For the past four years, Jackson County Neighbors in Need has been footing the bill to put people lacking winter shelter up in motel rooms for the night, but the group is on the lookout for the perfect facility to serve as a central shelter before the winter gets much deeper. 

“We haven’t been able to get into a shelter facility of our own which we are very much hoping to do because it’s very expensive to lodge people in a motel,” said Veronica Nicholas, co-chair of the Neighbors in Need shelter committee. 

At T-minus three days until the scheduled opening day for Haywood Pathways Center, Nick Honerkamp still wasn’t sure how to answer the big question: will the shelter open?

“That is the question of the week,” said Honerkamp, one of the leaders of the effort, Wednesday (Nov. 12) morning.

Shane Claiborne was a couple minutes late for his interview with The Smoky Mountain News, but for good reason. Claiborne and his entourage of Philadelphia friends-turned-family had encountered some crawfish that needed catching, and the job required a couple of extra minutes to splash in the creek. 

The 2nd annual United Community Bank Mountain Challenge featuring American tennis legends Andy Roddick and Jim Courier will be held at 9 a.m. Saturday, July 26, at the Cedar Creek Racquet Club in Cashiers.

The event will be hosted by the Cashiers Area Chamber of Commerce and benefits the nonprofit organizations Mountain Youth Charities and the Boys & Girls Club of the Plateau.

Not everyone was happy about the free shoes. Betty Cloer Wallace was more concerned about the “holy war.”

By Doug Wingeier • Columnist

For some years now I have been promoting fair trade products as a means of helping organic farmers and cooperatives in the Third World get just prices and living wages, improve living standards, educate their children, build stable communities, and protect the environment from toxic chemicals destructive use of land and water. 

My wife and I use fair trade coffee, tea, cocoa, and chocolate from farmers in Latin America, Africa, and Asia, and Palestinian olive oil — all organic, high quality, and reasonably priced. I sell it at cost, and have encouraged its use at church functions. My interest in this has grown out of visits to coffee farms in Nicaragua, Colombia and Chiapas, Mexico, where I have seen first-hand the struggles of farmers who operate at the mercy of the fluctuating world market with prices set in New York, unpredictable weather patterns, an invasive and destructive rust, and exploitative middlemen called coyotes who buy cheap at the peak of the season from small farmers with no storage facilities. I encourage you to join me in bringing your purchasing and dietary practices into conformity with the values of compassion and justice for the “least of these.”

On Sept. 12, Jeff Clontz walked out of Haywood County Jail a free man. It wasn’t his first time, though. Jail, release and failing to pay child support comprised a cycle he knew well, but this time was different. When Clontz left the jail, he left behind more than just physical bonds. His spiritual bonds were gone, too. 

Dark clouds hung above Cullowhee last Friday morning. And as the rain fell on the mountain community, tears slid down the face of Suzanne Stone.

“I’m numb,” she said. “I rotate between crying and disbelief. It’s like losing your home.”

The mother lode of charity operations was less than 24 hours away, and the daunting punch list should have had Johnny Strickland sweating bullets.

Sylvia Russell remembers how crucial it was to wear the “right” clothes to school, how the “right” outfit could win the acceptance of peers.