By Scott Nicholson
George Gilleland is president of the High Country Home Builders Association and owner of The Hardwood Company in Boone, selling wood products and other building materials. He said while the construction market has cooled a little, it’s still far from doom and gloom.
“I think we’re doing better than the national average,” Gilleland said. “People are still buying high-end second homes. Our average home prices are still up there.”
Click here to read the Watauga Democrat article.
Written by John Boyle
The lingering drought in much of North Carolina has resulted in the U.S. Department of Agriculture declaring 59 counties, including nearly all of Western North Carolina, disaster areas.
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That means local farmers who can prove significant crop losses may be eligible for low-interest loans or other payments. This is the second year in a row that drought has severely impacted crops, with corn and eastern tobacco crops taking the worst hits this year.
If you think the drought is no longer an issue, just ask a local farmer.
Click here to read the article from the Asheville Citizen Times
Story by Kathleen McFadden
Researchers at Colorado State University released an economic study this week stating that the creation of the proposed Grandfather National Scenic Area (GNSA) would attract an estimated 1.5 million visitors a year, result in the creation of 724 new jobs and generate an additional $38.4 million in annual revenue for Avery, Caldwell and Watauga counties.
The proposed scenic area would encompass 25,500 acres of the 510,119-acre Pisgah National Forest along the Blue Ridge Parkway from Grandfather Mountain to Blowing Rock and would apply scenic protections only to public lands currently managed by the U.S. Forest Service.
Click here for the article from High Country Press
Grandfather Mountain President Crae Morton announced this week that based on a recent survey by Doug Suttles of Suttles Surveying in Marion, N.C., Grandfather Mountain will list the elevation of its summit as 5,946 feet.
This number is 18 feet lower than the elevation of 5,964 feet that Grandfather Mountain has been using in its promotional materials since opening as a scenic travel attraction in 1952. The higher number originally came from North Carolina Geologic and Economic Survey Bulletin No. 27 entitled “Altitudes in North Carolina” published in 1917.
Click here for the article in High Country Press
Story by Kathleen McFadden
“Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”
So cautioned Craig Lewis of the Lawrence Group at the closing presentation of the Boone 2030 planning charrette last week.
What Lewis meant is that the collective vision of what Boone can become won’t be accomplished in one fell swoop or even in the next several years. The vision is a long-term one, looking ahead two decades from right now, and the only way to reach it is in incremental steps.
Those incremental steps are the “good” that Lewis referred to, with the “perfect” being the ideal vision.
Click here for the complete article from High Country Press
Story by David Brewer
Sheri Baker, owner of Dragonfly Theater & Pub, quit her job 2.5 years ago to focus her work and attention on Boone’s new movie theater and pub. The Dragonfly Theater and Pub is absolutely the only venue in the High Country that has, in four months, hosted major motion pictures, independent movies, live concerts, church meetings, fundraisers, multimedia events, political debate viewing parties, Monday Night Football and a beer tasting. To say that the Dragonfly is versatile would be a bit of an understatement.
Click here to read the story from High Country Press
Click here to visit the Dragonfly website
ps. EDITOR- I recently held my sons 5th birthday party at Dragonfly and it was great! They let us bring in our DVD and served all the children lunch and popcorn. Best of all, the cost was very reasonable.
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