Macon County will receive $100,000 to be used for “community purposes” thanks to help from Sen. Jim Davis, R-Franklin.

During the long session of the North Carolina Legislature that recently concluded, hundreds of bills were again proposed, studied and debated.

Sen. Jim Davis, R-Franklin, will keep his seat in the N.C. Senate after an easy victory over Jane Hipps, D-Waynesville, who opposed him for the second election running. 

Franklin orthodontist Jim Davis has held the District 50 seat in the N.C. Senate since 2010, when the legislature flipped to a Republican majority for the first time in more than 100 years. But if Jane Hipps, a retired educator and certified nurse practioner from Haywood County, has her way, she’ll be the one representing District 50 come January.

In the last year, Macon County teacher John deVille has asked county commissioners several times to pass a resolution asking the North Carolina General Assembly to restore public education funding to 2008 levels.

Although the upcoming general election has much of the nation’s attention focused on just two candidates — a controversial populist and a former Secretary of State under investigation for mishandling classified material — local races offer considerably more palatable choices that will have a direct impact on the lives of area residents. 

N.C. Sen. Jim Davis, R-Franklin, is inadvertently 43 days late on his latest campaign finance reports due to a computer glitch in the state campaign finance database.

Last fall’s election is barely in the rearview mirror, but battle lines are already being staked out for 2016.

And voters may be looking at a rematch for the state senate seat that sprawls from Waynesville to Murphy, spanning seven mountain counties. Both N.C. Sen. Jim Davis, R-Franklin, and challenger Jan Hipps, D-Waynesville, say they will run again in two years.

Editor’s note: The Smoky Mountain News spent a day on the campaign trail with Sen. Jim Davis, R-Franklin, as he tries to retain his seat in the N.C. General Assembly representing the seven western counties.

It’s almost dark and North Carolina Sen. Jim Davis, R-Franklin, is sitting in the Ryan’s steakhouse in Sylva. It’s Thursday, another day on the campaign trail with an election only weeks away. 

A candidate debate last week between N.C. Sen. Jim Davis, R-Franklin, and challenger Jane Hipps, D-Waynesville, plowed a lot of ground. Education, Medicaid, and fracking were the biggies, but the 90-minute debate ran the gamut, touching on government spending, guns, charter schools, teacher salaries, higher ed, and so much more.