After a full day of brainstorming, the Waynesville Board of Aldermen had thrown a lot of meat onto the table. Ideas, concerns and potential opportunities were written down on giant pieces of paper and tacked up on the walls, canvassing a good portion of the meeting room overlooking Lake Junaluska. 

The Waynesville skate park became an instant rock star after its debut last fall, gaining repute as a wildly popular concrete playground for all things on wheels gliding, sliding and flying over the ramps and rails all hours of the day.

Two video gambling halls were raided in Haywood County last week following an undercover investigation by law enforcement agencies.

Though the process has been long, Steven Lloyd is beginning to see the fruits of his labor.

“I sometimes feel like I’ve pushed a big boulder up a hill and it’ll fall backwards,” he said. “But, the momentum is still going. We’re a proven, successful theatre, and this is going to happen.”

Sitting at her loom, weaver Amy Tromiczak feels right at home.

“It’s an amazing thing. You’re making cloth, and I love it,” the 25-year-old said. “It’s all about the whole process of choosing your fibers, deciding what kind of cloth to make, seeing it laid out on the loom.”

Electric car owners will soon have the option of charging their vehicles in downtown Waynesville.

By Jake Flannick • SMN Correspondent

Haywood County leaders have all but signed off on plans by a pair of faith-based groups running social service ministries in the county to convert a defunct state prison into a homeless shelter and halfway house.

The silence seeped from the mountain ridges and hung heavily over the forest, silence like a deep well, so deep that a pebble tossed in just might go on forever, swallowed up for what seems like an eternity until at last, a dim, muffled plunk echoes up from in the darkness far below.

It was the kind of quiet so steadfast, so impenetrable, little stood a chance against it.

Waynesville residents will soon be reaping the benefits of an information technology makeover at town hall. While town employees will be happy to see the last of the decades-old computers some of them have been using, residents will notice an increase in the forms, calendars and updates posted on the town’s website. 

Waynesville will soon have a new section of walking path along Richland Creek and, if all goes as planned, public access to a 15-acre wooded area adjoining the trail.