In 2020, following the murder of George Floyd, there was significant public outcry calling for police reform. Among the reforms people wanted to see most was the use of social workers on certain calls, people with no badge and no gun who could deal with someone in the throes of a mental health crisis. 

With the impending sunset of grants that have sustained the Community Care Program in Sylva Police Department, town officials have made clear that continuing the program will be a top budget priority. 

To the Editor:

As I ponder the implications of the presidential election, I have to ask myself and I ask you to think about what the outcome means in the larger context of our values as a nation. 

With three new members seated following November elections, the Sylva Town Council is once again considering an update to the Streets and Sidewalks section of its code of ordinances to include a section on panhandling. 

Many years ago when I was an educator, my school was tasked with reading a book titled “The Cycle of Poverty” by Ruby Payne.

Voters in Waynesville are preparing for a contentious election that offers very different visions for the future of the town the candidates want to lead. 

For more than 50 years, Haywood Christian Ministry has served as a safety net for some of Haywood County’s most vulnerable citizens looking for help with the most basic of needs – rent, heat, medication, clothing, utilities and, perhaps most importantly, nutrition.

The Covid relief bill now working its way through Congress will mark a transformation in the way this country treats poor children. It’s about damn time.

First the numbers, which vary ever-so-slightly from year-to-year, but which should be appalling to the citizens of the world’s richest country: 24 percent in Swain County, 26.6 percent in Macon, 22.5 percent in Jackson and 22.5 percent in Haywood. That the number of children living in poverty every single day of their lives. Right at one-fourth of the youngsters we see around our community every day.

Of all the socioeconomic and educational weaknesses lain bare by the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 perhaps none is more disturbing than the fact that the closure of public schools has resulted for many children not just in a loss of education, but also a loss of nutrition. 

For most, childhood is a time of growth, learning and stability nurtured by fertile environmental and economic conditions that ultimately prepare young people to become the leaders of tomorrow. 

In much of North Carolina, the future’s not nearly that bright.