For months, town officials have been hard at work creating the framework and the process for updating the Town of Waynesville’s 16-year-old comprehensive plan. Now, it’s time for residents to have their say. 

A cultural survey currently underway that seeks to document the legacy of an overlooked Waynesville community could add to the town’s growing roster of properties listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The Town of Waynesville is about to embark on year two of a more conservative budget mindset; the days of 7 percent annual growth are gone, but the days of rising costs are not. 

The Town of Waynesville is about to embark on year two of a more conservative budget mindset; the days of 7 percent annual growth are gone, but the days of rising costs are not. 

A Gastonia-based developer’s request to change a small part of the Town of Waynesville’s zoning rules to allow for multi-family housing in a semi-rural community generated big waves last week.

Fifteen or so years ago, meetings like those Monday and Tuesday night in Waynesville were all too common: private citizens who usually keep to themselves flooding a public meeting because they are worried how a particular development project will affect their lives and their communities, and they wanted to make sure their voices were heard. Large, high-end residential developments were being planned across the mountains in the early 2000s, and steep slopes, water quality, traffic, viewsheds and a concern for preserving that highly subjective “sense of place” and “quality of life” were on many minds.

It’s rare to see great interest taken in the meeting of a municipal planning board, but a contentious proposal that would allow for apartments on a semi-rural piece of land on the outskirts of Waynesville has ignited a debate not only about the future of the 41-acre parcel on Plott Creek Road, but also about the future of the community as a whole. 

Second Amendment supporters in Haywood County will take to the Historic Courthouse lawn May 19 to protest what they say are threats to the Constitution, but the focus of the rally remains on firearms. 

While most people have certainly heard of agritourism, ecotourism and even necrotourism (visiting famous cemeteries and gravesites), most may not have heard of so-called “gun tourism.” 

One memorable afternoon several years ago, Perry Hines was sitting in the dining room of the Open Door after it had closed for the day, discussing with officials from a nearby church a grant opportunity, when there came a knock at the locked front door.