photo by Jonathan Welch Mark Gibney is an ambitious man. When he’s 85, he says, he’s going to be the No. 1 tennis player in the world. But at 53, he’s pretty busy doing his bit to make sure there’ll still be a world by then, through such efforts as his forthcoming book, Ending the … Read more
Timeless beauty: Bernard Elias’ 1970 photograph of Cold Mountain. photo by Bernard Elias When I moved to Asheville, the first book I read about the area was Strangers in High Places by Michael Frome. Among the many pictures sprinkled throughout the book was a familiar face, that of Bernard Elias. At nearly 88 years old, … Read more
When we hear about streams and rivers these days, it’s often in the context of conservation and preservation. But there’s a deeper magic to these waterways that children of all ages still respond to. When I was a small child growing up in Dillingham, N.C., where Big Creek flows from the Coleman Boundary up above, … Read more
Preventing the massive exodus of college graduates from a small city like Asheville is always a concern. But there’s not enough talk about another migration of local young people — the ones who will disappear unnoticed into the new, slate-colored building going up behind the courthouse downtown. Even as work continues on the jail annex, … Read more
Culture Watch blind-sided Roberson I appreciate your usual good judgment and decent arts-and-culture reportage, from which our organization and our members have often benefited. In fact, the existence of your newspaper itself was one reason that our organization chose Asheville as the host city for the Stoneleaf Theatre Festival. Our organization and many of our … Read more
Campaign calendar • Wed, Oct. 25: “Generating Solutions — A Candidate Forum on Energy and the Environment” takes place from 6 to 8 p.m. at Pack Place in downtown Asheville. The forum is sponsored by Environment North Carolina, the new home of NCPIRG’s environmental work. Candidates for U.S. House District 11, N.C Senate District 49, … Read more
“Robinson Creek has a long history of flooding. … These are thunderstorm rains, not 100-year floods.” — Brookwood resident James Fox The biggest splash at the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners’ Oct. 17 meeting came not during the formal session but during the public-comment period that preceded it. Members of the neighborhood associations in Brookwood … Read more
Most voters don’t thrill to developments in the clerk of court race. They don’t pay attention to which candidate spends more. Most of them, it’s probably safe to say, don’t care a whit about who occupies the office, so long as he or she is not an Al-Qaeda affiliate. Don Yelton, the Republican challenger to … Read more
Buncombe County sheriff candidates Van Duncan and Bobby Medford met for their first public debate at an Oct. 18 luncheon organized by the Leadership Asheville Forum at the Country Club of Asheville. In his opening statement, before a crowd about 75 people, the Republican incumbent Medford outlined his local roots and said he wasn’t running … Read more
“We owe it to the people to fix our pipes and fix our plants and not be paralyzed by a process that is out of our hands.” Vice Mayor Holly Jones The capital-improvements fee — an extra charge on city water bills to fund infrastructure repairs — has surfaced repeatedly in recent weeks. In July, … Read more
