In the new documentary, “Papertown,” a film that immerses itself into the mountain community of Canton as it dealt with the closure of its 115-year-old paper mill in 2023, features a scene with Gail Mull — the town’s mayor pro tem and secretary of the local millworkers union — that sums it all up. 

“The mill has provided, and there is going to be life after the mill,” Mull said. “Billionaires come and go, we’re going to be here forever. We have to make something of it.  We have to have the backbone. We have to have the grit. We have got to stay here and make something of it — and we will.” 

Haywood Christian Ministries has announced its fourth annual Farm Fresh 5K on to be run at 9 a.m. Saturday, April 18.

The Farm Fresh 5K is a chance to come together as a community and make a difference. Runners will support local farmers, putting food on the tables of families in need while strengthening the local economy. 

Silicon Valley and Sylva are about as different as any two places can be, but they do share at least one thing in common. 

In Cupertino, billion-dollar office buildings rise within sight of tents and tarps. People sleep in cars or on bare ground backdropped by a landscape where extreme wealth and extreme poverty exist side by side. 

To the Editor:

The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. There has been a coordinated plan by people such as those in the Heritage Foundation to dumb down regular people in the USA since the Reagan era. Alvin Toffler even said in his book, “The Third Wave,” that industrial era schools were designed to teach students to be obedient, on time and do rote repetitive work. 

Waynesville resident Sam Wilds is blind, cannot work, uses her entire Social Security disability check for household bills, has approximately $50 left on her SNAP card for the month of October, and once it’s gone, it’s gone. 

To the Editor:

Last week at the Jackson County commission meeting, we heard some truly disturbing news about the ways the “Big Beautiful Bill” will affect Jackson County. Cris Weatherford, the Director of Department of Social Services, gave a breakdown of federal money our county is about to lose.

Like any parent or guardian, Katie Clubb wants to provide nutritious food for her grandchildren. Clubb, a Canton resident, said with rising grocery prices, SNAP benefits don’t adequately cover healthy options for anyone in her household. 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture for fiscal year 2024 reported that the average person received $187.20 in SNAP — Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program — per participant, per month.

To the Editor:

In the 2024 Presidential race, 49.8% of the votes went to Donald J. Trump, who promised to reduce the costs of consumer goods, end the wars in Gaza and Ukraine and fix our immigration crisis.

In Western North Carolina, where aging populations and rural poverty place extraordinary pressure on the social safety net, few programs matter more than Medicaid and Medicare. Congressman Chuck Edwards, who represents North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District, has repeatedly said he and fellow Republicans had “no interest” in cutting Medicare, but his voting record tells the real story. 

To the Editor:

Neither the President’s omnibus budget bill nor the House’s abysmal substitute warrant the approval of sens. Thom Tillis or Ted Budd. The senators should stand up for our country and North Carolina in a time of great need.