Month: August 2025

6. Report | LGBTQ+ rural teens find more support online than in their communities

Liz Carey/Education NC New research has found that rural LGBTQ+ teens experience significant challenges in their communities and turn to the internet for support. The research from Hopelab and the Born This Way Foundation looked at what more than 1,200 LGBTQ+ teens faced and compared the experiences of those in rural communities with those of […]

Written by on August 6, 2025

8. More legal trouble for former Swain sheriff

Lucas Thomae/Carolina Public Press Former Swain County Sheriff Curtis Cochran continues to fall deeper into legal trouble. Two weeks ago, he was arrested again and charged with second-degree forcible rape according to filings in Swain Superior Court. The embattled sheriff left office last month after being arrested and charged in both North Carolina and tribal […]

Written by on August 6, 2025

9. Chair resigns, Democratic gala lineup revised after NC-11 candidates protest

Cory Vaillancourt/Smoky Mountain News A blistering letter signed by four Democratic candidates for Congress in North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District is raising questions about party neutrality in primaries, calling the party’s decision to include only one congressional candidate — Jamie Ager — as the keynote speaker at the NC-11 Democratic gala “deeply unfair” and fundamentally […]

Written by on August 6, 2025

10. East Spencer to request exemption from state annexation limits

Elisabeth Strillacci/The (Salisbury) Post  The state of North Carolina has a restriction on annexations for every community in the state that prohibits growth beyond a certain point, but there is an allowance for an exemption to that limit. The town of East Spencer is one of three remaining communities inside Rowan County that has not […]

Written by on August 6, 2025

1. PBS North Carolina cutting staff after losing federal funding

Colin Campbell/WUNC Radio PBS North Carolina announced Tuesday that it plans to cut staff due to the loss of federal funding for public media. The loss of Corporation for Public Broadcasting funding will mean a nearly $5 million cut for the TV network. It’s giving “voluntary separation offers” to most of its staff, freezing hiring […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

2. Firm managing NC’s Helene recovery is set to be barred from government contracts in WV

Galen Bacharier/NC Newsline Horne LLP, the company tapped to manage homebuilding and recovery from Hurricane Helene in western North Carolina, is facing a ban on government contract work in West Virginia. State officials informed the Mississippi-based firm on July 22 that they were pursuing debarment, or permanently banning the company from participating in government contracts, […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

3. Lombardi, Belichick’s hand-picked general manager, signs 3-year, $4.5M deal with UNC

Brian Murphy/WRAL News North Carolina football general manager Michael Lombardi signed a three-year contract worth $1.5 million annually, according to an appointment letter signed on July 31. The three years matches the guaranteed years in head coach Bill Belichick’s five-year, $50-million. contract. Lombardi was Belichick’s first hire in December and the two have worked together […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

4. Five North Carolina counties off newest Homeland Security sanctuary list

Alan Wooten/The Center Square  Five North Carolina counties listed as sanctuary jurisdictions in May are not included in Tuesday’s release from the Department of Homeland Security. The counties of Buncombe, Chatham, Durham, Orange and Watauga had been the only entries in the state-by-state listing. Respectively, the sheriffs are Democrats Quentin Miller, Mike Roberson, Clarence Birkhead, […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

5. Whooping cough spreads as families prepare for back to school

Sarah White/The (Waynesville) Mountaineer Haywood County has confirmed its 13th case of pertussis, or whooping cough, since early July, meaning infections are on the rise with just two weeks before students go back to school. While it’s typical to see kids getting sick about three weeks into the school year, a disease outbreak prior to […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

6. Amid backlash, Dare board retains Buxton Woods restrictions

Kip Tabb/Coastal Review Online The Dare County Board of Commissioners, in the face of strident pushback from residents and coastal advocates over a proposal to gut special protections for an area around the Buxton Woods Reserve, voted Monday to keep in place those development restrictions officials had previously called “unenforceable.” The longstanding restrictions on multifamily […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

8. ‘Disaster Rodeo’ gathers near Asheville to talk climate resilience and plan for future catastrophes

Zachary Turner/WFAE Radio The Eden Lake Retreat buzzed with activity last week as a couple hundred attendees built mini solar installations, wired battery controllers and shared stories of recovery and resilience. Absent was the hum of gas generators, as strings of solar panels powered Starlinks, lights and projectors. Jamie Trowbridge, a Marshall resident and operations […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

9. AI-powered private school set to open in Charlotte, Raleigh

Kate Denning/Carolina Public Press Alpha School, an “AI-powered” private school, is preparing to make its mark on Charlotte and Raleigh this year. North Carolina is part of an expansion into five additional states this fall for the private school company, which currently operates Texas and Florida. It plans to expand into Puerto Rico in 2026. […]

Written by on August 5, 2025

10. Lessons from the military for solving North Carolina’s child care crisis

Katie Dukes/Education NC The U.S. military faced a new threat to national security toward the end of the 20th century. This threat affected the recruitment and retention of our nation’s armed forces, reducing their capacity to defend the denizens of the United States and our interests overseas. The threat wasn’t the Cold War; it wasn’t […]

Written by on August 5, 2025