mission area within the United States Department of Agriculture
Shannon Watkins of the Martin Center writes about the role higher education can play in boosting the economic status of rural North Carolina. Higher education officials tend to be optimistic…
Dan Way writes for Carolina Journal that Ronald Penny, State Revenue Secretary, warns that small municipalities in rural counties may not survive due to losing residents and tax base. State…
Last week, the NC Department of Commerce announced various grants to rural communities. Their press release opened with this: The North Carolina Rural Infrastructure Authority (RIA) approved 16 grant requests…
History may often rhyme, but legislation lacks the imagination to do that, so it shows up with new names for previously rejected programs. The North Carolina Rural Job Creation Fund is this…
It’s not big news because it’s a renewable energy corporation. Still, what National Review reports here is disturbing: NextEra Energy, which bills itself on its website as “the world’s largest generator…
Kari Travis reports for Carolina Journal Online on the N.C. Senate’s plan to boost teacher pay. Michael Lowrey’s Daily Journal explains there is no one-size-fits-all strategy to cure what ails…
There is a proposal in the General Assembly to reallocate sales tax revenues in a way that benefits rural counties and hurts urban counties. Jim Baker, a Madison County commissioner…
In 2010, JDC Manufacturing, a real estate company owned and managed by Sen. Kay Hagan’s husband Charles “Chip” Hagan and his brothers John and David, applied for and received a…
At a regional meeting held at Western Carolina University, county commissioners spoke against reductions in state aid. They did not approve of the governor’s proposed cuts to Education Lottery funding…
Here is yet another example of how that golden cornucopia of free money just blows more golden cornucopias out its little ears, and so on, and so on . .…
What is a city without a heart? In order to help the Town of Fletcher find one, the Wizard, acting through the USDA’s Community Facility Direct Loan program, has awarded…
The General Assembly is saving us again with its resplendent economic policies. A beneficent grant, no doubt a sacfrifice out of the legislators’ own hard-earned savings, will create jobs. Don’t…