Lilly Knoepp

Western Carolina Faculty Senate will vote on Monday for a resolution asking the university to be 100 percent online because of COVID-19.  Chair of Faculty Senate Kadence Otto says the emergency meeting was called in order to bring up the resolution before the semester starts – even though it won’t send students home.

“Even if the resolution passes nothing is going to change because the resolution is simply the voice of the faculty,” says Otto. The vote will take place via Zoom. 

Western Carolina University students will be back on campus this weekend.

Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Sam Miller expects about 400 students will move into the residence halls on Saturday. Students have signed up for specific times to remain socially distant.  

In total, about 3,500 students will be living in the dorms when classes start on August 17. Miller says this is down from about 4,000 last year for a variety of reasons. 

Right now only about 30 percent of Jackson and Swain Counties have responded to the U.S. Census. Statewide almost 60 percent of North Carolians have already responded to the census. 

“Western North Carolina has historically been undercounted in the Census and 2020 is no exception,” said Jackie Simms, chair of the programs and grants committee at Dogwood Health Trust in a press release. 

The Town of Sylva board of commissioners met this morning - in part to discuss the removal of the county’s Confederate monument. However the meeting was cut short after being “zoom bombed.”

Five employees of the table games section at Harrah’s Cherokee Casino have tested positive for COVID-19. 

"The cluster occurred as a result of 5 employees testing positive in a 14-day period," says Vickie  Bradley, Secretary, Public Health and Human Services in an email. The fifth employee was identified on Friday, July 17. 

The town of Andrews has transferred their police department over to the Cherokee County Sheriff’s leadership.

Andrews Police Chief Michael Hobgood resigned at the beginning of July. This week, Andrews' Mayor James Reid says that instead of searching for a new police chief the town board decided it should transfer its three police officers to the leadership of the Cherokee County Sheriff Derrick Palmer. 

The Cherokee County Board of Commissioners have changed the location of its monthly meeting because of the new requirement that persons entering court facilities must wear a mask.

The board’s meetings usually take place at the Cherokee County Courthouse.

The July 20 meeting will be held at the Penland Senior Center in Murphy, located at 69 Alpine Street. The board says all future meetings will take place at the senior center while court facilities are under COVID-19 pandemic requirements. The meeting starts at 6:30 p.m. 

Jackson County Commissioners did not to move forward with creating a task force to discuss the fate of a Confederate statue in Sylva.  

At a Tuesday work session, all commissioners could agree on was that something should be done to improve the context of the statue known as “Sylva Sam,” which sits on the steps of the old Jackson County courthouse.

There is a movement to remove the statue, and another group who wants to keep the statue. 

The Town of Sylva Board of Commissioners passed a resolution on Thursday to prohibit Confederate imagery on town vehicles and property. Currently, the old Jackson County Courthouse including the Confederate soldier statue which stands in front of the building, is featured on town vehicles and Sylva Police badges. 

The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI) has amended its federal lawsuit which hopes to block the Catawaba Nation, based in South Carolina, from building a casino near Charlotte.

Sixteen people spoke during the Jackson County Commissioners public comment period on Tuesday night about the Confederate soldier statue which stands in the middle of the old Courthouse steps. 

The county commissioners are set to discuss creating a task force to decide the monument's fate at their July 14 work session. Many who spoke say they would consider a taskforce a step in the wrong direction. 

The North Carolina Department of Public Transportation is asking the people of Yancey County to weigh in on the future of the county's transpotation.

Yancey County is updating its Comprehensive Transportation Plan, which was last released in 2008. The plan will map out what transportation will look like in the county for the next 30 years, according to NC DOT. 

Three men have been charged for carrying firearms in downtown Asheville on June 21 at a demonstration, according to the Asheville Police Department.  

NCDOT has announced a big change in construction plans to build a new bridge in the town of Dillsboro. 

Officials plan to close down Haywood Road (U.S. 23 Business) for nine months instead of building a temporary bridge. This will shave about 2 years and $3 million dollars off of the project, according to Div 14 Construction Engineer Ted Adams. 

Highlands Mayor Patrick Taylor announced that a Highlands Town Hall employee tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday. All of the town hall’s employees - about 10 including the mayor - have now been tested and are awaiting results. Taylor says the employee had been working from home but had been in the office intermittently. 

 Taylor says that he supports the new mandatory order for masks in public. 

The public comment period for Nantahala Pisgah Forest Plan is coming to a close on June 29. 

After over 5 years of discussions and drafts, this draft plan was released in February. The pandemic caused many of the public comment meetings across the region to be cancelled. As a result the deadline for comment was extended by 45 days.

Jackson County commissioners will discuss the future of the statue of a Confederate soldier on the old courthouse steps in Sylva next month.  

Commissioners held a meeting on Tuesday which included a conversation about “diversity and inclusion” which centered around the statue which stands on the old courthouse steps. About ten people spoke during public comment in support of the statue's removal at the afternoon meeting. 

One resident was Christina Sutton, who identified herself as an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. 

Erlanger Health System has laid off CEO Mark Kimball of Erlanger Western Carolina Hospital in Murphy.

The health system laid off 11 leadership positions throughout the Erlanger Health System due to revenue losses associated with COVID-19. 

Macon County now has the highest number of confirmed COVID-19 proportionately in the Blue Ridge Public Radio listening area.