Today’s round of questions, my smart-aleck replies, and the real answers:
Question: (John Boyle here, not a questioner). This topic comes from a Facebook post on the Original Black Mountain Exchange in which a person who attended the Black Mountain Christmas Parade on Saturday was unsettled by the presence of what appeared to be a sniper atop a building along the route. Another man with a pair of binoculars was also on the rooftop, and neither appeared to be in police uniforms. The post, and another on an individual’s Facebook page, generated almost 500 comments, with several people asking for an explanation from the Black Mountain Police Department. The gist of the commentary was: Why was this done? Were these men police officers? Is this necessary? Why was there no notice that this was going to take place? And, is this really the world we live in now? Honestly, I was curious myself, and folks were asking for answers, so I reached out to the Black Mountain Police Department.
My answer: Sadly, I think we all know the answer to the question, “Is this really the world we live in now?”
Real answer: Black Mountain Police Chief Chief Steve Parker told me Monday that the men on the roof were police officers with the department, including the man with the sniper rifle.
“He’s been there for the last three years,” Parker said. “We’ve had somebody ever since Waukesha, Wisconsin, and the Christmas parade that 60 people got mowed down. (After that) we started making sure that we had an overwatch, just making sure that we can protect everybody.”
Parker was referring to the Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin, in which a man drove an SUV into the parade in 2021, killing six and injuring dozens more. As NPR reported in 2022, the attacker was sentenced to life in prison. He had gotten into a fight with his ex-girlfriend before the incident, and he had struggled previously with mental illness.
The Black Mountain officers did wear clothing that identified them as officers and part of the overwatch, Parker said, referring to a police term that refers to setting up a security perimeter at a public event.
Parker acknowledged that the officers’ appearance, especially with the clearly visible rifle, may have been upsetting to some attendees.
“It doesn’t always look pretty, but (we’re) just making sure that we’re doing our due diligence for public safety,” Parker said, noting the department provided similar security for the recent visit of first lady Jill Biden, assisting Asheville with the overwatch. “It’s kind of a common practice.”
The team on the roof consisted of an officer to man the rifle and a spotter with a pair of binoculars. The officers were “a little more overt” this year than last, Parker said.
“It’s kind of like insurance. We’d hope we never use it, right?” Parker said. “We hope we will never have to have it, but at the end of the day, we have got to make sure that we are ensuring that the public is safe if there is somebody who wants to take a car through the crowd or there is an active shooter. And that’s just kind of the world we live in.”
Smaller towns can be tempting targets because potential attackers may think security is more lax, Parker said.
As far as letting the public know in advance, Parker said that can cut both ways, because it could alert someone with bad intent about where the most security is. Letting the public know in advance could calm some fears, but that comes with possibly losing some of the security advantage, he said.
Similar problems arise with having the officers in full uniform or wearing a bright vest that states, “Police.” The parade started late in the afternoon, and as the sun set, a man dressed in a black police uniform could also have scared attendees, Parker noted.
Some on social media suggested the police should concentrate on security on the ground. Parker said they staff the parade with 30 to 35 police and reserve officers, with officers on the sidewalks and streets.
Question: Why doesn’t the city or county sell the fallen trees from Tropical Storm Helene to lumber companies? Couldn’t the county use the money to help with rebuilding/disaster relief? Same with the national parks. The amount of trees up at Rattlesnake trailhead alone has got to be worth a ton. Tons of oaks, cedars, and ash that could be recycled into lumber for homes, furniture, etc. Seems wasteful and a missed opportunity.
My answer: If ever there was a time when North Carolina could re-energize its furniture manufacturing heritage, this is it.
Real answer: As we reported in November, Tropical Storm Helene downed or damaged about 40 percent of trees in Buncombe County.
“The U.S. Forest Service is exploring the possibility (of) salvaging downed timber on the Pisgah National Forest left in the wake of Tropical Storm Helene to help remove road and trail blockages, reduce potential fuels for wildfires and improve overall public safety,” Forest Service spokesperson Adam Rondeau said via email. “Our focus right now, however, continues to be on clearing access throughout the forest and assessing damage to roads, bridges, and trails.”
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and contractors move 20-foot logs to a staging site last month as part of the Interagency Recovery Coordination program. // Credit: FEMA
Rondeau said Helene damaged several thousand acres of Pisgah National Forest, “leaving a significant amount of woody debris and downed trees in the aftermath and creating higher-than-usual levels of fuel for wildfires.”
“To help mitigate this risk, the U.S. Forest Service invited the public to gather firewood for personal use without a permit on reopened sections of the Pisgah National Forest through December 2025,” Rondeau said.
He noted that you cannot try to gather firewood from closed portions of the forest, block traffic, create warming fires or collect wood in an active logging area. Also, the wood is for personal use only, not commercial use.
Leesa Brandon, a spokesperson for the Blue Ridge Parkway, part of the National Park Service, said Park Service policy states:
“Natural resource products that accumulate as a result of…hazard tree removal, vista clearing, or other management action will be recycled through the ecosystem when practicable. When recycling is not practicable, the products may be disposed of by other means. Disposal may be accomplished by contract, if the result of the work done under contract and the value are calculated in the contract cost, or by sale at fair market value in accordance with applicable laws and regulations.”
Brandon noted that in the 11-mile section of the parkway through Asheville, “park staff and contractors moved more than 350,000 cubic feet of storm debris” from the road.
“This volume of woody debris could fill nearly 150 shipping containers,” Brandon said. “Some wood was chipped, and some logs were transferred to Cherokee.”
“Along other sections of the park that have now opened, most of the large wood has not been removed from beyond the tree line within the opened areas,” Brandon continued. “Within the closed areas debris is still piled or present on site.”
I should note that FEMA and the North Carolina Arboretum have a cool program underway to salvage and repurpose thousands of downed trees through Interagency Recovery Coordination, “a team of federal, state and local government, nonprofits and faith-based organizations,” according to a Nov. 13 FEMA news release. The release noted that more than 320,000 pounds of wood had already been removed.
“Stages of the project include clearing debris and fallen trees from the North Carolina Arboretum south of Asheville,” the release states. “The arboretum has walking trails, gardens and an educational center that serve 600,000 visitors per year. Helene knocked down more than 5,000 trees across trails and roads in the 434-acre site in the Pisgah National Forest, making the park non-operational.”
The Arboretum is back open, although some trails remain closed.
The FEMA news release noted the project already has sent logs to a staging area to be sorted based on potential use.
Wood from fallen trees is sorted in early November as part of the Interagency Recovery Coordination project. The trees are sorted by potential use, including furniture material, firewood and mulch. // Credit: FEMA
“The wood will then be distributed to residents and communities for firewood, furniture material, mulch and more,” the release states. The IRC had removed 65 truckloads of timber by mid-November.
City of Asheville spokesperson Jessica Hughes said private property owners can sell logs from fallen trees.
“At this time, the city is not selling fallen logs for lumber,” Hughes said. “Any vegetative debris that is collected in the right of way is taken to a storm debris management site where it is then reduced in size by grinding.”
Hughes pointed out that “any lumber that was submerged in floodwaters should not be sold due to contamination concerns as public safety and environmental health are top priorities.”
Buncombe County spokesperson Stacey Wood said, “All vegetative debris collected in the right of way is taken to a storm debris management site where it is then reduced in size by grinding. However, private property owners may choose to sell lumber from fallen trees on their land.”
I also reached out to a couple of local sawmills to see if they could use these downed trees for lumber. They can, but they can take only so much of a good thing.
“We have taken in nearly a half a year’s worth of inventory in a period of six weeks,” Don Shuford, owner of Sunrise Sawmill off Sweeten Creek Road, told me. “We can barely move in our yard for all the logs that are stacked up.”
Good logs abound — if properly cut.
“Actually, most of the stuff that’s down has been really good quality stuff — if they would cut it properly,” Shuford said. “A lot of people are in a hurry to just get things out of their way, and they cut them into four and five foot chunks, and that’s useless for a log to be considered a log by sawmill standards.”
Generally speaking, it has to be at least eight feet long for a sawmill to want it. Shorter logs, called “bolts,” end up in the grinder for mulch or wood chips.
Shuford owns 25 acres and has plenty of trees down.
“I’ve got the same problem everybody else does, and I don’t have enough hours in the day to get it all processed,” Shuford said.
Logging companies and sawmills can process much of the wood, but it’s going to take time, Shuford said. The logs on the ground now will make it through the winter just fine, but in the spring when the weather warms, they’ll become more problematic.
“Logs laying on the ground will not spoil or go bad until late spring when things start getting hot,” Shuford said. “With the sap and such, the moisture inside the log will cause them to stain, and that hurts it for furniture quality — it creates a coffee-looking stain in the lumber that won’t come out.”
Hot weather also brings insects, and that can damage the wood.
Mary Catherine Tennant, the office manager at Bee Tree Hardwoods in Swannanoa, another family-owned operation, brought up another potential problem.
“If the trees slam and bounce when they’re coming down, the rings inside the lumber will separate,” Tennant said, explaining that this ruins the quality.
Shuford said this usually happens if a tree hits rock or another stump as it falls.
“It’ll hit with such force, it’ll literally shatter the inside of the tree, and it’ll come apart just like onion skin,” Shuford said. “When you saw into it, it’ll fall apart right in front of your very eyes.”
Asheville Watchdog is a nonprofit news team producing stories that matter to Asheville and Buncombe County. Got a question? Send it to John Boyle at jboyle@avlwatchdog.org or 828-337-0941. His Answer Man columns appear each Tuesday and Friday. The Watchdog’s reporting is made possible by donations from the community. To show your support for this vital public service go to avlwatchdog.org/support-our-publication/.
www.thecentersquare.com – By Alan Wooten | The Center Square – (The Center Square – ) 2025-05-01 08:16:00
(The Center Square) – Taxpayers in North Carolina will face an average tax increase of $2,382 if the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act expires at the end of the year, says the National Taxpayers Union Foundation.
Results of analysis were released Thursday morning by the nonprofit organization billing itself a “nonpartisan research and educational affiliate of the National Taxpayers Union.” Its four state neighbors were similar, with South Carolina lower ($2,319) and higher averages in Virginia ($2,787), Georgia ($2,680) and Tennessee ($2,660).
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of eight years ago was a significant update to individual and business taxes in the federal tax code. According to the Tax Foundation, it was considered pro-growth reform with an estimate to reduce federal revenue by $1.47 trillion over a decade.
Should no action be taken before Jan. 1 and the act expire, the federal standard deduction would be halved; the federal child tax credit would decrease; higher federal tax brackets would return; the federal estate tax threshold will be lower; and some business tax benefits will be gone.
The foundation, in summarizing the impact on North Carolina business expensing, says the state conforms to Section 168(k). This means “only 60% expensing for business investments this year and less in future years. State policymakers could adopt 100% full expensing, particularly since the state conforms to the Section 163(j) limit on interest expense and the two provisions were meant to work together.”
The foundation says business net operation loss treatment policies in the state “are less generous than the federal government and impose compliance costs due to lack of synchronization with the federal code and are uncompetitive with most other states.”
The National Taxpayers Union Foundation also says lawmakers “should at least be conscious of any retroactive provisions when selecting their date of fixed conformity.” North Carolina is among 21 states conforming to the federal income tax base “only as of a certain date” rather than automatically matching federal tax code changes – meaning definitions, calculations or rules.
The foundation said nationally the average filer will see taxes raised $2,955. It estimates an increase for 62% of Americans. The biggest average increases by state are in Massachusetts ($4,848), Washington ($4,567) and Wyoming ($4,493) and the lowest are in West Virginia ($1,423), Mississippi ($1,570) and Kentucky ($1,715).
Individual wages, nationally, are expected to go down 0.5%, reducing economic growth by 1.1% over 10 years.
Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.
Political Bias Rating: Center-Right
The content primarily reports on the potential impact of the expiration of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, relying heavily on analysis from the National Taxpayers Union Foundation, which describes itself as a nonpartisan organization but is known to advocate for lower taxes and limited government intervention, positions typically aligned with center-right economic policies. The article uses neutral language in presenting facts and data and does not explicitly advocate for a particular political viewpoint; however, the emphasis on tax increases and business expensing challenges following the expiration suggests a subtle alignment with pro-tax-cut, business-friendly perspectives associated with center-right ideology. Thus, while the article largely reports rather than overtly promotes an ideological stance, the framing and source choice reflect a center-right leaning.
www.thecentersquare.com – By David Beasley | The Center Square contributor – (The Center Square – ) 2025-04-30 21:25:00
(The Center Square) – Authorization of sports agents to sign North Carolina’s collegiate athletes for “name, image, and likeness” contracts used in product endorsements is in legislation approved Wednesday by a committee of the state Senate.
Authorize NIL Agency Contracts, known also as Senate Bill 229, is headed to the Rules Committee after gaining favor in the Judiciary Committee. It would likely next get a full floor vote.
Last year the NCAA approved NIL contracts for players.
Sen. Amy S. Galey, R-Alamance
NCLeg.gov
“Athletes can benefit from NIL by endorsing products, signing sponsorship deals, engaging in commercial opportunities and monetizing their social media presence, among other avenues,” the NCAA says on its website. “The NCAA fully supports these opportunities for student-athletes across all three divisions.”
SB229 spells out the information that the agent’s contract with the athlete must include, and requires a warning to the athlete that they could lose their eligibility if they do not notify the school’s athletic director within 72 hours of signing the contract.
“Consult with your institution of higher education prior to entering into any NIL contract,” the says the warning that would be required by the legislation. “Entering into an NIL contract that conflicts with state law or your institution’s policies may have negative consequences such as loss of athletic eligibility. You may cancel this NIL agency contract with 14 days after signing it.”
The legislation also exempts the NIL contracts from being disclosed under the state’s Open Records Act when public universities review them. The state’s two ACC members from the UNC System, Carolina and N.C. State, requested the exemption.
“They are concerned about disclosure of the student-athlete contracts when private universities don’t have to disclose the student-athlete contracts,” Sen. Amy Galey, R-Alamance, told the committee. “I feel very strongly that a state university should not be put at a disadvantage at recruitment or in program management because they have disclosure requirements through state law.”
Duke and Wake Forest are the other ACC members, each a private institution.
Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.
Political Bias Rating: Centrist
The article primarily reports on the legislative development regarding NIL (name, image, and likeness) contracts for collegiate athletes in North Carolina. It presents facts about the bill, committee actions, and includes statements from a state senator without using loaded or emotionally charged language. The piece neutrally covers the issue by explaining both the bill’s purpose and the concerns it addresses, such as eligibility warnings and disclosure exemptions. Overall, the article maintains a factual and informative tone without advocating for or against the legislation, reflecting a centrist, unbiased approach.
SUMMARY: Donald van der Vaart, a former North Carolina environmental secretary and climate skeptic, has been appointed to the North Carolina Utilities Commission by Republican Treasurer Brad Briner. Van der Vaart, who previously supported offshore drilling and fracking, would oversee the state’s transition to renewable energy while regulating utility services. His appointment, which requires approval from the state House and Senate, has drawn opposition from environmental groups. Critics argue that his views contradict clean energy progress. The appointment follows a controversial bill passed by the legislature, granting the treasurer appointment power to the commission.