The Women of Waynesville (WOW) will host a “Queens of Country” themed karaoke party at 8 p.m. Friday, May 24, at The Gem at Boojum Brewing Company in Waynesville. 

It’s  tough out there for anyone hoping to gain entry into the housing market. 

Volunteers with Haywood Habitat for Humanity returned to the construction site March 5 for the first time since the pandemic started to help build more affordable homes in Waynesville. 

It’s the kind of street – lined with modest, well-kept houses flying U.S. flags – where neighborhood children haphazardly cast their bicycles in piles on a playmate’s lawn to tear off and play in the woods or on a backyard Slip ‘N Slide.

Social services Agency Mountain Projects continues to be at the forefront of solving the affordable housing crisis in Haywood and Jackson counties. 

The issue of homelessness has been a growing concern among Haywood County residents, businesses, law enforcement and government officials for the last several years.

With a site plan approved unanimously by the Waynesville Planning Board, Haywood Habitat for Humanity is getting ready to embark on its second major affordable housing development. 

There, in Sumter County, Georgia, not far from the Alabama line lies the tiny town of Plains (pop. 784), a most unremarkable place home to a most remarkable man. 

Home for President Jimmy Carter has always been the clay roads and cotton fields of Plains, except when he was at Annapolis, in the Navy, or serving as state senator or governor or president. 

About five years ago, Suzanne Cianciulli and her son were living in a rundown mobile home rental while she tried to make ends meet working a retail job.

With the holidays currently underway, there’s plenty for all of us to be grateful for living here in Western North Carolina. A roof over our heads, food in our bellies, a warm bed to climb into each night, a beautiful mountain view to awaken us each morning.