It’s election season in Cherokee, and with the long-time chief Michell Hicks opting not to seek re-election, five candidates are vying for the tribe’s top office.

Voters could see more Ds and Rs on their election ballot in 2016 if Republicans push through legislation to make local school board and statewide judicial races partisan.

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.

No personal voter identification information was found missing following a break-in at the Swain County Board of Elections Office in Bryson City.

Cherokee will have a new chief when Election Day concludes this September.

Principal Chief Michell Hicks, who is serving his third four-year term, will not seek re-election, but five candidates have filed in hopes of taking his place.

The newly elected tax collector in Haywood County has been benched indefinitely.

Mike Matthews was supposed to take office Monday, but his swearing in ceremony was canceled at the 11th hour. Matthews wasn’t able to get bonded at the amount stipulated by county commissioners — namely a $410,000 professional liability bond. 

The newly elected tax collector in Haywood County was unable to take office Monday as scheduled after failing to secure a $410,000 bond.

For now, the long-time tax collector David Francis will continue in the role on an interim basis.

In a narrow upset in the Haywood County Tax Collector race last week, voters elected a man with a history of delinquent property tax bills and little experience for the job.

A new tax collector has been elected in Haywood County, but when he takes office next month his duties will be substantially less than the outgoing tax collector.

When Jackson County commissioners halted the controversial rewrite of the steep slope development rules earlier this year, critics were both pleased and skeptical.

Pleased that a rollback of the county’s steep slope rules wouldn’t be pushed to the finish line before November’s election, but skeptical that the sitting commissioners would really stop work on the rollback. Instead, many thought the incumbents were trying to save their own re-election chances and would pick up where they left off after November.