MOUNT AIRY — The Barter Theatre, which has operated since the Great Depression, reportedly draws 160,000 people a year to the charming mountain town of Abingdon, Virginia. Officials in Mount Airy — who already traffic on the celebrity of native Andy Griffith and the mythical town of Mayberry — think they should risk tax money...
When conservatives advocate smaller government, they do it not because they are “pro-business” but because they are pro-progress.
A $55.7 million expansion by the N.C. Global TransPark’s anchor tenant would bring that company’s total investment to less than half of what then-Gov. Mike Easley promised in 2008. Wichita, Kansas-based Spirit AeroSystems is the world’s largest independent supplier of commercial airplane assemblies and components, and it’s one of just a few tenants at the...
I’ve enjoyed following the drama surrounding location of Amazon’s second headquarters and, make no mistake, drama it certainly has been. Amazon probably missed an opportunity by simply issuing a request for proposal rather than turning it into a reality TV series available exclusively on Prime. Tucson tried to give Jeff Bezos a cactus. Stonecrest, Georgia, offered to rename part of itself Amazon. Birmingham has...
Former Wilmington-area theater owner Finley Powell on April 22 committed suicide at a Kure Beach house owned by his father. He was 52 and left behind a wife and three children. The day he died, the Greensboro News & Record published a story that Powell was living a double life. From 2010-15, he was an...
RALEIGH — At an emergency closed-session meeting Wednesday night, less than a week after Gov. Pat McCrory announced a $272 million CSX rail terminal project near Selma, the Johnston County Board of Commissioners issued a statement opposing both the project at the current location and the railroad company’s threats to use eminent domain to acquire property for the transportation hub.
RALEIGH — Saying the current plan is antiquated, a legislative agency on Monday recommended that the state scrap its three-tiered system for awarding economic development grants. “The economic development tier system, which was designed to award tax incentives, has outlived its purpose,” said Sara Nienow, senior program evaluator at the General Assembly’s Program Evaluation Division. “Measurement at the county level fails to identify struggling communities located within prosperous counties.”
SALISBURY — The city of Salisbury’s website boasts that it is “America’s first 10 gig city,” noting that anyone who connects to the municipal Fibrant broadband network has access to Internet connection speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second. But a technology analyst questions the wisdom of city leaders gambling with taxpayer funding over such a risky endeavor.
RALEIGH — N.C. counties entered into incentives contracts totaling nearly $284 million from 2009 to 2014, according to a first-of-its-kind John Locke Foundation Policy Report compiling statewide local incentives data. The report shows actual incentives payments totaled $144 million over the same five-year period. Report authors urge the N.C. General Assembly to consider changing state law to make local incentives information more transparent.
RALEIGH — While Duke Energy is passing higher costs to ratepayers because state law forces it to purchase renewable energy, the utility also claimed $62.8 million in tax write-offs in 2014 for its own investments in green power projects.
RALEIGH — An unusual coalition of 12 liberal Democrats and 11 conservative Republicans comprised the only formal opposition to the $22.1-billion General Fund budget passed around 1:00 a.m. May 22 by the state House of Representatives. The spending plan, approved by a 93-23 vote, is expected to undergo dramatic changes in the Senate and received a less-than-enthusiastic response by Gov. Pat McCrory, who has tended to align more closely with the lower chamber in fiscal debates.
