Jane Winik Sartwell/Carolina Public Press For the second year running, HCA is potentially not in compliance with its 2019 purchase agreement for the Asheville-based Mission Health hospital system. The repeated compliance issues raise questions about whether HCA is fulfilling its promise to maintain health care services for Western North Carolina...

Matt Lamb & Frank Daniels IV/The (Southern Pines) Pilot First Citizens Bank has filed a lawsuit against Southern Pines Brewing Co. owner Micah Niebauer and his wife, Patricia, for more than $2 million dollars in unpaid loans and credit card bills related to the company. Filed in Cumberland County last...

Zachary Turner/WFAE Radio Summer is in full swing even as Charlotte loses its best defense against the heat: trees. The city of Charlotte is reevaluating its tree canopy goals, but while the city collects canopy data, developers keep bulldozing forests in residential areas. Claire Morissette started a petition to temporarily...

Catherine Kozak/Coastal Review Online Nearly 40 years after the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service launched an innovative program to save the eastern red wolf from extinction, a nonprofit conservation group is challenging the agency’s prior decision to not upgrade to a more protective management designation, despite its outsized importance to...

WRAL News The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) announced Tuesday a first-of-its-kind partnership with a virtual therapy platform to expand services to teenagers in N.C. The department is partnering with Talkspace to provide free virtual mental health therapy to teenagers between the ages of 13 to...

Sergio Osnaya-Prieto/Education NC Corinne Smith, director of Appalachian State University’s Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) and deputy director of College Access Partnerships, received the 2025 GEAR UP Professional Leader of the Year award at a ceremony in San Francisco earlier this month, according to a...

Gary D. Robertson/The Associated Press Former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper will run for the U.S. Senate in North Carolina, giving Democrats a proven statewide winner in an open-seat race that is expected to be one of the most competitive 2026 contests. Cooper made the announcement Monday with a video released...

Daniel Walton/Blue Ridge Public Radio Asheville city government employees all started getting bigger paychecks July 11, as funded by the $256 million budget Asheville City Council unanimously approved in June. But one group of municipal workers, the officers of the Asheville Police Department, saw proportionally greater gains than their colleagues....

Charlie Fossen/Port City Daily The local water authority is actively seeking advanced solutions to address the challenge of 1,4-dioxane contamination in the region’s drinking water. The Cape Fear Public Utility Authority’s (CFPUA) Long Range Planning Committee convened July 24 to discuss and evaluate potential strategies for improving the removal of...

Zachery Eanes/Axios Raleigh Following in the footsteps of Raleigh and Chapel Hill, Durham has unveiled initial plans for adding a bus rapid transit line through the center of the city. Why it matters: With dreams of light rail and commuter rail across the Triangle seemingly quashed, officials in the region...

Jane Winik Sartwell/Carolina Public Press When Shaun Adams was laid off by Stanley Furniture in 2014, he was beyond frustrated. Not only was he losing his job at the furniture manufacturing plant, but Graham County was losing its largest employer and last major manufacturer. In the year after Stanley left,...

Cory Vaillancourt/Smoky Mountain News In its first regular meeting since a superior court judge ruled that Head of School Joshua Morgan was responsible for the “improper use of governmental authority to stop or inhibit the public from accessing public records,” Shining Rock Classical Academy’s governing board doubled down on Morgan’s...

Caleb M. Soptelean/The Sanford Herald An aluminum automotive component manufacturer in Sanford was issued numerous health and safety violations last year. Bharat Forge Aluminum USA, which is located at 777 Kalyani Way on the north side of Sanford between Route 1 and Colon Road, was inspected in late 2023 and...

Olivia Neeley/The Wilson Times Wilson Community College will no longer participate in the federal government’s Direct Loan program in an effort to reduce debt risk for students. The decision does not affect financial aid options, including Pell grants, scholarships or work study. Amy Noel, WCC’s vice president of student development,...

Paul Woolverton/CityView North Carolina’s long-awaited Civil War & Reconstruction history center will open in Fayetteville in spring 2028, project advocates said on Friday. Construction of the 60,000-square-foot museum building is about to begin, museum board Chair Mac Healy told about 50 people gathered Friday for a ceremony on the construction...