Working in the National Park Service has taken Tracy Swartout all around the country. But in many ways, her new role as superintendent of the Blue Ridge Parkway, based at the service’s office in Asheville, is a homecoming. Swartout grew up in Columbia, S.C., and has many fond memories traveling along the park’s 469-mile route […]
“One million species face extinction by 2050, including the red-winged blackbird, which travels through Asheville and the Arctic Refuge.”
According to Redfin, a nationwide real estate brokerage, the average real estate budget for an outsider moving to Asheville was $615,500 as of April, 31% higher than the average local budget of $469,000. That disparity between outside and local buyers was greater than in either Charlotte or Raleigh.
“I call upon locally important environmental groups to take a stand on this issue in this time of emergency climate crisis.”
“Ultimately, favoritism is handed toward developers and bottom lines, while major impacting projects are slipped past under the radar. People don’t get a fair chance to oppose such, let alone win.”
“Can we allow for growth and address our affordable housing needs while also combating climate change and maintaining the character of our neighborhoods?”
“What is emerging is the idea that we’re now able to quantify what’s happening,” says Jennifer Harrison, agriculture and land resource director for Buncombe County, about the ability of farmers to combat climate change through practices like cover cropping and rotational grazing.
Asheville could prosper, believes Mack Pearsall, by monetizing a unique yet little-known asset: Its federal archive of climate and weather data — the largest such collection among all the nations on Earth — curated by a local talent bank that includes several Nobel laureates and scores of climate scientists.
Ongoing habitat loss and warming temperatures present an existential threat to Western North Carolina’s only native trout species, the brook trout.
For activists like Victoria Estes, environmental scientists and others, the existential threat of climate change is taking an increasing toll on their mental health and well-being.
“Faced with significant development pressures, we must do what we can to protect some of the region’s natural habitat and biodiversity, as well as our most productive farmland.”
Increasing heat and stronger storms threaten trout populations dependent on clean, cold, oxygen-rich water. A decline in trout production could hurt farmers and recreational fishermen.
“If it was truly perceived as an emergency, then I think we would be doing more and talking about it more,” says Asheville City Council member Kim Roney, who was elected in November on a platform that included a local Green New Deal and rapid renewable energy deployment.
In a year marked by a constant churn of updating numbers — COVID-19 dashboards, economic forecasts, political polls — Assistant Editor Daniel Walton took comfort in stories that were able to report more deeply on some of the issues facing Western North Carolina.
For many environmental organizations across Western North Carolina, COVID-19 fell like a lightning-struck tree across the path to progress. But like an intrepid hiker, WNC’s activists and organizers have bushwhacked new trails for action in the world of the pandemic.
“The Asheville High School Environmental Science program invites you, Western North Carolina, to join us in a three-week engagement competition, the Drawdown EcoChallenge, which is rooted in learning about and practicing the solutions to reverse global warming.”
Deteriorating forest roads damage the ecosystem and limit access essential for forest management and the forest-product economy.
“Adding more population, cars and demand on natural resources is only going to bring extreme climate change right here faster.”
“It’s going to cost gazillions to retool the economy, rebuild infrastructure and control COVID-19. That’s just the icing on the cake. The cake is global warming.”
“Without a direct and unflinching acknowledgment of the climate crisis, we cannot ensure the future of North Carolina agriculture.”
In their first public face-off, the candidates vying for the increasingly competitive 11th District congressional seat, Republican Madison Cawthorn and Democrat Moe Davis, touted their differences on just about all issues and hurled accusations, with each calling the other “fast and loose” with the facts. Who was telling the truth?
