Developers Withdraw Charlotte Street Request

September 17, 2021Read more

After nearly a year of intense opposition from community activists, the developers of the proposed 101 Charlotte Street development formally withdrew their application to the City of Asheville for special permission to exceed current zoning restrictions along the near-northside Asheville corridor.

The out-of-state developer, RCG of Massachusetts, and its local landowner partner,

The out-of-state developer, RCG of Massachusetts, and its local landowner partner, Killian Chestnut Residential Properties, planned to tear down and replace a dozen century-old homes with a new apartment complex, parking garage, retail space, office space, condominiums and rowhouses on the nearly seven-acre 100-block of Charlotte Street.

On Friday, the development team withdrew its request for a variance from the city that would have allowed buildings along Charlotte Street to be five stories tall, significantly taller than current zoning regulations allow. The withdrawal means that, at least for now, development will proceed under current zoning guidelines intended to prevent over-development.

Opponents, including the Preservation Society of Asheville and Buncombe County (PSABC) and the Charlotte Street Neighborhood Association, cheered the news, but said their fight to save the existing homes was not over.

“While we are very pleased that the developers are no longer moving forward with the project, the future of this block remains uncertain and there are a number of complicated zoning issues at play,” the PSABC wrote on Facebook. “We will continue to monitor the situation and to encourage the developers to work with us and the community towards a project we can all support.” — Peter Lewis

Trish Jones joins board of Asheville Watchdog

September 9, 2021Read more

Trish Jones, a former senior executive at Turner Broadcasting System in Atlanta, has joined Asheville Watchdog’s Board of Directors. As director she will help oversee overall direction and strategy of the year-old nonprofit news organization.

Trish Jones

Jones, a resident of Asheville, was senior director of business planning at the Coca-Cola Company of Atlanta before joining Turner.

Trish Jones

Jones, a resident of Asheville, was senior director of business planning at the Coca-Cola Company of Atlanta before joining Turner. At Turner she held roles as executive vice president and general counsel of Turner Broadcasting International and deputy general counsel of the Turner organization. She went on to become senior vice president and chief emerging technologies officer.

A graduate of Spring Hill College and the University of Richmond School of Law, she earned a master’s degree in international law at Georgetown University Law Center. She is a member of the Virginia and Georgia state bar associations.

Jones is also a director of the National Center for Women & Information Technology, a nonprofit coalition that works to increase diversity in IT and computing, and on the board of the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association.

Jones and her spouse, Lisa, have four-legged family members, Mattie, a 16-year-old Shih Tzu; Harper, a newly adopted English Cream Golden Retriever puppy; and CoCo, a feline rescue. They enjoy travel, hiking, and fly-fishing the local streams and rivers. — Peter Lewis

Not-so-happy Labor Day: Study ranks North Carolina “worst” for working women

September 6, 2021Read more

For the second straight year, North Carolina ranks last overall in the United States for meeting the needs of working families, and especially in meeting the needs of working women, according to an annual study by Oxfam, the international anti-poverty organization.

The study, called the “Best and Worst States to Work in America 2021,” found that North Carolina “provides no support for workers’ rights to organize,

The study, called the “Best and Worst States to Work in America 2021,” found that North Carolina “provides no support for workers’ rights to organize, does not exceed the federal minimum wage, and has very few worker protection policies.” In ranking North Carolina at the bottom for working women, Oxfam cited the lack of a mandate for paid leave, no accommodation for pregnancy, and no protection against sexual harassment.

Oregon topped the list of “best places to work,” which surveyed working conditions in all 50 states plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.

Unlike many other states, North Carolina has not raised its minimum wage beyond the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, a level not changed since 2009, or the federal minimum tipped wage of $2.13 an hour, which has not increased in 30 years. In theory, employers of tipped wage earners are legally obligated to ensure that tipped employees earn at least the state minimum wage if tips fall short. However, the Oxfam report said, enforcement of this mandate is “paltry at best.”

Notably, women make up 69 percent of the tipped minimum wage workforce, and 36 percent of them are mothers, half of whom are single mothers, according to the report.

Asheville-based nonprofit Just Economics, which studies wage and cost of living issues in western North Carolina, put the 2021 “living wage” for the Asheville metro area at $17.30 an hour. The figure is calculated using the Universal Living Wage Formula, which is based on a 40-hour work week, the Fair Market Rent for Asheville determined by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, and another HUD guideline that no more than 30 percent of a person’s gross monthly income should be spent on housing.

HUD determined that the Fair Market Rent for a safe apartment in Asheville is $1,255 including utilities for a two-bedroom apartment. The statewide average for North Carolina is $919.

The 2019 Bowen Report on housing needs for the City of Asheville found that 46.8% of renters were cost burdened, meaning they spent more than 30 percent of their income on housing, and 19.4 percent were severely cost burdened, paying more than 50 percent of their income on housing. And that report was completed before the latest surge in Asheville housing prices.

In a meeting Sept. 2, the city’s Affordable Housing Advisory Committee noted that no houses were for sale in Asheville for less than $275,000. In August 2021, the real estate company Redfin reported, Asheville home prices were up 22.1 percent compared to last year, selling for a median price of $428,000. — Barbara Durr

Cawthorn targeted by panel investigating Jan. 6 attack

September 5, 2021Read more

[Sept. 5] Western North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn is among the Republican members of Congress whose records are being targeted by the special committee investigating the fatal Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, The New York Times is reporting.

The committee has asked technology firms to preserve the phone and social media records of 11 far-right members of Congress,

The committee has asked technology firms to preserve the phone and social media records of 11 far-right members of Congress, including Cawthorn, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, and Jim Jordan of Ohio, the newspaper reported.

“These are the individuals who have been publicly supportive of Jan. 6 and the people who participated in the insurrection on Jan. 6,” Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi and the panel’s chairman, told The Times.

“We need to find out exactly what their level of participation in this event was,” he said. “If you helped raise money, if you provided misinformation to people, if you served on a planning committee — whatever your role in Jan. 6, I think the public has a right to know.”

Cawthorn rallied the crowd at a pro-Trump protest just before the attack on the Capitol. During the attack, while hiding in the basement, he called a right-wing radio show to say the rioters were “paid by the Democratic machine” and that he had carried loaded weapons into the Capitol.

At a recent GOP meeting in Macon County, Cawthorn said people arrested for their roles in the attack are “political prisoners” and warned of “bloodshed” over a “rigged” American election system. Among a number of provocative and misleading statements at the Macon rally, Cawthorn said in response to a question that “we are actively working on” plans for another similar protest in Washington. — Sally Kestin

Mission Nurses’ Union Calls for Public Protest, Citing Patient Safety

September 1, 2021Read more

[Sept. 1] The labor union representing registered nurses at Mission Hospital said nurses will stage a protest Thursday morning to call attention what it called “patient safety and unsafe working conditions” at Asheville’s flagship hospital system.

Among other complaints, the National Nurses Organizing Committee of National Nurses United asserted that HCA Healthcare-owned Mission Hospital scheduled symptomatic,

Among other complaints, the National Nurses Organizing Committee of National Nurses United asserted that HCA Healthcare-owned Mission Hospital scheduled symptomatic, COVID-positive nurses to work at the hospital, and failed to provide nurses with adequate masks, gowns, gloves and other personal protective equipment.

In a statement, Hannah Drummond, a registered nurse in Mission’s emergency department, said hospital administrators have ignored “months” of staff complaints about safety standards, including staffing. “We have a duty to the Asheville community to provide optimal care, and we will continue our advocacy until Mission is a safe place for our patients,” she said.

“We’re disappointed that the labor union would attempt to pull people away from patient care for a rally during COVID and not follow the mutually agreed upon process that they requested as recently as July,” JC Sadler, Vice President for Communications and Community Strategy at the North Carolina Division of HCA Healthcare, said when asked by Asheville Watchdog for a response to the union’s statement. “Caring for our patients and employees safely is our priority. We have ample PPE for our colleagues, require universal masking, and follow CDC protocols for returning employees to work.”

The protest is scheduled for 8 a.m. Sept. 2 at the corner of Biltmore Avenue and Hospital Drive. — P.L.

Pardee Hospital Requires All Staff to be Vaccinated

August 23, 2021Read more

Pardee UNC Health Care in Hendersonville on Monday became the first hospital in western North Carolina to make COVID-19 vaccinations mandatory for all staff, according to a memo sent Aug. 23 to employees by the hospital’s president. The announcement came within hours of formal approval of the Pfizer vaccine by the federal Food and Drug Administration.

Despite a local surge in COVID cases related to the highly contagious delta variant of the virus, vaccinations remained voluntary on Monday for healthcare workers at Mission Hospital in Asheville and AdventHealth Hendersonville. The vast majority of COVID infections, hospitalizations, and deaths nationwide are among unvaccinated people.

James M. Kirby II, president and CEO of Pardee, set a Nov. 12 deadline for all workers to be vaccinated, but his memo did not specify the consequences for noncompliance. “As with the flu vaccine, we will review requests for a medical or religious exemption to this requirement,” he wrote. “Full policy details will be shared by the end of this week.”

Hospitals nationwide are struggling with staffing shortages, especially among nurses and nursing assistants, and hospital administrators elsewhere have said they fear staff will quit if required to get vaccinated.

“We hope that the FDA approval of the Pfizer vaccine encourages those who were previously hesitant to decide to get the vaccine,” said Nancy Lindell, director of public and media relations at HCA Healthcare North Carolina Division-Mission Health. “Our infectious disease experts as well as those at the CDC are strongly encouraging vaccination as a critical step to protect individuals from the virus, but at this time our colleagues are not required to be vaccinated for COVID-19.”

“AdventHealth has not mandated vaccines for our team members,” Victoria Dunkle, director of communications and public relations at AdventHealth Hendersonville, told The Watchdog on Monday. “Based on scientific evidence, COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective at reducing the risk of severe illness, hospitalization and death from COVID-19,” she said. — P.L.

Local Residents Sue HCA, Alleging Overcharging at Mission Hospital

August 10, 2021Read more

Since being acquired by the giant for-profit hospital chain HCA Healthcare, Mission Health and its Mission Hospital flagship have become the most expensive hospital system in North Carolina for many procedures, with prices often double the state average, according to a class-action lawsuit filed Tuesday against HCA Healthcare and its Mission Health subsidiary in Asheville.

The 87-page lawsuit, filed in Superior Court in Buncombe County by a group of local residents, alleges that Nashville-based HCA illegally used its effective monopoly market power in the region to raise prices while reducing the quality of care at the six hospitals and multiple clinics it operates in Western North Carolina, harming doctors and consumers.

“Once we have been served with the lawsuit, we will respond appropriately through the legal process,” Nancy Lindell, division director for public and media relations for HCA Healthcare North Carolina Division and Mission Health, said in a statement. “Mission Health is committed to the health and well-being of every person who comes to us for care, and we are proud of our dedicated hospital teams that are facing the many challenges of this pandemic and the exceptional care they have provided to our patients.”

Many of the allegations against HCA and Mission Health were first reported by Asheville Watchdog.

The plaintiffs in the class-action suit include Katherine Button, Faith Cook, and Will Overfelt of Asheville, Richard Nash of Candler, William Davis of Clyde, and Jonathan Powell of Morganton. The complaint was prepared by the law firms Wallace & Graham of Salisbury, N.C., and Fairmark Partners of Washington, D.C. — P.L.

Update: Covid cases spike among younger, unvaccinated

July 21, 2021Read more

The Delta variant of the SARS-COVID-19 virus is spreading “exponentially,” doubling since last week, and about 92 percent of all new cases in Buncombe County are among individuals who are not fully vaccinated, Buncombe County Public Health Director Stacie Saunders said Wednesday. The average age of newly infected individuals is 39, Saunders said.

Even so,

Even so, Gov. Roy Cooper said his executive order mandating facial masks at schools, camps, and child care facilities will expire next week and will not be renewed. However, Mandy Cohen, secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Services, said Wednesday she and Cooper “strongly recommend” masks for all students, teachers, and staff inside elementary and middle school facilities even if adults or students 12 and older have been fully vaccinated.

Three-fourths of North Carolina’s children 12 and older have not been vaccinated, according to Cohen and Cooper, leaving most schools vulnerable to the Delta variant of COVID-19. — P.L.

COVID-19 cases rise sharply a month before schools open

July 20, 2021Read more

New COVID-19 cases are rising sharply in Buncombe County in the past two weeks, but public schools in Asheville and Buncombe County will resume in-person classes a month from now without requiring students, faculty or staff to be vaccinated against the coronavirus.

Most of the average 18 new cases a day — triple the number of early July but far fewer than at the height of the pandemic in January —are among people who have not been vaccinated for the coronavirus,

All children age 12 and older are eligible for free COVID-19 vaccinations — adults too — and Asheville and Buncombe County schools hosted free immunization clinics this summer. But COVID-19 vaccinations are voluntary, and any decision to make them mandatory for students, faculty, and staff ahead of the scheduled Aug. 23 opening would have to come from the state health department and the Department of Public Instruction, school officials said.

Health officials say current vaccines are effective against the Delta variant, but only 51 percent of Buncombe County adults are fully vaccinated, according to figures updated Tuesday by the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services.

As of Tuesday, “Asheville City Schools is NOT requiring our students or staff to receive a COVID-19 vaccine prior to the start of the 2021-2022 school year,” Ashley-Michelle Thublin, the system’s executive director of communications, told Asheville Watchdog via email.

“We will return to school in person, five days a week in August,” Stacia Harris, director of communications for Buncombe County Schools, emailed The Watchdog, adding, “BCS is not requiring COVID-19 vaccines for students or staff to begin school in August.”

All students will still be required to have been vaccinated for diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, polio, measles, rubella, mumps, flu, chickenpox, hepatitis B, and meningitis. By state law, school principals are required to deny admittance to any student who has not been vaccinated for these diseases.

One-hundred years ago, before an effective vaccine against diphtheria was developed, the disease killed 1,864 North Carolinians in the period 1920-24. The North Carolina General Assembly made the diphtheria vaccine mandatory for schoolchildren in 1939. The disease is now rare.

North Carolina was the first state to make a polio vaccine mandatory for schoolchildren, in 1959. A decade earlier, in 1948, polio killed 143 children and adults in the state and crippled thousands more. Today the disease is virtually eliminated. — P.L.

Cawthorn opposes removing statues of white supremacists

June 30, 2021Read more

Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC11) voted by proxy Tuesday against a House bill to remove statues of white supremacists and pro-slavery Confederate sympathizers from the halls of Congress. The resolution passed with bipartisan support, 285 to 120, with three North Carolina Republicans joining the Democrats in voting to replace the statues.

The bill now goes to the Senate.

The bill now goes to the Senate. A similar resolution passed the House last year, 305-113, but then-majority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) did not allow it to come up for a Senate vote.

The bill opposed by Cawthorn calls for the removal of “all Confederate statues and Confederate busts from any area of the United States Capitol which is accessible to the public.” It also specifically calls for removing a statue honoring former North Carolina Gov. Charles Brantley Aycock, who was a key figure in fomenting the Wilmington massacre of 1898, in which a mob of some 2,000 whites attacked and killed at least 60 and possibly more than 300 Black residents.

Charles B. Aycock

As governor, Aycock wrote that North Carolina had “solved the negro problem” by “as far as possible under the Fifteenth Amendment to disfranchise him.” “He is unfit to vote,” Aycock wrote.

In 2018 the state of North Carolina voted to replace the Aycock statue — on display in the Crypt of the U.S. Capitol — with one of the Rev. Billy Graham, the Christian evangelist from Montreat, who died earlier that year, but the replacement has not yet happened. Each state has two statues in the Capitol’s National Statuary collection; North Carolina’s other statue is of Zebulon B. Vance, a Confederate officer, two-time governor, U.S. senator, slaveholder, and avowed white supremacist whose monument in downtown Asheville was demolished this year.

The bill Cawthorn opposed also specifically calls for replacing a bust honoring former Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Brooke Taney, a white supremacist who delivered the majority opinion in the Dred Scott decision of 1857, with one of Thurgood Marshall, the court’s first African-American justice and a champion of the civil rights movement.

In Scott, Taney wrote that Blacks were “beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race.” His landmark decision argued that “any person descended from Africans,” whether enslaved or free, would never be eligible for citizenship in the United States and that the federal government had no right to forbid or abolish slavery in expansion states.

Asheville Watchdog requested comment from Cawthorn’s office about his opposition to removing the statues and busts, but has not yet received a response. Cawthorn was traveling to Texas for a media event at the Mexican border with former President Donald Trump.

But in an interview with The Washington Examiner a year ago, then-candidate Cawthorn spoke in favor of removing public monuments to Confederate leaders. “Gen. Lee was a great man, an incredible man,” Cawthorn told the newspaper, “but I think he was on the wrong side of history, and I don’t think we should romanticize the side of history he was on.” — P.L.

[Editor’s note: This story was updated to note that because he was traveling, Rep. Cawthorn instructed his “nay” vote to be cast by his proxy, Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX).]

City must pay legal fees to local media, judge rules

June 24, 2021Read more

The city of Asheville must pay nearly $4,200 in legal fees to a coalition of local media organizations that sued the city for trying to bar news reporters from a public meeting in March. The coalition, including Asheville Watchdog, The Asheville Citizen Times, Mountain Xpress, Blue Ridge Public Radio, and Carolina Public Press, successfully sued the city, citing North Carolina’s open meetings law, and on Tuesday Buncombe County Superior Court Judge Steven Warren ruled that the city must pay the coalition’s legal fees.

“We are grateful that Judge Warren apparently agreed that it was important not only for the city of Asheville to comply with the open meetings law but to be accountable when they tried to sidestep it,” said Amanda Warren, the lawyer who represented the local media coalition. “A different ruling could have encouraged public bodies and public agencies to flout the law with little consequence.”

Brad R. Branham, Asheville’s city attorney, told Mountain Xpress that he disagreed with Judge Warren’s rulings and that “it is difficult to say that this particular ruling would have any bearing on Council meetings moving forward.” He declined to say how much the city spent on its legal defense.

Urban Renewal Impact website to be launched June 24

June 22, 2021Read more

A new website that allows residents to tell their stories about the impact of the urban renewal program that uprooted the Black community from its traditional neighborhoods in Asheville will be launched Thursday, part of the first phase of city’s plan to implement its July 2020 resolution to provide reparations to the Black community.

The website, “Urban Renewal Impact,” was created by Priscilla Ndiaye Robinson, a former Southside resident and researcher on urban renewal. Robinson said her work, which was supported by funding in 2021 from the Preservation Society of Asheville and Buncombe County, is expected to be “an important resource in the truth-and-reconciliation conversations on reparations in Asheville.”

A multiyear digital collaboration with local citizens and experts, the website focuses on urban renewal programs in the 1950s to 1980s that displaced Black communities from such areas as Valley Street (now South Charlotte St.) and Southside (also called East Riverside in the urban renewal program). (See Asheville Watchdog’s stories on reparations here and Black home ownership here.)

Robinson unveils the website on in the evening of June 24th. It can be accessed through this link: http://urbanrenewalimpact.org/ after the 7 p.m. launch. — B.D.

Nurses to picket Mission Hospital, citing concerns about safety

June 14, 2021Read more

The labor union representing Mission Hospital nurses said members will picket two hospital facilities in Asheville June 15 to highlight concerns about under-staffing that, they contend, has affected the safety of patient care. The labor action is the latest in a growing fusillade of complaints about the safety and quality of patient care made to regulators and to Asheville Watchdog since for-profit HCA Healthcare took over nonprofit Mission Health in 2019.

In announcing the picket, National Nurses Organizing Committee North Carolina said Mission and St. Joseph hospitals — both owned and operated by HCA — need to make improvements to retain experienced registered nurses (RNs) and recruit new ones. Working conditions at Mission make it hard to attract new recruits, the union committee said.

Asked to comment on the union’s statement, Nancy Lindell, Director of Public and Media Relations for HCA Healthcare North Carolina Division and Mission Health, said in an emailed statement: “Since mid-February Mission Hospital has held roughly a dozen bargaining sessions with the union representatives and, in those sessions, the parties have reached more than 30 tentative agreements” on topics including health and safety.

“Despite this progress, we understand that this kind of picketing activity sometimes occurs when a union and an employer are engaged in negotiations for a contract, as we are with this union,” Lindell wrote. “This is merely a form of demonstration that the union is legally allowed to do. We want the public to be assured that Mission Hospital remains open and continues to provide the quality patient care that Mission Hospital has always provided.”

In calling for picketing, Mission nurses said hospital management has consistently failed to adhere to its own staffing standards, including nurse to patient ratios.

“Since HCA purchased our hospital in 2019, the management has cut corners on safe patient care by cutting support staff and violating their own nurse staffing grids,” said Shelby Runkles, a cardiovascular Intensive Care Unit RN at Mission. “With each additional patient, nurses are more prone to make mistakes and the risk of serious complications increases.”

Registered nurses at HCA Mission voted overwhelmingly last September to join National Nurses Organizing Committee-North Carolina, an affiliate of National Nurses United (NNU), and are negotiating with HCA Mission on a first collective bargaining agreement. The pickets are scheduled to be at Mission Hospital at 509 Biltmore Avenue and Mission’s St. Joseph Campus at 428 Biltmore Avenue from 8 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Tuesday. — Barbara Durr

Stein hints at second thoughts about Mission sale to HCA

June 8, 2021Read more

Although he approved HCA’s purchase of Mission Health in 2018, Attorney General Josh Stein now appears to be having second thoughts about that sale. In a June 2 statement regarding a different hospital merger, he said he had “real concerns” about hospital consolidations, and specifically named HCA and Mission. “Bigger doesn’t always mean better.

Stein approved the deal that ended more than 130 years of Mission’s legacy of putting quality of care over profits. But now, he said, his office has had more than 100 complaints from patients about quality of care and billing. “Consolidations drive up already inordinate health care costs,” Stein said. He urged hospital administrators, including those at HCA, to be transparent on their pricing.

HCA raised prices 10 percent shortly after taking control of Mission in 2019. As reported in The Wall Street Journal in March, a number of HCA hospitals violated federal price transparency rules that required hospitals to post their prices starting in January 2021. HCA embedded coding in its website to hide prices from consumers trying to understand what their costs might be, The Journal found. After The Journal revealed the blocking links, HCA removed them.

State Treasurer Dale R. Folwell, reacting to the Journal article, criticized Stein in March for not taking action “to protect consumers.”

“I am disappointed by hospitals’ pattern of deceit,” Folwell wrote March 31. “Patients and taxpayers deserve to know what they’re paying for care. We must get rid of secret contracts and push the power down to the consumer. The attorney general needs to be involved.”

It is not the first time Stein has warned HCA about transparency. More than a year ago, the attorney general wrote to Greg Lowe, president of the North Carolina division of HCA Healthcare, to raise concerns including “a surge in complaints about quality of care” and about HCA’s transparency in billing patients.

In his latest letter to hospital administrators, Stein said obfuscation on pricing “layers needless anxiety and uncertainty on top of what are already some of the most stressful circumstances a person can face.” — B.D.

Abolish Department of Education, Cawthorn tells NC GOP leaders

June 6, 2021Read more

Rep. Madison Cawthorn visits Trump Tower in New York City June 2 (PHOTO CREDIT DAILY MAIL)

U.S. Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC11), speaking at the North Carolina Republican Party’s Old North State Dinner on June 4 in Greenville, called for abolishing the federal Department of Education, The East Carolinian reported.

Rep. Madison Cawthorn visits Trump Tower in New York City June 2 (PHOTO CREDIT DAILY MAIL)

“We need to abolish the Department of Education because no Washington D.C. bureaucrat, no one who wants to push critical race theory, nobody who believes that they should indoctrinate our children at a young age and force politics upon them should be allowed to be in charge of our schools,” Cawthorn was quoted as saying.

Critical race theory is an academic discipline, primarily taught in law schools, that examines why racial inequality persists in the United States despite Constitutional guarantees and two centuries of laws enacted to codify equality and equal justice. It argues that racism is embedded in the American social system and enabled by the legal system.

“We need to allow the next generation to be raised in a nation where they’re not politicized from the age of five,” Cawthorn said. “When we have drag queens in our public libraries reading to our children, the libraries that we paid for … it is up to us to fight as hard as we possibly can for the next generation.”

Cawthorn, who was home-schooled and left college after one semester, sits on the House Committee of Education and Labor.

Cawthorn also called for abolishing the federal income tax and impeaching judges who “do not believe in our constitution.”

Former President Donald Trump spoke at the North Carolina dinner June 5. Cawthorn made an unannounced visit to New York City on June 2 and was photographed leaving Trump’s New York residence. — P.L.

HCA and Google partner to mine patient data

May 27, 2021Read more

Mission Hospital (Photo credit: Bloomberg)

HCA and Google have agreed to work together to develop healthcare algorithms using patient records, The Wall Street Journal reported May 26. The patient records, including digital health records and data from internet-connected medical devices, would be extracted from HCA’s 186 hospitals and more than 2,000 clinics and facilities across the country,

Mission Hospital (Photo credit: Bloomberg)

The new multi-year agreement expands a previous alliance between the two companies to share patient health data related to COVID-19. Google and HCA engineers will work to develop algorithms to “help improve operating efficiency, monitor patients, and guide doctors’ decisions,” according to the companies.

“Data are spun off of every patient in real time,” said Dr. Jonathan Perlin, chief medical officer of HCA, which is based in Nashville, Tenn. “Part of what we’re building is a central nervous system to help interpret the various signals.”

Some of Google’s earlier forays into the $3 trillion healthcare industry have raised concerns about data privacy. Dr. Perlin told The Journal that HCA patient records would be stripped of identifying information before being shared with Google data scientists and that the hospital system would control access to the data. — P.L.

Blue Ridge Public Radio’s Feingold to Retire in 2021

May 25, 2021Read more

David Feingold (Photo credit: WLOS)

David Feingold, chief executive officer and general manager of Blue Ridge Public Radio, told staff this week that he plans to retire sometime before Thanksgiving, The Watchdog has learned. Feingold, 71, joined WCQS in July 2015 after a career in commercial radio and television broadcasting including six years as London bureau chief for CNN, and, for 16 years, as assistant general manager of NET, Nebraska’s statewide educational radio and television service. In Asheville, Feingold oversaw the creation of BPR News, a sister station to BPR Classic. A search committee has been formed by the BPR Board of Directors to find his replacement. Disclosure: Blue Ridge Public Radio is a publishing partner of Asheville Watchdog. — B.D.

Asheville native Joe West poised to break MLB record

May 25, 2021Read more

Major League Baseball umpire Joe West is scheduled to be behind home plate Tuesday night, working his 5,376th regular-season game. In doing so, “Country Joe” will break baseball’s umpiring record held by Hall of Famer Bill Klem, who died in 1951, the year before West was born in Asheville.

Besides calling balls and strikes,

Besides calling balls and strikes, West is famous for his feuds and confrontations with players and managers. Although his eyesight has been questioned on occasion, he has exquisite hearing, and last year ejected a team’s general manager who was yelling criticisms from a luxury box high above the playing field. In April West won $500,000 in a defamation lawsuit he brought against former major league catcher Paul Lo Duca, who falsely accused West of expanding the strike zone for pitcher Billy Wagner in return for Wagner letting West drive his classic 1957 Chevy.

West, who moved to Greenville, NC, for high school, was a star quarterback at Elon College (now Elon University). He plans to retire at the end of this season. West is a singer-songwriter and has recorded two country music albums, and is an avid golfer. Baseball scribes say he is almost certain to be elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Good luck, Joe! The Watchdog regrets that it cannot print this story in Braille so that you can read it. — P.L.

Update: Cawthorn taunts Liz Cheney after GOP purge

May 12, 2021Read more

Cawthorn, who backed Cheney, now calls for her ouster

May 11, 2021Read more

If there were a political Olympics, Madison Cawthorn would surely be a contender for a gold medal in back-flipping. In advance of this week’s House GOP vote on its leadership team, the 25-year-old congressman from Western North Carolina executed a perfect reverse somersault on Liz Cheney, whom he had supported for the GOP’s leadership just three months ago — only to run into a buzz saw of criticism from his far-right base on his Madison Cawthorn Chat channel on Telegram.

Last week, apparently chastened, Cawthorn posted a broadside attack headlined LIZ CHENEY MUST GO. He implied that his reason for flipping was that Cheney had fist-bumped President Biden when he entered the House chamber for a joint address to Congress last month. Cawthorn also urged readers to donate to his 2022 reelection campaign.

Rep. Madison Cawthorn posted this May 8 on Telegram

Cawthorn has also back-flipped since telling CNN anchor Pamela Brown in January that “the election wasn’t fraudulent” and that “Joseph R. Biden is our President.” He also joined 16 other GOP freshmen in signing a letter to President Biden expressing willingness to work with the Democratic administration in the “hope we can rise above the partisan fray.”

His Telegram followers booed him. Cawthorn has now reverted to calling the election “stolen,” writes that Donald and Melania Trump are still President and First Lady, vows to support “President Trump’s agenda,” and refers to President Biden and Vice President Harris simply as “Joe” and “Kamala.”

As for rising above the partisan fray, Cawthorn has voted against every proposal brought forward by Democrats, including his vote against pandemic relief programs and broadband expansion for Western North Carolina. — Tom Fiedler

Documentary shows how racial covenants segregated Asheville neighborhoods

April 29, 2021Read more

Asheville neighborhoods as we know them didn’t just happen. Racially restrictive covenants that barred the sale of homes to people of color have been among the many racist barriers to Black home ownership here. When Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity discovered such a covenant on a property it intended to develop, it decided to raise the profile of the issue by producing an 18-minute documentary.

“We hope this film expands peoples’ knowledge of how past laws and practices shaped the current housing landscape,” said Ariane Kjellquist, Habitat’s communications director. The film includes interviews with Buncombe County Commissioner Al Whitesides; Drew Reisinger, of the Buncombe County Registry of Deeds; Kel Compton, a Habitat homeowner; Sophie Dixon, of the Shiloh Community Association; Sarah Judson of the University of North Carolina at Asheville; and Parker Smith of Pisgah Legal Services. — B.D.

Free COVID-19 vaccinations, no appointment needed

April 28, 2021Read more

Buncombe County Health and Human Services is now offering free, walk-in COVID-19 vaccinations at the Buncombe County vaccination clinic located on the campus of A-B Tech. The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine is available to everyone 16 years of age and older at the A-B Tech location. The clinic is open Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday from 9 a.m.

Cawthorn calls Democrats “bastards”

April 28, 2021Read more

Rep. Madison Cawthorn told a Newsmax interviewer last week that “We have got to get Democrats out of power … we’ve got to take the majority away from these bastards.” Cawthorn, who told fellow House Republicans soon after taking office that his priority would be to seek publicity rather than to craft legislation, then posted a link to a Breitbart story about his interview to the Madison Cawthorn Chat channel on the social media platform Telegram. The Madison Cawthorn channel is popular with white supremacists, neo-Nazis, antisemites, QAnon adherents, Big Lie proponents, and other self-described “patriots.”

Cawthorn also agreed with the Newsmax interviewer that he believes Democrats are promoting a surge of refugees at the southern border in order to get cheap labor and register people to vote Democratic. “You know I absolutely think that’s exactly what it is,” Cawthorn said. “I think that the cartels want to make the money. I think the Democrats want to profit off the power. So I genuinely believe that this border crisis is something that they are actually promoting.” — T.F.

Soaring construction costs hammer affordable housing

April 22, 2021Read more

One of the city’s more interesting experiments on affordable housing is dead.

Paul D’Angelo, the Director of Community Development for Asheville, told the city’s Housing and Community Development Committee meeting this week that far higher constructions costs have nixed the project. Construction costs have risen more than 15% in the last year,

One of the city’s more interesting experiments on affordable housing is dead.

The proposal in West Asheville would have provided one of the few opportunities for the city to address home ownership for lower income residents. It would have built 11 single family homes at $275,000, and 12 condos, six of them one-bedrooms at $199,00 and six two-bedrooms at $239,000.

A $1.1 million loan that was approved for the developer from the City’s Housing Trust Fund will now be returned to the fund. — Barbara Durr

HCA-Mission monitor invites public comments

April 19, 2021Read more

Gibbins Advisors, the independent monitor approved by Attorney General Josh Stein to make sure HCA Healthcare adheres to the conditions he placed on its 2019 purchase of Asheville-based Mission Health System, says it wants to hear from Asheville Watchdog readers.

“The Independent Monitor for Mission Health System encourages comments from the community,”

“The Independent Monitor for Mission Health System encourages comments from the community,” a spokesman wrote to The Watchdog. “The Independent Monitor catalogs all commentary to assist it in its monitoring work. Commentary is also passed along to HCA to be addressed. Respondents can choose to submit information anonymously or include their contact information so that HCA may follow up directly. The contact form is available at https://www.independentmonitormhs.com/contact or you can email the Independent Monitor at independentmonitor@gibbinsadvisors.com.”

Readers are also invited to follow the activity of the Independent Monitor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/independent-monitor-for-mission-health-system/ — Peter H. Lewis

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Most new COVID-19 cases in NC are among school children (WRAL)

For the first time in the pandemic, children make up the highest number of new coronavirus cases reported in North Carolina, state officials said on Monday. Children under 18 are also the largest age group of patients seeking emergency treatment for coronavirus, officials said.

“Children can spread [it] to other people and can spread to other adults. There are numerous, numerous studies that children are quite efficient spreaders to their households,” said Dr. Elizabeth Tilson, state health director and the chief medical officer for the Department of Health and Human Services.

The majority of cases reported since late August and September are in children and young adults, state data shows, and not just because they are being tested more, Tilson said. The percentage of positive tests among children is also higher than any other age group. — Peter Lewis

Majority of N.C. K-12 students failed state exams last year (AP)

The majority of North Carolina public school students taking standardized state exams in reading, math and science last school year failed them, the Associated Press reported. State education leaders cautioned against making year-over-year comparisons with the tests taken during a school year marked by limited in-person instruction due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Only 45.4% of K-12 students passed the exams for the 2020-21 school year, according to results released at a State Board of Education meeting Sept. 1. — P.L.

Survey: Republican trust in news media plunged since 2016 (Pew)

In the past five years, the percentage of Republicans with at least some trust in national news organizations fell by half, dropping from 70% in 2016 to 35% this year. This decline is fueling the continued widening of the partisan gap in trust of the media, according to a new Pew Research Center survey.

Seventy-eight percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents say they have “a lot” or “some” trust in the information that comes from national news organizations, compared to 35 percent for Republicans and Republican leaners.

A similar partisan divide emerges when it comes to local news, though to a lesser extent. As of June 2021, Democrats are 18 percentage points more likely than Republicans to have at least some trust in the information that comes from local news organizations (84% vs. 66%, respectively). Five years ago, 85% of Democrats had at least some trust in local news organizations, while 79% of Republicans did. — P.L.

Patients pay thousands more at HCA trauma centers (Kaiser Health News)

HCA Healthcare, which operates the only designated trauma center in Western North Carolina at Asheville’s Mission Hospital, is allegedly making a “money grab” on trauma centers, according to a report in Kaiser Health News. Trauma centers, which are highly lucrative for hospitals, make specialized physicians and equipment available round-the-clock and typically treat severely injured people.

HCA’s fees for treatment at its trauma centers are sometimes 10 times greater than those of other hospitals, according to the Kaiser report. In Western North Carolina, HCA charges an average “trauma team activation fee” (which applies when a patient is sent to a trauma center) of $9,187, compared to $5,175 at other hospitals.

“There’s no question it’s a money grab” by HCA, according to Ed Jimenez, CEO of the University of Florida Health Shands hospital, noting that injured people who otherwise could be treated in the emergency room of their local hospital are now being sent to an HCA trauma center, Kaiser reported. — B.D.

When local paper shrank, these journalists started an alternative (NYT)

“There’s a crying need in a complex city like New Bedford [Massachusetts] for in-depth, contextual, explanatory investigative journalism,” Barbara Roessner, The Light’s editor and the former managing editor of The Hartford Courant, said. Studies over the last decade have shown real costs to cities without a watchdog, including declines in voter participation and drops in a city’s bond rating. The lack of accountability can lead to waste and corruption, which drives up the cost of government. — P.L.

Waynesville fires town attorney for anti-Trump Tweets (Smoky Mountain News)

In a 4-to-1 vote, the Waynesville governing board terminated its contract with Town Attorney Bill Cannon over anti-Trump comments he made on his personal Twitter account, The Smoky Mountain News reported. Cannon, who has 38 Twitter followers, had been town attorney for four and a half years. His personal Twitter posts were brought to the attention of town officials last week by Chad Nesbitt, a conservative activist and blogger based in Asheville. Joey Reece, a member of a group called Saving Haywood, wrote in a letter to the editor: “Criticism of President Trump by him, although in poor taste and showing a lack of professionalism, might conceivably pass the smell test, but not calling the good citizens of Haywood County and Waynesville bigots that remind him of Nazi Germany.” — P.L.

Veteran NC lawmaker punished for trying to stop backroom deal (WRAL)

State Rep. Julia Howard (R-Davie County) learned that money is thicker than GOP blood. Citing ethical concerns, the 17-term chair of the North Carolina House Finance Committee tried to stop a bill that would financially benefit dozens of lawmakers, including House Speaker Tim Moore. Moore (R-Cleveland County) stripped Howard of her leadership post and kicked her off the Finance Committee. — P.L.

“News deserts” are real. Here’s one in eastern NC (The New Yorker)

The U.S. has lost 1 in 4 of its newspapers in the last 15 years. Around 1,500 American counties have just one paper; another 20 counties are without a newspaper altogether. These latter areas are what researchers call news deserts, and Jones County, North Carolina, is a classic example. Here’s what happens to the community, and to democracy. — P.L.

The hottest commodity on the planet today? Dead trees. (The Atlantic)

From 2015 to 2019, lumber traded at $381 for 1,000 board feet, according to Fastmarkets. (A typical new house uses 15,000 board feet.) This month, it reached an all-time high of $1,104 for the same amount. “There are people who say, ‘Climate change isn’t affecting me,’ ” said Janice Cooke, a forest-industry veteran and biology professor at the University of Alberta. “But they’re going to go to the hardware store and say, ‘Holy cow, the price of lumber has gone up.’” — P.L.

Police body cam recordings are not public records in NC (New York Times)

Police body cam footage is considered a public record in most states. In North Carolina, a court order is required, even if a police chief or sheriff wants it released. Bills have just been introduced in the General Assembly to require body cam recordings to be released within 48 hours of an incident. Police departments would have the option of going before a judge to argue that release could jeopardize someone’s safety or hinder an investigation. — S.K.

Needed: Local funding for local news (Substack)

Local news still plays a critical role in people’s lives, and in democratic governance. One of the most promising developments in serious news in this country in the last few years has been an explosion in large-scale nonprofit funding for local news, writes Richard J. Tofel, president of ProPublica, a non-profit investigative journalism organization. But here’s the problem, he says: Most of this money is coming from national sources rather than local funders. — P.L.

NC-11 Congressman Madison Cawthorn marries Cristina Bayardelle (People)

They were legally married in a private civil ceremony in December, and held a religious ceremony in Hendersonville on April 3. “I ran for Congress because Cristina and I didn’t want to raise a family in the America many on the left seek to
create,” the newlywed congressman said.

NC Senate committee votes to keep minimum age for marriage at 14 (WLOS.com)

North Carolina has the lowest minimum age marriage in the country at just 14. A proposed bipartisan bill to ban child marriages would have raised the minimum age to 18, but state senators on Wednesday watered it down to leave it at 14. In a compromise, they voted to restrict marriages for anyone under 18 to someone who’s no more than four years older. “North Carolina has become a destination place for folks marrying children and for sex trafficking,” said Sen. Danny Britt
(R-Robeson). — P.L.

In NC, 6-year-olds can be arrested (New York Times)

A 7-year-old boy was charged with rape in a small town in upstate New York. The only state in the nation with a lower “age of delinquency” — the age at which children can be charged with crimes and sent to court — is North Carolina, where earlier this year a 6-year-old boy was arrested and taken to court in Durham after he picked a tulip while waiting at a bus stop. — P.L.

Government wants to help pay your internet bills (Washington Post)

The Emergency Broadband Benefit, a Biden administration pandemic relief program, will pay $50 a month toward the cost of Internet service for all families who lost some income in the last year and earn less than $198,000. But there’s a catch. You can get the EBB discount on your home Internet or cellphone bill only if you sign up. This tech column tells you how. — P.L.

For city planning geeks: Can Charlotte streets be saved?

New research finds that the “spatial logic” and order of Charlotte, North Carolina’s city street network is the most chaotic and disordered of the 100 world cities studied. This includes such urban driving nightmares as Rome, Tokyo, Moscow. Unlike cities with highly planned street-grid layouts (Chicago, Miami, Atlanta), Charlotte scored an almost perfect mark for disorder and maximum entropy with a uniform distribution of streets in every direction. — P.L.

Evanston city council approves funding for reparations to Blacks (NPR)

The Illinois city plans to use the first $10 million from taxes on legal marijuana sales to finance housing assistance for African Americans. Asheville and Buncombe County voted last year to consider reparations but plans are still
undefined.

Delayed census puts pressure on NC redistricting ahead of 2022 voting (Brennan Center)

The much anticipated, fraught process of North Carolina’s U.S. congressional and state legislative redistricting is coming up. Redistricting occurs every 10 years based on the decennial census but was delayed by the pandemic. The count that would have been delivered to the state at the end of 2020 is now expected for the end of September. This will put pressure on the state’s electoral processes and, while legislative leaders in Raleigh have said they believe they will be able to execute the redistricting in time for candidates to file in December, it is possible that they may need to adjust the primary elections schedule in 2022. Notably, if the state does not complete its redistricting in a timely manner, the courts could step in and draw temporary maps to ensure legal compliance with the schedule of 2022 elections. — B.D.

Cawthorn: "My service as a husband" trumps duty in Congress (Real America's Voice)

Asked to explain why he has missed more votes than any other freshman member of Congress, Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC11) said “To that, I really laugh. It shows how the Democrats feel about the nuclear family in America right now. I was doing the only thing that I find more important than my service in Congress, and that’s my service as a husband.” Besides, Cawthorn told host David Brody of Real America’s Voice News, a conservative program, “Every single vote that came up was some Democrat garbage, so I was happy to be able to not actually have to vote on those.” — P.L.

Asheville is North Carolina’s priciest spot to live (Citizen Times)

The Asheville metropolitan area’s cost of living is 106% of the national average, according to price data collected by the Council for Community and Economic Research (CCER). On the flip side, pay in the Asheville area is lower than the state’s major metro areas and only 84 percent of the United States average. Driving the high cost of living are a spiking housing market and medical costs, said Jennie Allison, senior program manager at CCER. — P.L.

Amid mass shootings nationwide, gun sales soar in North Carolina (Raleigh Observer)

“They talked about more gun laws, and people read into it that ‘I better get my gun now,’” said gun dealer Larry Hyatt. “And then they sent out $1,400 to buy one,” Hyatt said of federal stimulus checks deposited in taxpayer accounts.

NC to gain a 14th seat in U.S. House. (Carolina Journal)

North Carolina has grown enough over the last decade to earn a 14th congressional seat, the U.S. Census Bureau announced this week. Complete data is expected to be released Aug. 16, paving the way for the General Assembly to begin creating new maps for the 14 congressional districts, all 120 N.C. House seats, and all 50 N.C. Senate seats. Although the state is nearly evenly divided between Republican and Democratic voters, Carolina Journal says the “Best case scenario for Democrats would be a 9-5 GOP map that leaves all Democrat incumbents with blue leaning districts, and the GOP protecting all 8 of its member districts, while drawing a GOP friendly 14th seat. Worst case would be a map in which voters select 10 GOP members of the U.S. House and 4 democrats, to represent N.C.” — P.L.