Faced with a mounting backlog of infrastructure needs, Jackson County commissioners have failed to agree on a basic annual budget yet continue to insist they can accurately forecast the added costs to taxpayers of withdrawing from the Fontana Regional Library system.

Regional rock/jam group Arnold Hill will perform at 6 p.m. Friday, June 20, at Whiteside Brewing in Cashiers.

Formed in 2011, the Jackson County band is named after a road in Sylva where the musicians lived and practiced.

The Town of Sylva, Jackson County Parks and Recreation Department and Jackson County Chamber of Commerce are proud to present the 16th season of the annual “Concerts on the Creek” music series. 

Jackson County recreation is hosting a stand-up paddleboarding event on Wolf Lake.

Beginners and seasoned paddlers alike are welcome to enjoy the adventure, which will be held at 10 a.m. on Friday, June 20. 

Citizens and constituents of Sylva, I’d like to offer you an apology. In fact, I owe you two.

All Sylva residents are also Jackson County constituents — Sylva is the county seat, and county-level decisions affect us directly. The Jackson County Public Library is a clear example. 

A  proposed resolution that expressed support for the Fontana Regional Library system didn’t survive the first four minutes of the Town of Sylva Board of Commissioners meeting on June 12, after Commissioner Jonathan Brown moved to strike the item from the meeting’s agenda. 

My office is cool and our building on Montgomery Street in Waynesville is quiet. Almost everyone who works at The Smoky Mountain News has gone home for a few minutes to tend to kids, dogs, wives and husbands as it’s one hour before the annual first Friday in June birthday bash celebrating another year of putting out this weekly print newspaper (and now a seven-day-per-week news website).  

The following events will be held at City Lights Bookstore in Sylva.

• Elizabeth and Quintin Ellison will present “Land of Blue Shadows: Mountain Life in Verse & View” — a poetry and photography collaboration with the late George Ellison — at 3 p.m. Saturday, June 14.

In a year when Jackson County commissioners are proposing a substantial property tax hike, outside agitators are still pushing commissioners to consider a costly withdrawal from the Fontana Regional Library system that could result in an even costlier lawsuit, all over an issue that will never be resolved to everyone’s liking — the definition of “inappropriate.” 

As Mountain Projects celebrates its 60th anniversary serving Haywood and Jackson Counties, the organization is marking a season of both reflection and action. Executive Director Patsy Davis, who has led the agency for 27 years, will retire this summer.