Brighton McConnell/WCHL Chapelboro Emily Baragwanath loves her backyard. In fact, the yard and trees bordering the property line were major factors that led her to move from elsewhere in Chapel Hill’s Glen Lennox neighborhood to the first block of Oakwood Drive a few years ago. But now knowing a grocery...

Jane Winik Sartwell/Carolina Public Press The weather is starting to cool here in North Carolina, bringing with it the joys of fall. There’s just one thing that could ruin your pumpkin spice latte, apple picking and hay rides: coming down with the flu or COVID-19. This year, there could be...

Jay Price/WUNC Radio A flurry of public and private sector dealmaking in recent weeks has raised the profile of a family of minerals that are crucial for much of modern technology. And for national security — which is a big reason for all the deals. Most of the world’s supply...

Will Atwater/NC Health News Mid-September signals the soon-to-arrive familiar fall rhythms: leaves preparing to turn from green to gold and crimson, pumpkin spice flavors reappearing on menus and migratory birds filling the skies. Along with these seasonal markers comes a more troubling one — the likely spread of highly pathogenic...

Will Doran/WRAL News Top North Carolina officials are closely watching contract negotiations between Duke Health and health insurance company Aetna — which are now heating up, with barely a month left to salvage a deal — over fears the outcome could lead to higher insurance costs for state employees or...

Sarah White/The (Waynesville) Mountaineer Haywood County is still waiting on $15.2 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency almost a year after Helene. Only $623,000 of the total $15.8 million spent on recovery efforts so far has been reimbursed by the federal agency, according to Haywood County’s Finance Director Kristian...

Daneen Khan/The Daily Tar Heel Last May, UNC Professor Philip Berke received an email from Kristi Noem, the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Berke is the director of UNC’s Center for Resilient Communities and Environment (CRCE). In the email, he learned that two of the Center’s research...

Andrew R. Jones/Asheville Watchdog A Mission Hospital cardiac patient died in late July after becoming disconnected from telemetry monitoring for at least an hour, and hospital administration repeatedly refused to hold an emergency meeting requested by union nurses about the incident, according to union leaders and emails obtained by Asheville...

Cory Vaillancourt/Smoky Mountain News When the Pactiv Evergreen paper mill in Canton closed after more than a century of operations in June 2023, the shockwaves went far beyond the hundreds of workers who lost their jobs. The closure of the 115-year-old plant left behind an enormous industrial footprint in the...

Gary D. Robertson/The Associated Press A federal appeals court has ruled that a North Carolina law that made it a crime for felony offenders who vote before they have completed their sentences without knowing they were breaking the law is unconstitutional. A panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of...

Abraham Kenmore/CityView For Mike Lopez, the small 82nd Airborne Division War Memorial Museum at Fort Bragg is a cornerstone of the military unit he once served with. But he worries it may not remain there much longer. In June, the Army announced plans to consolidate its current 41 museums down...

Pat Kimbrough/The High Point Enterprise A south High Point medical distribution company plans to expand in a shuttered furniture factory near its headquarters. Exemplar Health earlier this month acquired the 16-acre property at 1914 S. Elm St. that included the former Richloom Weaving, which recently closed, laying off 54 workers....

Paul Nielsen/The (Waynesville) Mountaineer The Federal Emergency Management Agency has reneged on an implied promise to pay for Helene-related repairs on a bridge that provides a vital link to downtown Waynesville. And the end result could be costly to the town’s taxpayers. Waynesville leaders were under the impression that FEMA...

Lucas Thomae/Carolina Public Press The North Carolina General Assembly pledged to rein in “unelected bureaucrats” with an overhaul of the state’s creation of regulations in one of its most contentious legislative actions of 2025. But what does it really mean when lawmakers say they intend to cut through red tape?...

Liz Schlemmer/WUNC Radio As the bell rings to start a new period at Green Hope High in Cary, students settle into Harrison Miller’s earth science class. Hanging on the wall by the door is a set of small numbered pouches, most of them already holding a student’s phone. “Anyone who...