Tammy Grubb/The Raleigh News & Observer A Chapel Hill couple and other top union officials were convicted Friday in federal court of using millions in members’ dues to pay for lavish trips, dinners and payouts. The union dues were meant to provide members and their families with retirement and health...

Carly Haynes/WRAL News Picture this: the Canes are playing at home. You’re in line to fill your novelty “beer stick” along the concourse of Lenovo Center. You hear the bass of the jumbotron followed by the crowd’s roar; it’s your sign to take your seat. On the screen, a video...

Analisa Sorrells Archer/Education NC School nutrition programs have long operated on thin margins, but budget pressures are intensifying. Faced with federal reimbursement rates that have not kept pace with increasing costs, compounded by state-mandated increases in wages, school nutrition leaders in North Carolina are raising alarm bells on the financial...

Will Hofmann/Asheville Citizen Times Christ School is planning to expand, adding 12 new housing units and a new academic building, according to Buncombe County planning records. The plan will expand on-campus housing options for existing faculty. Founded in 1900, roughly 308 boys from grades 8 to 12 are enrolled at...

Greater Fayetteville Business Journal Cape Fear Valley Health is expanding access to behavioral health services with the opening of the new Community Mental Health Center – Dunn on June 22. Located at 805 Tilghman Drive, Suite A, the new clinic will provide comprehensive mental health services for children, teens, and...

Mark Bergin/WRAL News The Raleigh City Council unanimously passed a $1.77 billion budget on Monday. The fiscal year 2027 budget includes a 1.7 cent property tax increase per $100 of assessed value. It means about $67 more per year for a median Raleigh home, which costs about $450,000. “The Proposed...

Jennifer Fernandez & Ashley Fredde/NC Health News Outrage over the death of Moore County toddler Rylan Ott in 2016 compelled North Carolina on a path to improve its child welfare system. Nearly a decade later, the state has rolled out several of those reforms — a statewide office focused on...

Lucas Thomae Facebook/Carolina Public Press After an exceptionally dry spring, North Carolina’s farmers are in need of several timely rains. According to state corn extension specialist Ron Heiniger, “that’s like trying to hit the perfect lotto numbers.” Such precision when it comes to the weather usually isn’t required for a...

Mary Helen Moore/Axios Raleigh  In some Wake County waterways, signs announce to anglers that the fish cannot, under any circumstances, be eaten. Why it matters: Eating lots of freshwater fish in North Carolina comes with health risks because of the widespread presence of mercury in the environment. Total bans are...

Liz Schlemmer/WUNC News North Carolina’s school calendar law requires most traditional public schools to start no earlier than August 24 this fall. The 2004 law originally came out of lobbying from the coastal tourism industry to extend the summer busy season through August. The state board of education received a...

Brian Murphy/WRAL News A billionaire investor in multiple major U.S. sports teams wants to bring a Major League Baseball team to Raleigh. The news? It’s not Carolina Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon, who has long professed his desire to bring a team to the area. Marc Lasry, the co-founder and chief...

Trista Talton/Coastal Review Online Nearly a dozen abandoned marine vessels left to rot in North Carolina’s coastal waters are expected to be removed by July. Crews this week pulled a dilapidated commercial fishing trawler and a sunken cabin cruiser from Wheeler Creek, a working waterway nestled off the New River...

Aaron Keck/WCHL Chapelboro Voicing a desire to better fund its public school systems while managing funding losses for other areas of government operations, the Orange County Board of Commissioners is poised to further raise taxes in its final budget for the upcoming fiscal year. During the board’s budget amendment work...

Mackenzie Thomas/Hendersonville Lightning A former North Carolina resident is asking the state to reconsider criminal charges against her that have been hanging over her head for the past decade. Joanne McDowell, a resident of Hendersonville for roughly five years until December 2012, reached out to the North Carolina Department of...

Amy Diaz/WFDD Radio Think about how much you’ve spent every time you’ve filled your car up with gas lately. Now, imagine your car is a bus. And you have 178 of them that need to be on the road every day, transporting thousands of kids to and from school. You...