Jack Evans & John Boyle/Asheville Watchdog As it inches toward its billion-dollar I-26 Connector project, the North Carolina Department of Transportation has trumpeted its efforts to keep costs down, including $125 million in cuts it announced this week. But until now, it has not acknowledged a key measure in the...

Mebane Rash & Emily Thomas/Education NC Attainment is on the rise in Burke County, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. The percent of high school graduates, as well as those with associate degrees, bachelor’s degrees, and graduate degrees, are all going up, while the percent with some college...

Sarah Michels/Carolina Public Press To cast an absentee ballot by mail in North Carolina, voters must follow two simple steps. First, they need two witnesses to watch them sign the ballot envelope. Second, they need to attach a copy of an acceptable form of photo identification to their ballot.  And...

Bradley George/WUNC Radio President Donald Trump has called tariffs “the most beautiful word,” but his threats to slap duties on imports are creating ugly uncertainty for governments and businesses in North Carolina, while at least one of the state’s largest companies is welcoming the move. International trade is not the...

Haleluya Hadero & Matt O’Brien/The Associated Press Workers at an Amazon warehouse in North Carolina rejected a proposal to unionize, becoming the latest group of the company’s employees to side against union representation. About three-quarters of employees at an Amazon fulfillment center in Garner, a town located near Raleigh, voted...

Zachary Turner/WFAE Radio Albemarle collected data between January 19-28, 2025. This chart shows the information collected by the monitor with the highest readings during the days that it picked up the highest levels of hydrogen sulfide gas. A foul odor plagued the city of Kings Mountain this winter as cold...

Jaymie Baxley/NC Health News A push by Congressional Republicans to slash federal funding for Medicaid could have “dire consequences” for the more than 1.2 million rural North Carolinians who depend on the program. That was the key takeaway from a report released in January by the Center for Children and...

Scott D. Yost/Rhino Times Guilford County officials have discovered a major mistake that has left fire departments across the county in a big bind: The departments, which are already struggling financially, do not have $2.3 million in funding that those departments were counting on from Guilford County. The departments across...

Jakob Emerson/Becker’s Payer Issues A federal judge is allowing a lawsuit against UnitedHealth Group to partially move forward, which alleges the company used an artificial intelligence algorithm to wrongfully deny Medicare Advantage patients post-acute care. On Feb. 13, the Minnesota federal court dismissed several claims in the lawsuit, but allowed...

Andrew Marshall/The (Waynesville) Mountaineer The Haywood County Tourism Development Authority’s 10-year master plan is not just for visitors and the tourism industry. Rather, the plan focuses on quality of life for both visitors and Haywood residents, convinced that what is good for one group will be good for all. The...

Trista Talton/Coastal Review Online A city-operated wastewater treatment plant in Randolph County discharged substantially high levels of 1,4-dioxane last month into a tributary of the Cape Fear River, the drinking water supply for about 1 million North Carolinians. Several downstream businesses and water utilities, including Cape Fear Public Utility Authority...

Paul Nielsen/The (Waynesville) Mountaineer Repairing Interstate 40 so that two lanes can be opened in each direction will require a stunning engineering and construction feat, with work scheduled to begin in March and lasting at least two years. After considering a range of possibilities, including a viaduct and tunnel, engineers...

Rusty Jacobs/WUNC Radio Duke University student Sofia Dib-Gomez was excited to vote in the election back in November. She registered in Durham last August, soon after arriving on campus as a first-year student. As a fellow with the Duke Votes mobilization effort, Dib-Gomez said she had become quite familiar with...

Makiya Seminera/The Associated Press Emily Russell remembers feeling hopeful after she managed to get an appointment with the Federal Emergency Management Agency not long after Hurricane Helene ripped though her home in Swannanoa, North Carolina. But after several assistance requests were denied or left pending, Russell says the agency has...

Zachery Eanes/Axios Raleigh Estella Patterson, Raleigh’s outgoing police chief, says she believes she will have successfully brought the Raleigh Police Department back to full strength by this summer. Why it matters: Like many police departments across the country, RPD has been plagued by a large number of unfilled positions since...