Receive the morning news briefs delivered to your email inbox every morning. Click here to sign up.
Residents Near Chemours Plant Will Be Tested For GenX
North Carolina and federal health officials want to test whether neighbors of a chemical company are carrying little-understood industrial compounds in their bodies.
The state Department of Health and Human Services said Tuesday it is working with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Bladen and Cumberland county health departments to test dozens of volunteers living around a Chemours Co. plant south of Fayetteville.
Officials plan to check the blood and urine of up to 30 residents for GenX and 16 related chemicals.
The state health agency says the results will allow better comparisons to levels detected in people elsewhere, but won't clarify whether GenX and related chemicals have specific health effects.
Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County Names New Leader
Randy Eaddy, who's practiced law for 38 years, is the newly announced president and CEO of the Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County.
A self-described arts advocate with a broad interest across disciplines, he's served on the Arts Council Board for the past eight years.
Current Council President Jim Sparrow resigns at the end of this month, after a five-year tenure. He's heading back to the Fort Wayne Ballet in Indiana to serve as executive director.
Eaddy says that nurturing other local arts groups is a big priority.
NC Court Shuns Worker Fired For Political Appointees
A North Carolina appeals court says a former state worker fired to open a job for one of former Gov. Pat McCrory's political appointees can no longer challenge the move.
The state Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday that state prison health care worker Joe Vincoli lost out because he failed to appeal a 2014 ruling against him within the allowed 30-day window.
Shortly after McCrory took office that year, the General Assembly expanded to 1,500 the number of state employees the governor could hire and fire at will in state agencies that report to him without recourse to disputing whether the move was fair.
Republican legislators moved to cut the number again to 425 appointees after Roy Cooper narrowly beat McCrory and became governor last year.
NC Dams Owner Loses Bid To Force Duke Energy To Buy Power
The new owners of four North Carolina dams that the state fought to claim as a public resource are losing their bid to force Duke Energy Corp. to buy the generated hydropower.
The North Carolina Utilities Commission decided that Cube Yadkin Generation missed a deadline to trigger Duke Energy's legal obligation to buy the clean hydropower. The dispute started before Cube completed its purchase of the four Yadkin River dams in 2016.
Cube bought the dams from Alcoa Corp., which for decades used the hydropower to run an aluminum smelter that once employed 1,000. The dams generated more than $225 million in revenues in the decade after the smelter closed and electricity has been sold to commercial customers.
North Carolina Democratic Powerbroker Bennett Dies At 97
A powerbroker in North Carolina Democratic politics for 40 years who helped guide the elected careers of former Govs. Terry Sanford and Jim Hunt has died.
Salem Funerals & Cremations confirmed Tuesday that Bert Bennett Jr. died Monday at age 97 at his Forsyth County home from natural causes.
Bennett managed Sanford's 1960 gubernatorial campaign in which he defeated segregationist I. Beverly Lake Sr. in a Democratic primary runoff. Bennett also helped operate Hubert Humphrey's unsuccessful 1968 Democratic presidential campaign.
His funeral will be Thursday at a Winston-Salem church.
300x250 Ad
300x250 Ad