE Curio cabinet, sectional sofa, leather recliners, kitchen sets, linens, chairs, sheets, clothes and much more. Located in front of Quality Inn in Cherokee. Call for appointment. 828.497.9427 or 828.226.0994.

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SUPER CROSSWORD

Hercules in 1958

79At odds with

80Biology slide specimen

82Accord

83* Unease

85Solidified

88Asia's -- Sea

89Think up

91Part of TMI

92* Fitted forearm cover

96* Not even a single time

102-- populi

103Pluses

106Strauss one-act opera

107* Short-pile cotton fabric

112Instruments of angels

114Left amazed

115Push away

116* The answers to the starred clues are all drawn from a certain set of them

119Troubadour relative

120Busy as --

121Live through

46"That's --!" ("Not true!")

48Source of some syrup

53* Tense situations make them rise

57Kitchen cover-up

58Not as hard

60Noble's crown

61* Horizontal supporting piece on a ship's lower mast

64First-class

65Leaves off

66Be nuts over

68Woman's office outfit

73* Actor who played

122Cooped (up)

123Cen. parts

124Part of BMI

125ER staffers

126Census stat

DOWN

1King's home

213th-century German king

3"Tristram Shandy" novelist Laurence

4"Silent" prez

5Outdated TV hookup

6Pipe part

7Husband of Heloise

8Bit of a song's words

9Actor Burton

10Dir. opposite NNW

11Push along

12Corn piece

13Show plainly

14Misfortunes

15Redding of R&B

16Hawaiian state bird

17Outer limit

19Zellweger of films

22Butter substitutes

24Identical

28Wobble

30Not crooked

31Omegas' preceders

33Actress Woodard

36Mauna --

38Denials

39Relish

40Kagan of the court

41Made angry

44Snaky curves

45End in -- (finish evenly)

47Punta del --, Uruguay

48Gymnast's landing pad

49Fourth mo.

50Nuptial lead-in

51-- Alamos

52-- four (little cake)

54Get points

55One running easily

56Unit of work

59Gallery work

62Scoundrel

63Gives off

64Actress Feldshuh

66Nuclear trial, in brief

67Cotillion star

68Legal aide, for short

69Golden -- (retirees)

70Like "m" and "n" sounds

71Duke, e.g.

72NBC hit since '75

73Sammy of baseball

74Author Welty

75Suffix with phenyl

76Actor Diesel

77Summer, to the French

78Pink Floyd's Barrett

80Like Peru's peaks

81Assembles

84The "S" of RSVP

86Off-road bike, in brief

87Some deer

90Filling dishes

93Incident

94Religious adherent

95Phillips -- Academy

97U.S. Open airer

98Bring joy to

99Oath takers

100Come forth

101Boston ball team

104"Come Back, Little --"

105Roof overhangs

107Improvise jazz-style

108Writer Wiesel

109"Perfect Strangers" costar Mark -- -Baker

110Waistcoat

111Twisting fish

113Squalid district

116U.S. "Uncle"

117Outer limit

118NFL stats

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Answers on 26

Overlooks are special places in the southern mountains

Editor’s note: This George Ellison article first appeared in an August 2010 edition of The Smoky Mountain News

High-elevation overlooks are one of our finest natural resources. These vantage points allow us to rise above our everyday humdrum existence and see the world with fresh eyes. Many of the finest overlooks along the Blue Ridge Parkway, in the Great Smokies, and elsewhere can be reached directly via motor vehicles.

Instant access is just fine when we don't have a lot of time to devote to getting there. But it always adds a bit of resonance to the experience if we have to walk a ways before reaching our destination. It doesn't have to be a long walk. Many of the most satisfying overlooks require relatively little time or effort to reach. Two of my favorites through the years have been Pickens Nose and Salt Rock.

Pickens Nose is located at the southern end of the Nantahala Mountains within the

Nantahala National Forest. From the backcountry information center at the Standing Indian Campground, continue on FR-67 along the headwaters of the Nantahala River. Eight miles from the information center this maintained road passes through Mooney Gap where the Appalachian Trail (marked with white blazes) makes a crossing. Continue another 0.7 mile along FR-67 to the trailhead for Pickens Nose, which is situated in a gap at 4,680-feet.

The trail leads south along the crest of a ridge through a rhododendron tunnel. At about a half mile there is a side trail leading a few yards to the east (left) to a small outcrop providing a view out over the Coweeta Creek watershed and the Little Tennessee River Valley to the Balsam Mountain Range. You can spot Highlands in the distance.

At 0.7 miles you reach Pickens Nose at 4,900 feet, a sloping, multi-level granite outcrop on the southwest end of the ridge. It’s maybe 45-feet long and 20-feet wide. The vertical drop of the rock face is 50 or so feet, while the almost sheer descent into the Bettys Creek valley below is 2,230 feet.

The views west and north are into the high Nantahalas. Standing Indian looms at 5,499-feet due west. It’s four miles away but

seems as if you could reach out and touch it. To the east the Balsams swing back in an arc toward the Smokies. And to the south you will look out over an endless blue expanse of mountains into Georgia and the upper headwaters of the Savannah. Here you are on the edge of the contorted Appalachian drainage system, with waters flowing on the one hand directly to the Atlantic and on the other through the vast heartland of the nation to the Gulf of Mexico.

Why Pickens Nose? In profile the outcrop resembles a huge nose.

All the evidence indicates that it was sonamed in honor of Gen. Andrew Pickens of South Carolina, a soldier in the Revolutionary War who subsequently initiated prohibited sales of Cherokee lands during the 1780s and helped lay out Indian boundary lines during the 1790s.

Salt Rock is located in Panthertown Valley, which is administered by the Highlands Ranger District of the Nantahala National Forest. Inquire at the Highlands Ranger District office regarding trail maps and additional information.

To reach Salt Rock turn east (towards Brevard) at the crossroads in Cashiers on U.S. 64 and proceed 1.8 miles before turning left onto Cedar Creek Road. At 2.1 miles, turn right onto Breedlove Road and

proceed 3.3 miles to the gated trailhead. A short walk down the roadway and around the first bend leads to Salt Rock, one of the most delightful overlooks in the southern highlands.

From this vantage point on the southwest rim of the Panthertown watershed (headwaters of the Tucksegee River) a series of extensive rock outcrops that rise from 200 to 300 feet above the valley can be observed. The broad valley floor and almost vertical rock-face terrain has led some to describe the area as “The Yosemite of the East.” Retired Western Carolina University biologist Dan Pittillo has observed that Panthertown Valley resembles what the Yosemite Valley of California “might look like following several million years of erosion.”

It’s a region of flat, meandering tannindarkened streams often bordered by white sand banks, extensive waterfall systems that form grottoes in which rare ferns reside, large pools several hundred feet in length, high country bogs and seeps that harbor vegetation not often encountered elsewhere in the mountains, upland “hanging” valleys on the sides of the tract, and rocky outcrops where ravens nest.

(George Ellison is a writer and naturalist who lives in Bryson City. info@georgeellison.com.)

FACES OF HAYWOOD

The staff at Haywood Health & Human Services

The staff at Haywood Health & Human Services have worked tirelessly since the beginning of the pandemic to provide information, resources, and case tracing for our County. When the Chamber approached Dr. Mark Jaben, Medical Director, about being the Face of Haywood after a series of webinars he presented for our businesses, he insisted on recognizing what he called “the heavy lifters”. These five ladies have led the charge to flatten the curve in our community. You have our unending support and appreciation for all you do.