The Waynesville town attorney serves at the pleasure of the board. Elected officials can fire or terminate him for any reason they see fit.

During a rare special-called meeting on the morning of June 16, aldermen shaved another 1.5 cents off the proposed ad valorem tax rate but couldn’t quite meet demands from citizens to bring the budget down to a revenue-neutral level, due to long-term ramifications on the town’s emergency savings. 

Ashten McKinney is the new kid on the block, but already she’s making friends with her neighbors and offering a welcoming, safe space for her community. 

During the pandemic, Asheville-based artist Pearl Renken wrestled with the pain, isolation and racial reckoning happening in the United States. Her first instinct during that time was to paint, very literally, the pain she was seeing, the hate that felt abundant. 

What should have been a simple contract renewal process has turned into an all-out fiasco for the Downtown Waynesville Association, as the group continues to struggle with transparency and professionalism while submitting a contract renewal proposal riddled with errors, oversights and outdated information. 

Following public complaints, the Waynesville Board of Aldermen voted to terminate the contract of its town attorney, Bill Cannon. 

Just days after a local nonprofit asked the Town of Waynesville to help fund emergency overnight stays for the unsheltered, aldermen gave them an answer.

Grabbing a seat inside Mad Anthony’s Taproom in downtown Waynesville one recent evening, Benji Boessel and Alex Tinsley can’t help but gaze around at the other tables. 

Friday morning in downtown Waynesville and Orchard Coffee is bustling. There are those entering and waiting patiently for strong coffee and freshly baked goods, those exiting with full hands and big smiles. 

A group of concerned citizens conducting a local cleanup effort intended to address the problem of homelessness in Waynesville inadvertently exacerbated the problem when they dismantled an elaborate makeshift residence, and now the man who’s been put out on the streets with nothing but the clothes on his back is pursuing legal action against those who threw away or gave away all of his earthly belongings.