Liz Schlemmer/WUNC Radio Michelle Reed is in her 22nd year of teaching English at Cedar Ridge High School in Orange County Schools. Her family has been saving scrap metal to help pay for a big field trip for her daughters. North Carolina’s state budget is now nearly four months overdue....

Aaron Keck/WCHL Chapelboro This month, UNC’s Nabarun Dasgupta was named as a recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Grant, an $800,000 award in recognition of his lifesaving work to help fight the opioid epidemic. Dasgupta is an epidemiologist and researcher with UNC’s Gillings School of Public Health. His Opioid Data Lab...

Felicia Sonmez/Blue Ridge Public Radio Growth is an issue throughout most of Western North Carolina. But it ranks especially high on residents’ minds in Weaverville. The town of about 5,000 people in Buncombe County has seen its population double in the last 25 years — and it’s expected to double...

Becky Johnson/The (Waynesville) Mountaineer The massive operation to rebuild sections of Interstate 40 washed away by Helene is ramping up — one that will employ up to 500 workers at its peak, cost $1.36 billion and take three years to complete. Engineers have seized on a novel approach to build...

Cierra Noffke/WilmingtonBiz Health care experts and politicians addressed changes to Medicaid at a summit in Wilmington on Tuesday, saying they fear those changes will limit access to care, strain hospitals and nursing homes and affect the state’s most at-risk populations. The Greater Wilmington Chamber of Commerce and South East Area...

Steve Harrison/WFAE Radio Four years ago, Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles launched the Mayor’s Racial Equity Initiative, an effort to raise $150 million from the private sector to help the city in four different areas, including bolstering Johnson C. Smith University and bridging the digital divide. The program is now winding...

Adam Wagner/WUNC Radio North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson is joining other Democratic officials across the country to sue the federal government and try to make it use reserve funds to keep funding food benefits amid the ongoing federal shutdown. Congress gave the U.S. Department of Agriculture a $6 billion...

Andrew Dys & Dawn Baumgartner Vaughan/The Charlotte Observer Jason Saine, a Raleigh lobbyist and former North Carolina lawmaker, was charged with driving under the influence in South Carolina on Sept. 8, according to online sheriff’s office records and a Charleston Police Department incident report. The Lincolnton Republican, who was a...

Pat Kimbrough/The High Point Enterprise A former industrial site in southwest High Point is on the market after the owner paused his redevelopment plans for the property. Terry Seitz said he recently listed 1673 W. English Road for sale because he hopes to purchase a larger warehouse at another location...

David Lance & Rodney Overton/CBS 17 News Five houses collapsed at the Outer Banks on Tuesday, now totalling 13 houses that have fallen into the ocean in the Buxton community since Sept. 30 and 15 along Cape Hatteras National Seashore since that day — just four weeks ago. Four weeks...

Chloe Collins/Gaston Gazette Gastonia-based philanthropists Don and Mary Doctor donated a $2 million property to Gaston County Schools, which will become a multi-use space, according to the district. Work is currently underway at the former Armstrong Athletic Club property, located at 3372 Robinwood Road in Gastonia, to transform the building...

Kristin Kharrat/The Daily Tar Heel Local entrepreneurs bring their ideas to Franklin Street in hopes of becoming restauranteurs. Restaurants in Chapel Hill are constantly opening and closing their doors, as setting up shop takes a specific set of structural processes. Owner of The Purple Bowl,Taylor Gilland, said he was warned...

Leena Mirchandani/The (Duke) Chronicle Incumbent Mayor Leonardo Williams and mayoral candidate Anjanee Bell took the stage Tuesday evening for their lone debate ahead of the Nov. 4 general election. Williams has been running his campaign on the slogan, “Durham is Dope,” championing issues of affordable living, culture, innovation and public...

Ahmed Jallow/NC Newsline The North Carolina State Board of Education on Monday approved a contract with the accounting firm Mauldin & Jenkins LLC to review Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools’ financial practices, after the district reported a multimillion-dollar budget shortfall earlier this year. The contract, valued at $97,770, calls for Mauldin &...

The (Southern Pines) Pilot U.S. Rep. Richard Hudson is calling upon U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to intervene and stop the proposed removal of the High Falls Dam by its property owner. Hudson, who lives in Southern Pines and whose district includes Moore...