Mountain Xpress 11.04.20

OUR 27TH YEAR OF WEEKLY INDEPENDENT NEWS, ARTS & EVENTS FOR WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA VOL. 27 NO. 14 NOV. 4-10, 2020

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C ONTENT S

6 STRAIGHT TALK ABOUT COVID How different WNC counties are delivering the message

14 COVID CONVERSATIONS Local resident creates care bags during COVID-19

PAGE 20 ON THE GO While local restaurants have scrambled to navigate the challenges of the pandemic, one sector of the dining industry has powered onward: meal delivery. And with winter weather and limited outdoor dining options on the horizon, restaurant delivery businesses expect that trend to continue.

COVER PHOTO Getty Images COVER DESIGN Scott Southwick

WELLNESS

4 LETTERS 16 MONEY MATTERS Dogwood trust board talks funding, strategic priorities

GREEN

FEATURE

NEWS

FEATURES

18 GREEN ROUNDUP WNC air quality improves; foresters urge caution during fall wildfire season; more

4 CARTOON: MOLTON 5 CARTOON: BRENT BROWN 6 NEWS 8

BUNCOMBE BEAT

13 BIZ BRIEFS 14 COVID CONVERSATIONS 14 ASHEVILLE ARCHIVES 15 COMMUNITY CALENDAR

FOOD

16 WELLNESS 21 FOOD NEWS 2020’s penultimate month kicks off with good news we can use

18 GREEN ROUNDUP 20 FOOD 24 ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT 27 CLUBLAND

A&E

28 MOVIES 26 TIMELY RHYMES Josh Blake spotlights local talent on new hip-hop album

30 FREEWILL ASTROLOGY 30 CLASSIFIEDS 31 NY TIMES CROSSWORD

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OPINION

Send your letters to the editor to letters@mountainx.com.

More info needed as aerospace plant proceeds I have some thoughts regarding Buncombe County’s new business, Pratt & Whitney, a part of the Raytheon megafamily, one of the top defense contractors in our country.

Welcome!

But to be truthful, I’m worried.

Thank you for promising average salaries of $68,000 a year. Thank you for being concerned about the gray bats, on whose behalf preparation for your new facility was rushed, so as not to disturb their habitats. You’re off to a good start.

Some of us are concerned, however, that we never knew whom this new manufacturer would be. All some of us knew was that Biltmore Farms was recruiting a blue-ribbon employer to the area. Great news for a community tired of tourism-related service jobs.

Most of us who value the uniqueness and beauty of our area didn’t even know that the floor was open for comments regarding a permit to build a five-lane bridge across the French Broad River, already under stress from contaminants in its historic waterway.

Many wonder why this new millionsquare-foot plant with more than 600 parking places had to locate on the grounds where Asheville forefathers George Vanderbilt, landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted and forester Gifford Pinchot combined forces to create a synergy that has since attracted millions to marvel at their creation and preservation.

Since their time, much of that land has welcomed the Blue Ridge Parkway, the North Carolina Arboretum and Bent Creek River Park. I would never have guessed that Biltmore Farms would develop 100 acres in this vicinity for a company that will build a massive aerospace-parts facility.

C AR T O O N B Y R AN DY M O L T O N I doubt very much that activists in our area were notified of the comment period regarding the proposed bridge.

Now I have just two requests: 1.

Please let the people of WNC know when additional comments will be accepted for new permit requests as the process moves on; 2. please don’t make this facility a place where equipment that is used kill people in other countries is manufactured.

So, welcome to Asheville. May we be neighbors who value building peace in this troubled world.

— Rachael Bliss Asheville

Asheville residents must play role in city planning As many Ashevilleans as possible need to know about the important

zoning and development discussions happening soon on City Council, all of which will directly affect us.

Soon the Council will pass votes on land use and development to prepare for Asheville’s predicted future growth, and it is imperative that residents and neighborhoods are taking action to make their voices and experiences heard.

Although City Council members have different zoning priorities, the first priority for each of them absolutely needs to be community input and participation. Thankfully, the city’s comprehensive Living Asheville plan includes neighborhood plans proposed by their residents, but after seeing the four proposed sites for the development of “urban centers,” I worry what will happen if residents of these areas do not have a place at the planning table.

Citizens must play a role in city planning, especially with the rate that Asheville is growing. Our needs are just as important as the needs of the people who will be moving here. Especially the needs of longtime residents and neighborhoods that have been the repeated victims of gentrification, marginalization and oppression.

I just hope we are heard.

— Abby Shuler Asheville

No grounds for protesters’ actions [In response to “APD Cannot Silence the Voices of Change,” Aug. 19, Xpress]: … These rioters and 4

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looters and destroyers do not have any grounds at all for what they are doing around the country. The Black Lives Matter movement is more racist than anything.

The liberal socialist un-American Democrats have used the Black voters for many years. Bill Clinton signed NAFTA into law and sent the Americans’ jobs out of the country. Hillary Clinton said that the Blacks had to be brought to heel! The Obama administration allegedly sent $3.7 million in grants in 2014 to the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China for coronavirus research!

An American can go to Mexico and spend money right and left. They can never vote; they cannot run for any office or receive any benefits from the government! In the same Mountain Xpress copy on the opposite page, there is an ad of a … Hispanic family in the Spanish language for them to be counted in the U.S. census!

Billions of the U.S. citizens’ money each year is going to illegal aliens, OK’d by the corrupt we-do-not-care Democrat politicians! This money should be going for American citizens’ needs!

This Asheville father does not have anything of the truth!

— Tom Robinson Burnsville Editor’s note: Snopes rated the statement about the Wuhan laboratory as a mixture of truth and false claims (avl.mx/8np).

Thoughts on voting and capitalism They have grown strong — the American coward. Financially rich, they deny and buy votes with noodle backbones and Old Europe condemnation, aristocracy as if it is needed.

Failure dooms them; they squeeze and hold tightly, hoping that the universe will destroy their disease only after they have lived a long and prosperous life.

The American coward — funding violence to obliterate care — two party systems operating as teamwins of personalized ambition when America’s Constitution tells what synchronization is needed to care for this living planet.

Lying, always lying, until their wealth is so great they buy voices to sell fear — fat and cowardly jurisdiction to propel ignorance as the educational process, while the new innocence arrives within this prescribed chaos of addictive marketing techniques because winning is their only care.

C AR T O O N B Y B R E N T B R O W N Supreme Court members taking bids? States’ rights of Texas and Florida showing us how our federal rights called voting can be owned, while not one of these cowards has been stripped of their jobs as a felon.

Most of those slated to “serve and protect” are standing by — waiting for American justice to come to town, where their day will be helping in a neighborhood, any neighborhood, and become the role models of the innocent. They are ready; the people are ready.

Many people have come to Asheville to be part of the grassroots culture of Buncombe County — artistically and nutritiously; these folks live their lives as participants within the living planet. Here, too, they are being priced out. While all other nature has natural limits — capitalism.

We live in a beautiful land, America, with a constitutional prescription for harmony and well-being for all. The old European models crashed, discovering America was a divergence; we now have the 1300s resurfacing.

We’re all children in this universe and, like all good care units, we are to heal the sick — not elect them.

— David Reilly Black Mountain

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NEWS

Straight talk about COVID

How different WNC counties are delivering the message

BY MOLLY HORAK mhorak@mountainx.com There’s no escaping the public health message that’s reverberating across North Carolina. Practice the three W’s: Wear a face covering. Wait 6 feet apart.

Wash your hands. But there are significant differences in how counties in the western region are delivering it.

Dr. Mandy Cohen, the state’s secretary of health and human services, reiterates that advice every time she steps to the lectern in Raleigh’s COVID-19 Emergency Operations Center. Stacie Saunders, Buncombe County’s public health director, echoes that counsel when she shares updates with residents and elected officials.

Mark Jaben, Haywood County’s medical director, tries to drive home the message during his signature coronavirus updates, which are filmed in his house. The catchphrase appears in the weekly press releases sent out by the Henderson County Department of Public Health, and it’s all over radio ads, billboards and social media feeds.

It’s a communications strategy that appeals to loyalty and respect, says Gene Matthews, a senior investigator at the N.C. Institute for Public Health who studies the ways that framing a health message can affect how it’s received by people holding different ideologies. But as local health officials try to find the best way to get important health information out to Western North Carolina residents, they face an uphill battle: COVID-19 cases are rising nationally, misinformation runs rampant, and public health guidelines are the focus of fierce partisan debates.

In North Carolina, local health departments are required to report COVID-19

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DATA-DRIVEN: Members of Henderson County’s health data team take a break from entering COVID-19 statistics into the county’s dashboard. Photo courtesy of the Henderson County Department of Public Health cases, outbreaks and diagnostic test results to the state Department of Health and Human Services, says HHS spokesperson Amy Adams Ellis. But they’re not required to publicly post or share that data, leaving it up to each local entity to decide if, when and how to do so.

And while WNC counties are making vital pandemic-related information public, they’re not all taking the same approach. “It’s been an evolution,” says Haywood County Emergency Services spokesperson Allison Richmond.

“Nobody knew how to do this before.”

KEEPING IT FRESH

Before Matthews took his current position with the Institute for Public Health, he spent 25 years as the chief legal adviser to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, providing guidance on the AIDS epidemic and the 9/11 and anthrax attacks. In such emergencies, he explains, the textbook strategy is to let public health experts speak directly to the people without any political slant.

But the public health messaging around COVID-19 has become weaponized and politicized by leaders on both the political left and right, leaving many people skeptical of any information about the pandemic that’s coming from a political figure, says Matthews.

Against that backdrop, he continues, the most trusted spokesperson tends to be the local county health director.

Even so, notes K. “Vish” Viswanath, a professor and director of the applied risk communication program at

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Harvard University’s School of Public Health, any messaging coming from a credible source must be clear. But the rapidly changing science concerning the virus makes clear messaging more difficult, he points out, citing health officials’ reversal of their initial advice on face coverings after further research showed that cloth masks could help limit COVID-19’s spread.

Misinformation amplified by political leaders and disinformation shared widely via social media pose additional challenges for public health officials, continues Viswanath. And then there’s COVID-19 fatigue: At this point, people are just plain tired of hearing about the disease and the endlessly repeated public health messaging.

“The question becomes, how do we keep it fresh?” Viswanath explains.

“I don’t think there’s an easy answer.

You have to be forgiving, you have to be understanding that people are tired — and somehow, you have to motivate them to stick with these messages and comply with them.”

ACCESSIBLE, ACCURATE INFORMATION

From the beginning, Buncombe County officials wanted the community to know that they were taking the coronavirus seriously. They also knew that a “one size fits all” communications strategy wouldn’t work, says Health and Human Services spokesperson Stacey Wood. Accordingly, they’ve tried to provide information in various ways that county residents can connect with, she says.

Those strategies have included daily dashboard updates, press conferences, a series of “Let’s talk COVID” panel discussions with community leaders and weekly press releases. Officials discontinued the press conferences at the end of September; bimonthly updates are now shared during Buncombe County Board of Commissioners meetings.

Accessibility across cultures is also a priority, notes Wood: Community updates are translated into Spanish and American Sign Language, and until recently, the county’s dashboard included a translation feature offering six languages in addition to English.

On Oct. 26, Buncombe County discontinued updating its dashboard, redirecting site visitors to the state HHS dashboard instead.

Federal law prohibits the release of personally identifiable health information, such as a patient’s medical history or treatment details. But within those limits, “There was never a question that we wouldn’t be as transparent as possible,” County Manager Avril Pinder wrote in an email to Xpress.

“At Buncombe County, we will always grow and adapt and get better, but that’s something that every government agency should commit to the community it has the privilege of serving.”

DOUBLING DOWN ON DASHBOARDS

In lieu of flashy press conferences, Henderson County’s communications strategy focuses on its COVID19 dashboard, spokesperson Andrew Mundhenk explains. Back in March, Henderson County was the first regional entity to create a dashboard after the first COVID-19 cases were reported, he says. It now includes a running tally of cases at long-term care facilities, a count of recovered patients and a heat map displaying cases by ZIP code.

But the county’s dashboard pioneering didn’t end there. In early October, the Henderson County Public Schools became the first school system in the region to launch a COVID-19 dashboard tracking all positive cases traced to a school setting. The Haywood, Jackson, Rutherford and Swain County districts have since followed suit.

When the Henderson County school system announced in September that students would resume their studies via a hybrid model including both in-person and virtual classes, the district committed to notifying families

“It’s been an evolution. Nobody knew how to do this before.”

— Allison Richmond, Haywood County Health and Human Services

TAKING CHARGE: Haywood County Health Director Patrick Johnson gives an update at an Oct. 27 morning meeting. Photo courtesy of Allison Richmond whenever a school-related COVID-19 case was confirmed, spokesperson Molly McGowan-Gorsuch explains.

Daily updates to a public dashboard were deemed the most efficient way to share pertinent data.

“Our district and schools have worked to provide transparency about our COVID-19 response to keep the public informed; respect the concerns and anxieties our staff, parents and guardians are facing; and try to provide them with the most helpful information they can use to make the best possible decisions for their families in an ever-evolving situation,” she says.

“Being transparent also allows us to

address misinformation before rumors cause unnecessary alarm.”

Unlike other WNC health departments, notes Mundhenk, Henderson County lacks direct access to social media channels, which limits the reach of its messaging. At the end of October, Henderson County Health Director Steve Smith began writing a weekly column, “Our Community and COVID19: The Way Forward,” to “provide additional focus on the human element of the data and trends that we see,” Mundhenk said.

“We’re learning as we go,” he says.

“We’re taking it day by day and seeing what people are interested in and what data points people want.”

LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION: Brownie Newman, chair of the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners, shares an update on the county’s coronavirus response. In March, the briefings were held daily; now, they are held bimonthly. Photo courtesy of the Buncombe County Department of Health and Human Services

wearing a mask,” Richmond explains.

Other common flashpoints include parties, travel and failure to wear masks consistently.

But community members are tired of constant COVID-19 warnings. On Oct. 27, nearly 100 Waynesville residents packed a town board meeting to protest a proposed local mask mandate, sparking a back-and-forth about the importance of public health precautions. The COVID-19 response team is adjusting its messaging accordingly, Richmond says, with an increased focus on encouraging residents to do their part to protect neighbors, community members and friends, instead of “ramming orders down people’s throats.”

The best information-sharing practices aren’t developed in silos, she notes.

Haywood is one of five North Carolina counties participating in a study run by Duke University’s Center for Advanced Hindsight and the N.C. State College of Design to improve local COVID-19

messaging using behavioral science.

The pilot study is focusing on communication about masks, social distancing, vaccinations and misinformation, research assistant Dan Rosica reports.

Preliminary findings show that statistic-heavy COVID-19 messaging coming from the state government, or messages from state authorities that are disseminated by county officials, are generally less effective than those delivered by a respected local leader, he says.

Regardless of the method, Viswanath sees transparency as critical to ending the pandemic. “We know what works: When someone goes out and says what they know, what they don’t know and what they are trying to find out,” he explains. “If people see that honesty, it lends a lot of credibility to the messenger. And that’s when people start complying.” X

SIMPLY PUT

In Haywood County, the plan thus far has been to simplify and personalize the message. At first, the communications team flooded the health department’s social media channels with guidelines and resources from the state HHS, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organization and the White House.

“That was our strategy: not to reinvent the wheel but to make sure we were sharing consistent, good information,” says Richmond.

Weekly updates now come in both press release and video formats, headlined by Jaben’s personal calls for residents to take COVID-19 seriously. Unlike other WNC health departments, Haywood’s highlights patterns identified by contact tracing to show how the coronavirus spreads through the community.

“We thought if people understood some of the common ways it was being spread, they might know which situations they should avoid, like eating lunch with co-workers without MOUNTAINX.COM

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BUNCOMBE BEAT

Asheville City Council halts sale of property acquired through urban renewal Asheville City Council is a step closer to fulfilling its promise of reparations for Black residents. At their meeting of Oct. 27, Council members voted 6-1 to suspend the sale or change in use of any city property acquired through urban renewal, a set of practices designed to clear blighted areas that often forced out established Black communities.

But the newly approved resolution exempts property located at 172 and 174 S. Charlotte St., which is under contract to be sold to White Labs Inc., a San Diego-based yeast manufacturer and brewpub; and property on Asheland Avenue currently being reviewed for an affordable housing partnership with Haywood Street Congregation.

Community members generally applauded the move as a step in the right direction. But excluding the White Labs property — which will net roughly $3.7 million after the December sale is finalized — is akin to deciding

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EXEMPTED: Once part of Asheville’s East End community, the property located at 172 and 174 S. Charlotte St. was purchased by the city in the 1970s through urban renewal. Now, the land is under contract to be sold to White Labs, despite opposition from residents and activists. Photo courtesy of the city of Asheville to quit drinking or smoking, but only after the holidays, said Joe Wilkerson, a West Asheville psychotherapist who offered comment during the remote meeting by phone.

“I think you did something really beautiful and insane by committing to reparations,” Wilkerson said. “But funneling money from the sale of stolen lands back into the city’s general coffers is effectively saying that you’ll stop doing harm, right after this one last sale.”

Because a portion of the property is associated with urban renewal, federal restrictions require $1.6 million of the proceeds to fund the city’s Community Development Block Grant program.

The remaining $2.1 million will go to the city’s general fund; Mayor Esther Manheimer said Council had previously decided in a closed session to use an unspecified part of that money to expand the city’s downtown transit center.

Instead, commenters urged Council to earmark the money for an eventual reparations fund.

“If you acknowledge the wrongs done by the city in the past, and you acknowledge this land has essentially been stolen and that it’s not going to be sold anymore for the profit of the city, to try to get one more deal in is inconceivably strange to me,” said Max Mandler of Asheville. “It’s almost worse than pretending that none of that was true. It’s clearly wrong and strange

and comes off as trying to sneak a deal in under the noses of the people of the city.”

Council member Brian Haynes agreed, ultimately becoming the sole vote against the resolution after not receiving a direct answer from city staff regarding Council’s ability to designate general fund money for reparations.

“I feel like it’d be a nice time for us to commit some funds there,” he said.

Aside from formally apologizing for the city’s role in urban renewal, Asheville’s reparations resolution directs City Manager Debra Campbell to develop recommendations to create generational wealth in the Black community and establish a commission to “make significant progress toward repairing the damage caused by public and private systemic racism.” As of Oct. 28, no information about this commission had been released.

“We’re counting on you to do the right thing,” said caller Linda Wolf of Candler. “We know that you plan to do it eventually. But especially in this political climate, it’s really hard to believe in your elected officials if things keep delaying. And we really need to see some kind of strong commitment on your part to keep your promise about reparations.”

— Molly Horak X

Council meetings fail to narrow hotel rules Two work sessions, a complicated flow chart and lengthy back-and-forth have brought Asheville City Council a little closer to agreement on an approach to hotels. With the city’s hotel development moratorium set to expire on Tuesday, Feb. 23, time is running out.

After growing community frustration that too many hotels were popping up within Asheville’s city limits, Council approved a one-year pause on all hotel development last September and extended the moratorium on Sept. 22. During that time, city staff members have been drafting guidelines to clearly outline requirements for new lodging projects, as presented during Council work sessions on Oct. 13 and 27.

In response to Council direction that the rules incentivize public benefits and limit where hotels can be built,Todd Okolichany, Asheville’s planning and urban design director, proposed a detailed system for evaluating lodging developments. Four areas are included: location, public benefits, development standards and design.

Under Okolichany’s new plan, if a project were to fall within a designated hotel zoning district, meet all city development standards, pass a design review and score enough public benefit points, the hotel could be approved

without Council review. Failure to meet any one of the criteria would trigger an application for conditional zoning, and the project would go before Council for a vote, as hotels of more than 20 rooms have since February 2017.

But each of those criteria drew discussion and debate among Council members. Outgoing member and outspoken hotel critic Brian Haynes said he felt “defeated” by the current proposal.

“If we’re going to do this, we’ve got to come up with a much stronger way, so that rather than seeing 10 or 15 hotels come in the first year that we do this, it becomes such a stringent process that maybe we get one or two,” he said at the end of the Oct. 13 session. “If we don’t do that, in my opinion, we’ve failed.”

The proposed hotel overlay district — which would limit hotels with 35 or more rooms to the east and west outskirts of downtown, River Arts District and Biltmore Village, as well as along Tunnel Road, Smokey Park Highway and near the Asheville Outlet Mall — is too big, members agreed. Vice Mayor Gwen Wisler suggested excluding the Asheville Mall and the River Ridge shopping center from the map to preserve those sites for future mixed-use development.

Wisler also proposed adding a 100room cap as a development standard,

UNDER THE WIRE: The historic Flatiron Building was the last hotel proposal to be approved by members of Asheville City Council before they implemented a yearlong hotel moratorium. Photo by Virginia Daffron forcing all larger proposals to come before Council. But while a room threshold may limit large proposals, it would likely incentivize developers to bring forward smaller projects, noted Mayor Esther Manheimer. Keith Young, the only member of Council currently running for reelection, agreed.

Sheneika Smith and recently appointed Council member Antanette Mosley advocated for allowing a maximum number of hotels per block or imposing a spacing requirement to keep development from occurring within a certain distance of existing hotels. Julie Mayfield countered with a suggestion for “sacrifice zones,” or areas specifically designated for hotel growth, to keep development limited to one section of the city.

Per staff’s proposal, any hotel project would also need to earn a set number of points by including items from a tiered public benefits matrix. Potential criteria include donations to Asheville’s Housing Trust Fund, assuring a living wage for all employees and sustainability certification. Displacement of existing businesses and housing would result in negative points.

Council members agreed that projects should be required to meet at least one of the larger items, such as affordable housing or environmental standards, instead of cobbling together several low-scoring items to reach the threshold. Smith suggested that some benefits like a living wage and bus passes for hotel employees should be coupled; Manheimer took the idea a step further by proposing a tiered benefit system for certain contributions, allowing hotels to earn additional points by combining Council priorities.

A final draft of the regulations is expected to return to Council on Tuesday, Jan. 26, followed by a formal vote on Tuesday, Feb. 9. A new Council will be seated for that vote following the recent general election of Tuesday, Nov. 3.

— Molly Horak X

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NEWS BRIEFS

by Xpress Staff | news@mountainx.com

Job recovery lags for WNC’s poorest At first glance, the Asheville metro area’s September unemployment rate of 7% looks like a sign of solid economic recovery: During May, in the wake of coronavirus-related shutdowns, Asheville-area unemployment was 16.1%, more than twice as high. But data compiled by Opportunity Insights, a nonprofit research project based at Harvard University, suggests that deep problems still remain for Western North Carolina’s lowest earners.

According to the Opportunity Insights Economic Tracker, the employment rate among Buncombe County workers making $27,000 or less per year was 30.2% lower in mid-September than at the start of 2020. That figure is up from its nadir in late April, when the county had 48.4% fewer low-wage jobs than in January. But by comparison, jobs making over $60,000 annually were down just 3.4% on the year as of Sept. 10, up from a maximum decrease of 21.3% in mid-April.

Trends are similar in Henderson County, for which only data on middle-wage ($27,000 to $60,000) and

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LAND OF THE SKY-HIGH TECH: A new Pratt & Whitney manufacturing facility will build aerospace components in southern Buncombe County. Photo courtesy of the Economic Development Coalition for Asheville-Buncombe County low-wage workers is available. As of Sept. 10, middle-wage employment was down only 1.6% from the start of the year, while low-wage jobs were down 26.2%.

That slow recovery for the region’s poorest continues as area rents creep ever higher. According to rental search website Apartment List, Asheville rents have increased by 2% since January, despite a national average rent decrease of 1.4% over the same period.

The median one-bedroom apartment in Asheville now rents for $1,027 per month, with the median two-bedroom going for $1,361.

It’s not all bad news for the area’s affordability, however. Insurify, an industry website, recently reported that Asheville’s car insurance costs are the cheapest in the nation. The city’s annual insurance rates average $603, compared with a national average of $1,464.

The trend is even stronger in Buncombe County, where over 140,000 (about 68%) of nearly 207,000 registered voters had already voted as of Oct. 31.

Roughly 106,000 of those Buncombe residents voted at in-person locations, while more than 34,000 voted by mail.

Democrats led the county’s early turnout, with nearly 58,000 (about 75% of all registered party members) having cast ballots. Unaffiliated voter turnout was more than 50,000 (63%), while just over 31,000 Republicans (66% of registered members) voted early.

Because North Carolina processes most early votes before polls close, the N.C. State Board of Elections expects those results to be available on its website by 9 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 3. “The results reported by the end of election night will include 97% or more of all ballots cast in North Carolina in the 2020 general election,” according to a board press release.

Buncombe, state tally record early votes

If Election Day were a candidate in North Carolina, it would’ve already lost by a landslide. According to the nonprofit Civitas Institute VoteTracker, over 4.55 million North Carolinians had cast their ballots through the end of early voting on Oct. 31 — nearly 62% of the state’s 7.34 million registered voters.

For women- and minority-owned businesses, doing business with the city of Asheville has been an uphill climb, a 2018 study of the city’s contracting and purchasing practices revealed.

Informed by those results, and in line with other initiatives to boost racial equity and social justice, members of City Council approved a business inclu-

MOUNTAINX.COM

City passes business inclusion policy

sion policy that will require bidders on city contracts to make substantive efforts to include women- and minority-owned subcontractors on their project teams.

According to a staff memo on the new policy, if a hypothetical bidder for a city project “does not perform outreach, in the form of good faith efforts, for each [minority- and woman-owned business enterprise] utilization goal,” purchasing officials may reject that bid “in favor of the next-lowest bidder who did meet the standard of responsiveness.”

The policy also requires the city to maintain an updated database of available small and minority- and women-owned businesses and provide certification, networking opportunities and workshops and training for those businesses.

The new policy will go into effect Friday, Jan. 1.

Manufacturing facility coming in 2021 The cat is officially out of the bag: “Project Ranger,” the long-awaited, mysterious manufacturing project along the French Broad River, is the site of aerospace and defense contractor Pratt & Whitney’s new manufacturing facility.

The Fortune 50 company is expected to invest $650 million through 2027, elected officials and business leaders announced at an Oct. 22 event hosted by the Asheville-Buncombe Economic Development Coalition. At full buildout, the facility will support 800 new jobs with an average wage of $68,000; hiring is set to begin in late 2021. A partnership with A-B Tech will provide residents with skills and training to enter the industry.

Pratt & Whitney’s announcement marks the largest new jobs investment in Western North Carolina history. According to a statement from the N.C. Department of Commerce, the project will be partially supported by a $15.5 million job development investment grant, disbursed over a 12-year period if the company meets job creation and investment targets.

The site, located on Biltmore Farms property between the French Broad River, the Blue Ridge Parkway and Interstate 26, will be accessed by a yetto-be constructed five-lane bridge that will cross the French Broad River near the N.C. Arboretum. North Carolina’s Golden LEAF Foundation has granted $12 million toward bridge construction costs. X

BIZ BRIEFS

by Xpress Staff | news@mountainx.com CATALYZING SUCCESS Ten entrepreneurs of color with existing businesses have been selected for Mountain BizWorks’ inaugural Catalyst Cohort. The one-year program began on Oct. 29 and will provide growth management training, mentorship and support in accessing capital.

Participants include: • P eterson Appliance Service: sale and service of home appliances in Asheville.

• LuXe Financial Co.: mortgage and financial services.

• A sheville Community Enterprises, LLC: resources for substance use, mental health, domestic abuse and anger management.

• K ente Kitchen: West African cuisine and African grocery.

• Sole82: sneaker boutique in Asheville.

• H ERS Limited Liability Co.: health care coordination services for women.

• MS Lean Landscaping: residential and commercial landscapers.

• S ora Surya No: healer, speaker and life coach.

• S pillway Bridge & Co.: gathering place for music, craft and classic brews and top-shelf spirits in Marion.

• G MZ Construction LLC: masonry and painting contractor.

According to a press release, “The goal of the Catalyst Cohort is to drive specific outcomes including reaching big individual business goals, increasing revenue and building businesses to scale.”

BUSINESS UPDATES

• TechHouse opened at 46 Commerce St. in Asheville. According to a press release, TechHouse is “a one-stop shop providing computer, mobile device and gaming system services such as hardware or software updates and repair, network solutions

HOSPITALITY HAPPENINGS

• Hilton Garden Inn opened at 9 Rocky Ridge Road across from the Asheville Outlets. The 111room lodging facility also includes a new restaurant, The Garden Grille, a cocktail bar and 2,500 square feet of outdoor entertainment space.

• The 87-room The Foundry Hotel was added to the management portfolio of Raines, a hospitality management, development and operating group based in South Carolina.

• A sheville Rooftop Bar Tours won a 2020 Travelers’ Choice award for top attractions.

• K impton Hotel Arras, McKibbon Hospitality’s 128-room hotel in downtown Asheville, received an award for the top new or renovated meeting site from ConventionSouth.

TALL ORDER: TechHouse owner Anuj Patel, left, says he hopes to make solving tech issues “a fun experience” for customers at the new downtown store. With Patel is staffer Early Gima.

Photo courtesy of TechHouse for home and business, data transfer and recovery, new device setup, gaming PC builds and much more.”

• E quinox, a local environmental planning and design firm, celebrated 20 years in business on Sept.

22 (the autumnal equinox).

• Dollar General opened a new store at 60 Old Mars Hill Highway in Weaverville.

• H arbor Freight Tools opened its 41st North Carolina store at 120 Henderson Crossing Plaza in Hendersonville.

• Pretty as a Peach Boutique opened at Asheville Outlets. The women’s clothing retailer is based in Johnson City, Tenn.

• I n September, Launch Trampoline Park Ashe-

ville at 24 Walden Drive in Arden completed the purchase of Sky Zone Asheville to consolidate market share. The Sky Zone Asheville location has closed.

• Amy Woody took over as CEO for Mountain Credit Union of Waynesville. She replaces Patty Idol, who retired after 20 years leading the institution.

• B anking industry veteran Rebekah M. Lowe was named a director of HomeTrust Bancshares, the holding company for HomeTrust Bank.

HomeTrust is the second-largest community bank headquartered in North Carolina.

Atomic style green chair, MCM Standing Bowl & Original Acrylic on panel Find in TRS inventory

REAL ESTATE BEAT

• A sheville Holistic Realty is now Owners Only Real Estate. More information at OwnersOnlyRE.com.

• C arolina Mountain Sales moved its offices to 80 Charlotte St. • S cott Pitzalis and Ken Cagle joined Weichert, Realtors offices in the Asheville area.

• A lex Barbosa-Medina, Jenna Walen and Margie Smith joined EXIT Realty Vistas offices in the Asheville area.

• J essica Auge joined Carla & Co. of Keller Williams Commercial Real Estate as a tenant representative.

• T here are two ways to experience the Southern Living Idea House in The Ramble Biltmore Forest: tour the showplace property through Wednesday, Dec. 30, or buy it. (Naturally, it’s possible to do both. The house is listed at $2,385,000.) Tour information is available at avl.mx/8no. X

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13

COVID CONVERSATIONS

ASHEVILLE ARCHIVES

by Thomas Calder | tcalder@mountainx.com

‘Cowardly and wicked’

You got this Local resident creates care bags during COVID-19

HERE TO HELP: For several months, Madelyn Schmidt has dedicated time each week to create care bags for individuals in need during COVID-19. Photo courtesy of Schmidt Since March, UNC Chapel Hill sophomore Madelyn Schmidt has been back home in Asheville, where she spends much of her time attending online lectures. But the 20-year-old psychology major has also been finding ways to give back to the community.

“I’ve worked in homeless shelters since I was a young teenager,” Schmidt explains. “But once COVID hit, I wasn’t actually able to go and volunteer anymore.”

Undeterred, Schmidt launched the You Got This bags initiative in August.

Slim Jims, medical masks, crackers, wet wipes and socks are among the items she includes in the 40 care packages she delivers each week for distribution through 12 Baskets Cafe, a local nonprofit that currently serves free to-go meals outside its 610 Haywood Road location on Tuesdays and Fridays, 11 a.m.-1 p.m.

“I have a crazy Excel spreadsheet with all of my costs from every single store,” she says.

And while Schmidt manages most of the project on her own, she emphasizes that community support sustains her efforts. To date, over $1,000 has come in through her online fundraising efforts to support the program.

“People have been superenthusiastic and supergenerous,” she says.

The project, continues Schmidt, is a way to contribute to the greater good while also creating some consistency and a sense of purpose in her own life during these otherwise unpredictable times. “‘No one can do everything, but everyone can do something,’” she says, quoting Christian author Max Lucado. “Pick that one thing you really want to help fix and work hard on doing just that.”

He gets his music online.

His t-shirts at the mall.

And his drugs from his uncle’s medicine cabinet.

BE AWARE. DON’T SHARE.®

LOCK YOUR MEDS.®

TM

LockYourMeds.org/NC 14

NOV. 4-10, 2020

MOUNTAINX.COM

— Thomas Calder X

Initial reactions to the Shelton Laurel Massacre, 1863

On Jan. 15, 1863, amid the Civil War, The Asheville News reported that enemies, “not in the shape of Northern soldiers, but … of disloyal men from Tennessee and our own State,” ransacked the nearby town of Marshall. Confederate soldiers, the article noted, were headed to Madison County to “restore order and security.”

Additional information, the paper continued, “will be fully known in due time.”

Subsequent reports explained how the region’s Union sympathizers, including those living in Shelton Laurel, were denied salt from Confederate commissioners. With food in short supply and salt critical for preserving meat, individuals took matters into their own hands.

Two months later, on March 17, 1863, The North Carolina Standard, based in Raleigh, shared an account from an unnamed source residing in the state’s western region. According to the individual, Confederate soldiers “shot down in cold blood” a number of Shelton Laurel residents accused of the January raid.

The source asserted that the officer who ordered the executions (identified in subsequent papers as Lt. Col. James Keith) “knew that the only object of the raid made by these [Shelton Laurel] men was to seize the salt, which they believed was wrongfully withheld from them.”

“I am no apologist for these miserable ignorant thieves,” the source continued.

“But I hold that the Constitution and the laws of this country guarantee to every man and woman in the Confederacy, no matter what their crime, a fair and impartial trial.”

The North Carolina Standard agreed. The men accused of the raid “committed a great wrong against society,” the paper wrote.

Along with the stolen salt, the article noted damage to private property and at least two wounded residents.

The men deserved lawful punishment, The North Carolina Standard continued.

But instead, the paper observed: “The musket did the work. The red hand of vengeance was triumphant, and the voice of mercy, which is heard everywhere except in hell, was raised in vain.”

Because these men were denied a trial, the paper deemed the 64th Regiment’s actions “both cowardly and wicked.”

By the summer of 1863 several newspapers — including the Baltimore Sun and The New York Times — picked up on the story and ran a syndicated article describing the January killing of the 13 men and boys, which became known as the Shelton Laurel Massacre.

The piece features gruesome and dramatic details about the executions, includ-

CALLING THE SHOTS: Lt. Col. James Keith, an impressively bearded native of Mars Hill, was in charge of the North Carolina 64th Regiment, which carried out the Shelton Laurel Massacre. Photo via Mrs. James F. Arnold, El Paso, Texas; courtesy of Southern Appalachian Archives, Mars Hill University ing alleged pleas made by one of the youngest victims, 12-year-old William Shelton.

“Poor little Billy was wounded in both arms. He ran to an officer, clasped him around his legs, and besought him to spare his life. ‘You have killed my father and my three brothers; you have shot me in both arms — I forgive you for all this; I can get well. Let me go home to my mother and sisters.’ What a heart of adamant the man must have who could disregard such an appeal! The little boy was dragged back to the place of execution; again the terrible word ‘fire!’ was given, and he fell dead, eight balls having entered his body.”

The syndicated report went on to note that a number of Shelton Laurel women were also brutally “whipped and hung by the neck till they were almost dead.”

Among the assault victims was an 85-yearold resident. “And the men who did this were called soldiers!” the article decried.

No members of the North Carolina 64th Regiment were ever tried for the deaths of the 13 people killed in Madison County on Jan. 19, 1863.

Today, the Shelton Laurel Massacre continues to inspire debate, research and publications, including the most recent work of historical fiction And the Crows Took Their Eyes by local author Vicki Lane.

(See “Author Vicki Lane Takes Multiple Views of the Shelton Laurel Massacre,” Oct. 23, Xpress) Editor’s note: Peculiarities of spelling and punctuation are preserved from the original document. X

COMMUNITY CALENDAR NOV. 4-13, 2020 For a full list of community calendar guidelines, please visit mountainx.com/calendar.

For questions about free listings, call 828-251-1333, ext.

137. For questions about paid calendar listings, please call 828-251-1333, ext. 320.

In-Person Events = Shaded All other events are virtual

ART Slow Art Friday: Finding Stories in Faces & Expressions Discussion led by touring docent Megan Pyle at Asheville Art Museum.

FR (11/6), 12pm, Registration required, $10, avl.mx/8m8 First Friday Art Walk Open galleries.

FR (11/6), 5pm, Free, Biltmore Ave/College St Local Cloth: Fiber Farmers Day Local fiber and textile sale and demonstrations.

SA (11/7), 9am, WNC Farmers Market, 570 Brevard Rd Asheville Art Museum: Discussion Bound Reading Group You Must Change Your Life: The Story of Rainer Maria Rilke and Auguste Rodin by Rachel Corbett.

TU (11/10), 12pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8nu Our VOICE: 19th Annual Survivors Art Show Opening Featuring live performance art and discussion.

TH (11/12), 6:30pm, Free, ourvoicenc.org/art Slow Art Friday: Works on Paper Discussion led by touring docents Hank Bovee and Joey Gigliotti at Asheville Art Museum.

FR (11/13), 12pm, Registration required, $10, avl.mx/8nv

MUSIC UNCA Live at Lunch Featuring student funkfusion and Afromusics ensembles.

TH (11/5), 12pm, Free, fb.com/uncamusic

LITERARY Stay Home & Write(rs) Group Community writing session with Firestorm.

WE (11/4), 7pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/83c Leicester Library: You wrote a novel, so now what?

PressBooks formatting workshop with Emily Gooding of BiblioLabs.

TH (11/5), 5pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8m2 UNCA Virtual Reading: Coming Home to North Carolina Featuring professor and author Mildred Barya.

TH (11/5), 6pm, Free, avl.mx/8nx Firestorm Visionary Readers Group As Black as Resistance

by William C. Anderson and Zoé Samudzi.

TH (11/5), 7pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8h7 City Lights Book Discussion: Racial Healing Bryan Stevenson's Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption, led by Donna Glee Williams.

SA (11/7), 6pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8jz West Asheville Library: Exploring & Settling the American West Lecture on John Wesley Powell's The Exploration of the Colorado River and Its Canyons by James Aton.

TU (11/10), 7pm, Free, avl.mx/83p Malaprop's Author Discussion Catherine Newman presents How to Be a Person.

WE (11/11), 7pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8ns Stay Home & Write(rs) Group Community writing session with Firestorm.

WE (11/11), 7pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/83c Malaprop's: Risky Behavior Discussion with contributors to Foreshadow: Stories to Celebrate the Magic of Reading and Writing Y.A. TH (11/12), 7pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8nt

FILM Bardo Arts Center at WCU: Reggae Boyz Documentary screening and Q&A with director Till Schauder.

TH (11/12), 7:30pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8d9

CIVICS & ACTIVISM Buncombe County Board of Adjustment Special meeting.

TH (11/5), 9am, avl.mx/wordcaoy Buncombe County Board of Commissioners Special meeting and agenda briefing.

TH (11/5), 3pm, avl.mx/8o5 OLLI at UNCA: What the 2020 Election Results Could Mean Discussion with political science professor Chris Cooper and journalists Joel Burgess and Mark Barrett.

FR (11/6), 11:30am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8ny Asheville Women in Black Monthly peace vigil.

FR (11/6), 5pm, Free, Vance Monument, 1 Pack Square French Broad River Partnership Annual meeting.

TU (11/10), 1:30pm, Registration required, avl.mx/8nn Asheville City Council Formal meeting.

TU (11/10), 5pm, avl.mx/8o4 Vance Monument Task Force Weekly meeting.

TH (11/12), 5pm, avl.mx/85h Firestorm: Educating & Parenting for Liberation Featuring a panel of activist educators.

FR (11/13), 7pm, Registration required, avl.mx/8nr

BENEFITS Coats for the Cold Free coats, hats, gloves and scarves for people in need. Donations accepted all week at Swannanoa Cleaners locations.

SA (11/7), 12-3pm, Western Carolina Rescue Ministries, 225 Patton Ave

BUSINESS & TECHNOLOGY Upselling to Improve Profits for Your Food & Beverage Business A-B Tech Small Business Center webinar.

WE (11/4), 10am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8mx Incredible Towns Business Network Weekly meeting.

WE (11/4), 11am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/7g8 Craft Your Commerce: Creating an Authentic Brand Mountain BizWorks panel discussion moder-

ated by Sarah Benoit.

WE (11/4), 2pm, Registration required, $5, avl.mx/8m4 Mountain BizWorks: People First Website usability best practices webinar led by Sarah Benoit.

TH (11/5), 9am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8my Harnessing Your Cash Flow Western Women's Business Center webinar.

TH (11/5), 10am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8mw Asheville Chamber: Business After Hours Networking and presentation by Jeff Kaplan of Venture Asheville.

Register: avl.mx/8nw.

TH (11/5), 5:30pm, Free, Atelier Maison, 121 Sweeten Creek Rd Managing Risks in Your Food & Beverage Business tenBiz webinar.

WE (11/11), 10am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8o2 Asheville Development Happenings Happy Hour Networking for builders, developers and architects.

WE (11/11), 3:30pm, Rabbit Rabbit, 75 Coxe Ave Deep Dive Lab: Small Business Accounting Western Women's Business Center webinar with Alicia Sisk-Morris.

TH (11/12), 10am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8o1

CLASSES, MEETINGS & EVENTS Spanish Conversation Group For adult language learners.

TH (11/5), 5pm, Free, avl.mx/7c6 Black Humanity Matters: Closing the Opportunity Gap UNCA panel webinar featuring Africana studies professor Tiece Ruffin.

SA (11/7), 10am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8nz

Say His Name: Healing from Collective Trauma in the Age of George Floyd Session 4 of 5: Transformational Power of Personal Stories with Dr. Dana Patterson.

TU (11/10), 6pm, $25, avl.mx/7qo Black Mountain Salutes: Veterans Day Roll Call Recognition ceremony.

WE (11/11), 2pm, Black Mountain Town Square

ECO Election Update & Mapping Trails of WNC: A Journey of Exploration Sierra Club webinar led

by Ken Brame and Ken Czarnomski.

TH (11/5), 7pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8Lu Climate Adaptive Design Symposium Presentations on climate-oriented building science by AIA Asheville and GreenBuilt Alliance.

FR (11/6), 10am, Registration required, $35, avl.mx/8mm Electronics Recycling Drop-off Accepting computers, cables, cell phones, printers and more.

MO (11/9), 3pm, Free, Weaverville Town Hall, 30 S Main St, Weaverville Managing Woods & Fields for Wildlife ForestHer NC webinar.

TH (11/12), 1pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8nl

FOOD MANNA Express Free grocery items for neighbors in need.

FR (11/6), 12pm, Beacon of Hope, 120 Cavalry Dr, Marshall

Fairview Welcome Table Community lunch.

TH (11/12), 11:30am, Admission by donation, Fairview Christian Fellowship, 596 Old US Hwy 74, Fairview

KIDS Miss Malaprop's Storytime Ages 3-9.

WE (11/4), 10am, Free, avl.mx/73b Family Outdoor Movie: Toy Story SU (11/8), 5pm, $5, Rabbit Rabbit, 75 Coxe Ave Miss Malaprop’s Storytime Featuring illustrator Mary Lundquist.

Ages 3-9.

WE (11/11), 10am, Free, avl.mx/73b

OUTDOORS Intro to Fly Fishing Ages 12 and up.

Register: avl.mx/8mk.

WE (11/4), 1pm, Pisgah Center for Wildlife Education, 1401 Fish Hatchery Road, Pisgah Forest Fly Rod Casting for Beginners Ages 12 and up.

Register: avl.mx/8mL. FR (11/6), 1pm, Pisgah Center for Wildlife Education, 1401 Fish Hatchery Rd, Pisgah Forest

WELLNESS Adult Eating Disorder Support Group Hosted by Carolina Resource Center for Eating Disorders.

WE (11/4), 6pm, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/82e Recovery Support Meeting Hosted by First Contact Ministries.

TH (11/5), 6:30pm, Free, avl.mx/7ko

Council on Aging: Intro to Medicare How to avoid penalties and save money.

FR (11/6), 2pm, Registration required, Free, coabc.org Pack Library: Mixed-level Pilates Class Led by Cisco Pilates.

SA (11/7), 11am, Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8m3 Mountain Care: Coping with the Holidays Practical tips for managing grief.

TU (11/10), 11:30am, Registration required, $25, mountaincareservices.org Steady Collective Syringe Access Outreach Free educational material, naloxone, syringes and supplies.

TU (11/10), 2pm, Firestorm Bookstore Co-op, 610 Haywood Rd Homeplace Running Club Led by Raelin Reynolds.

WE (11/11), 6pm, Free, Homeplace Beer, 6 South Main St, Burnsville

SPIRITUALITY Jewish Power Hour Hosted by Rabbi Susskind.

TH (11/5), 6pm, Free, chabadasheville.org/ zoom Buddhism in the South: What's the Meaning of Life?

Led by Gen Norden of KMC GA. FR (11/6), 7pm, Registration required, $10, avl.mx/8mp Groce UMC: A Course in Miracles Group Study Register to get Zoom link: 828-712-5472.

MO (11/9), 6:30pm, Free, Online Baha'i Devotional: Hope Gives Us Wings Devotional with prayers and music.

TU (11/10), 7pm,

Registration required, Free, avl.mx/8o3 Spiritual Care during COVID-19 Small group session with Pastor Ken. WE (11/11), 3pm, Registration required, Free, Grace Lutheran Church, 1245 6 Ave W, Hendersonville Buddhism in the South: From Anger to Compassion Led by Kelsang Jangchen of KMC SC. FR (11/13), 7pm, Registration required, $10, avl.mx/8mp

VOLUNTEERING Conserving Carolina: Rock Crushers Trail building and maintenance. Register: avl.mx/8i7.

WE (11/4), 9:30am, Hickory Nut Gorge, Gerton Community Garden Workday Pruning, mulching and weeding.

SA (11/7), 10am, Buncombe County Sports Park, 58 Apac Circle Conserving Carolina: Kudzu Warriors Invasive plant management. Register: avl.mx/8de.

MO (11/9), 9am, Norman Wilder Forest, Tryon Literacy Council of Buncombe County: Volunteer Orientation Meeting Information on ESOL and adult and youth literacy programs.

TU (11/10), 5pm, Registration required, litcouncil.com Conserving Carolina: Tryon Lot Workday Invasive plant management. Register: avl.mx/8dd.

TH (11/12), 9am, Tryon IGA Supermarket, 370 S Trade St, Tryon

Tranzmission: Legal Name Change Clinic Forms and instructions provided.

MO (11/9), 12pm, Free, avl.mx/8b8 Trade, Recruitment & Rebellion: Native Mediation of Spanish Colonization Swannanoa Valley Museum history webinar.

MO (11/9), 6:30pm, $10, avl.mx/8kz Hendersonville Woman's Club Monthly meeting.

TU (11/10), 10am, 310 Freeman St, Hendersonville

MOUNTAINX.COM

NOV. 4-10, 2020

15

WELLNESS

Money matters

BY MOLLY HORAK mhorak@mountainx.com All new organizations experience growing pains. There are priorities to set, employees to hire, decisions to make. Leadership teams learn — and adjust.

Dogwood Health Trust, the foundation created in 2018 to manage proceeds from the $1.5 billion sale of Asheville’s nonprofit Mission Health System to HCA Healthcare, is no different, said board member Casey Cooper. Amid internal upheaval following the sudden departure of CEO Antony Chiang and appointment of interim leader Susan Mims, the COVID-19 pandemic and economic uncertainty, the foundation held its first annual meeting virtually on Oct. 28.

Cooper, along with DHT board members Janice Brumit, Dawna GoodeLedbetter and Sarah Thompson offered statements and answered

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Dogwood trust board talks funding, strategic priorities

questions from moderator and UNCA professor Darin Waters. But one query seemed to weigh on most participants’ minds: As one of the largest foundations per capita in the world, what exactly has Dogwood been up to?

WHERE’S THE MONEY?

In its first year since the Mission sale, the foundation awarded more than $40 million in grants and investments, said Brumit, the board’s chair.

That amount, she acknowledged, fell shy of the $50 million the organization had hoped to allocate throughout its 18-county Western North Carolina service area.

“COVID-19 set us all back on our heels. We had to stop and pivot to help mitigate COVID, but I feel that $40 million is still a pretty respectable number,” Brumit said. “We plan to do better next year.”

The foundation spent $8.5 million to respond to COVID-19 by purchasing tests, personal protective equipment and internet hot spots to help students access remote learning. An additional $4.5 million was invested in area companies that shifted production to PPE and hand sanitizer, including McDowell County-based Kitsbow Cycling Apparel and Asheville-based Cultivated Cocktails, Brumit said.

In the spring, DHT awarded $3.7 million in immediate opportunities and needs grants to 259 nonprofits and government agencies, with the average award totalling $14,600. And in September, the foundation committed $1 million for racial equity community grants to benefit “historically underfunded” organizations serving Black and Indigenous residents and other communities of color.

Roughly $1.5 million went to WNC counties and nonprofits to incentivize participation in the 2020 census. Other grants and community investments accounted for $7 million, while about $12 million was allocated as bridge loans for businesses applying for federal paycheck protection funding, Brumit continued.

DHT has committed to spend $5 million annually over a five-year period to address substance abuse as part of an agreement with N.C. Attorney General Josh Stein and the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services. The foun-

MOUNTAINX.COM

PANDEMIC PARTNERSHIPS: In March, Dogwood Health Trust committed $10 million to help fight COVID-19 in Western North Carolina. Part of that funding was used to purchase face masks and distribute them to communities of color through a partnership with the Asheville Buncombe Institute of Parity Achievement, whose efforts are pictured above. Photo courtesy of Dogwood Health Trust dation is on track to meet that $5 million quota by the end of the year, Cooper said, noting current investments in needle disposal sites and naloxone kits to help reverse opioid overdose.

By law, private nonoperating foundations must distribute 5% of their net investment assets annually. When all of Dogwood’s $1.5 billion in assets come under foundation control in 2022, this will equate to roughly $75 million; Brumit clarified that the 2020 requirement falls closer to the $40 million the foundation has already allocated but did not give an exact number.

BEHIND THE VEIL

The Oct. 28 annual meeting was the first public update from the foundation since March, when local news outlets were invited to a press conference with Chiang to discuss the DHT’s COVID-19 response. A second media availability was scheduled for Sept. 23, but was canceled minutes after news broke of Chiang’s departure on the same day.

The foundation has been criticized for a lack of transparency, Waters noted as he asked panelists about their approach to sharing information and

updates. “We have intentionally and repeatedly engaged with community members,” Brumit responded, adding that listening sessions with community members and partner organizations are ongoing.

“Part of the reason we’ve been so quiet is because we’re so busy,” Brumit shared at the start of the meeting.

The same sentiment was stated almost word for word by Goode-Ledbetter an hour later: “Starting a foundation from scratch in a nonpandemic is hard.

Doing it in a pandemic is harder. If it seems like we’re being more quiet about things, it’s because we’re busy.”

And Thompson asked for patience as the trust continued to develop its communication strategies. The board was only a few sessions into strategic planning when the COVID-19 pandemic began, she explained, and decided to focus on responding to the virus instead.

Concerns with the DHT’s transparency, however, existed long before the pandemic. In late 2018, local nonprofits blasted the trust’s initial board as consisting largely of Mission insiders, and some feared retaliation for airing their concerns. Brumit admitted to Xpress in February 2019 that “we probably should have invited the press” to the trust’s first ostensibly public event in September 2018, which only included select nonprofits. Few details about Dogwood’s financial management were made available after the trust accepted its first assets in 2019.

When asked by Waters about the circumstances surrounding Chiang’s departure, Brumit stayed tight-lipped.

“With respect to why, there is not really anything else we can share at this time,” she said. “In terms of direction, sometimes a new organization needs a change or shift in style for the work in front of us.”

NEW DIRECTIONS

Housing, employment, education and health and wellness will be the foundation’s four strategic priorities for the next decade, Brumit announced.

During that time, the board hopes to build over 5,000 units of affordable housing, create at least 5,000 jobs to diversify the regional economy, shrink the opportunity gap in area school districts and address the opioid crisis and substance abuse. Diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives also remain a top priority, Goode-Ledbetter said.

“We see these areas as four roots of a mighty tree that come together to make a strong trunk and create branches that grow fruit for everyone,” Brumit said.

Mims will begin her new role as interim CEO in December. She comes to DHT from the Mountain Area Health Education Center, where she chairs the newly established Department of Community and Public Health at UNC Health Sciences at MAHEC. The search for a permanent CEO will begin shortly, Brumit said. “We’re very glad to have an interim with a deep knowledge of the community,” she shared.

DHT’s annual report, containing a detailed breakdown of all funding allocations, will be released at the end of the year. X

PIECE OF THE PIE: Dogwood Health Trust is on track to distribute roughly $43.2 million via grants and investments by the end of the year. Graphic by Scott Southwick MOUNTAINX.COM

NOV. 4-10, 2020

17

GREEN ROUNDUP

by Daniel Walton | dwalton@mountainx.com

WNC air quality improves Although residents of Western North Carolina may be breathing through face coverings these days, the air coming through those masks is significantly cleaner than it would’ve been 10 years ago. According to a new study by Filterbuy, an air filter industry website, the median air quality index in the Asheville metropolitan area was 15.3% better over the period from 2015-19 compared with the period from 2005-09.

Compiled by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, the air quality index is a composite measure of pollution that includes particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, ground-level ozone and other compounds. Lower values indicate better air quality; values below 50 are considered good, while those over 100 are considered “unhealthy for sensitive groups.”

Asheville’s median AQI score went from 52, indicating “moderate” air quality, to 44 over the study period. The average number of days in the metro area per year with good AQI scores also rose from 169 to 258, an increase of nearly 53%. Filterbuy attributes the changes to the continuing implementation of the federal Clean Air Act and “modern pollution control technologies.”

Other regional metros showed even better air quality results. Median AQI in the Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton area to Asheville’s east dropped from 54 to 43, a 20.4% improvement, while the same figure for the Greenville, S.C., area went from 57 to 44, an improvement of 23.1%. Both metros also saw more than 100 extra days per year with good AQI scores.

CLEAR OUTLOOK: Stunning views such as this vista from Bearwallow Mountain have become more common in Western North Carolina over the past decade thanks to improvements in air quality. Photo by Daniel Walton

State foresters urge caution during fall wildfire season WNC has so far this year avoided any major wildfires like those currently burning in California and Colorado, but the N.C. Forest Service is encouraging residents to be mindful of fire safety nonetheless. The state’s fall wildfire season lasts from mid-October through mid-December.

“As leaves begin to fall and vegetation starts to dry out, it’s important for all North Carolinians to use extreme caution when burning debris of any kind,” said Steve Troxler, North Carolina’s agriculture commissioner, in a press release. “As wildfires continue to rage in Western states and the COVID-19 pandemic continues to be a challenge, let’s remember that we’re not powerless.”

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Basic safety practices include preparing a water source, steel rake and shovel for fire control before starting a burn; avoiding the use of kerosene or gasoline to speed up a fire; and staying with a fire until it has been totally extinguished.

County forest rangers are available to provide further technical advice and develop safer options for burning debris.

Buncombe County’s forest ranger, Dillon Michael, can be reached at robert.michael@ncagr.gov or 828-686-5885.

Forest Service contacts for other counties can be found at avl.mx/6k0.

AG Stein awards nearly $340K to WNC environmental work

Four organizations across WNC stand to benefit from the most recent round of Environmental Enhancement Grants, administered by the office of N.C. Attorney General Josh Stein.

Approximately $340,000 will go toward projects in Buncombe, Henderson, Madison and Macon counties.

The largest award, more than $130,000, supports the Mountain Valley Resource Conservation and Development Council for stormwater management around two Madison County schools.

Ecologically sound practices such as a rain garden, vegetative plantings and wetland creation will be enacted at Brush Creek Elementary School and Madison Middle School.

Other grants include over $92,000 to the Macon Soil and Water Conservation District for streambank protection of

Cove Branch; $90,000 to the Henderson County Soil and Water Conservation District for stream stabilization in Lewis Creek; and nearly $27,000 to the N.C. Arboretum for an education kiosk at the Willow Pond wetland.

“Educating people about our environment can reap benefits for generations of North Carolinians,” said Stein about the last-mentioned effort in a press release announcing the awards. “I hope this project will foster interest in nature for North Carolinians of all ages.”

Community kudos

• A sheville-based nonprofit MountainTrue honored former state Rep. Chuck McGrady with the Esther Cunningham Award in recognition of his “lifetime of service in environmental conservation.” Suzanne Hale, Maureen Linneman, Joan Parks and Craig Weaver also received awards for their volunteer work with the organization.

• Transylvania County was one of only five North American areas to be named a “Global Top 100 Sustainable Destination” by Green Destinations, an international nonprofit. According to a press release by Transylvania County Tourism, the award acknowledges the area’s “full compliance with 30 core sustainability best practices,” as well as recent campaigns around COVID-19 management and waterfall safety.

• The Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy received the Garden Club of America’s Cynthia Pratt

Czarnomski at 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 5. The Zoom webinar will also include an update on the results of the 2020 general election by Ken Brame, the club’s political chair. More information and registration at avl.mx/8lu.

• The Ramsey Center for Appalachian Studies at Mars Hill University hosts a free virtual Feast and Farmin’ event celebrating heritage foods in Madison County at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 12. The first 50 households to register will receive free seed packets of Lazy Wife greasy beans and Dutch Fork pumpkins, two heirloom varieties.

More information and registration at avl.mx/8ni.

CIRCLE UP: The Medicine Wheel Collective, a nonprofit permaculture education center at Earthaven Ecovillage, is seeking donations to help renovate its community kitchen. Photo courtesy of Medicine Wheel Laughlin Medal, which recognizes “outstanding achievement in environmental protection and the maintenance of the quality of life.” Previous winners have included author Wendell Berry and the U.S. Green Building Council, which developed LEED environmental standards.

• Warren Wilson College’s divestment from fossil fuels was featured in a report by the Intentional Endowments Network, a Massachusetts-based nonprofit. The college passed a responsible investment policy in 2015 and completed its divestment earlier this year.

• The town of Waynesville’s Parks and Recreation Department earned national accreditation through the Commission for Accreditation of Park and Recreation Agencies. According to Rhett Langston, the department’s director, Waynesville is the third-smallest populated area in the country to receive the honor and the only one in WNC.

Get involved

• The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission is seeking information on the spread of rabbit hemorrhagic disease virus serotype 2, a deadly infection of both domestic and wild rabbits. Those who observe a dead rabbit for which the cause of death is not readily apparent or one showing blood around the nose, mouth or rectum are asked to call 866-318-2401 or email wildlifehelpline@ncwildlife.org.

• The Medicine Wheel Collective, a nonprofit permaculture education center located at Earthaven Ecovillage in Black Mountain, is raising funds to renovate its community kitchen. More information and a donation link are available at avl.mx/8nc.

• The Buncombe County Soil and Water Conservation District is conducting a questionnaire about the future of its Friends of Agriculture program. Farmers, nonprofit leaders, agricultural educators and others are encouraged to complete the survey at avl.mx/8nd by Friday, Nov. 13.

• Darby Communications and Status Forward, two Asheville-based marketing agencies, are accepting applications from outdoors-focused nonprofits for the 2021 Stand Up Initiative.

Two winners will receive 100 hours of pro bono consulting for media outreach, event planning and other communications needs. Applications are due by Friday, Nov. 27, at avl.mx/8ng.

• Fletcher-based Cane Creek Cycling Components has organized the Pisgah Project raffle to benefit the nonprofit Pisgah Conservancy. For every $20 donation by Monday, Nov. 30, participants will receive one entry to win a custom-built mountain bike valued at over $9,000. More information at ThePisgahProject.com.

Save the date

• The WNC Sierra Club presents a virtual lecture by local mapmaker Ken

• The Pisgah Center for Wildlife Education in Brevard has resumed in-person workshops on a variety of outdoors topics. Due to COVID-19, all programs take place outdoors, and masks and social distancing are required. A full list of offerings through Friday, Nov. 20, and registration information are available at avl.mx/5qm. X

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FOOD

Good to go

Restaurant delivery services continue to adapt to new demands

BY KAY WEST kswest55@comcast.net

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As Asheville restaurants have struggled to segue between various phases of the pandemic shutdown while adhering to shifting policies and protocols, one sector of the dining industry has powered steadily onward: meal delivery.

Restaurant delivery businesses like Kickback AVL have seen strong growth since Gov. Roy Cooper closed the state’s dining rooms on March 17, with room for more like newcomer Take It 2 Go, which went live in mid-October. The owners expect that trend to continue with winter weather and limited outdoor dining options on the horizon.

In late May, Jennie Townsend, founder and owner of Asheville-based Kickback AVL, took a minute to comment on the madness that had enveloped her restaurant delivery business since March.

“Overnight we had a whole lot of new restaurants sign up and a whole lot of new customers,” she said then. “I’m working nonstop trying to manage it.”

Checking back four months — or four COVID years — later, Townsend says business hasn’t slowed down, partly due to the return of tourists to the area. “Since summer, we have seen a big jump of deliveries to hotels and short-term rentals,” she says.

She also points out that inclement weather drives more traffic to her site, partially from customers of member restaurants that rely on outdoor seating areas. She cites the rainy Oct. 11-12 weekend as a prime example. “Saturday, Oct. 11, we beat our previous record by 25 orders, and the next day we had our second-biggest Sunday ever,” she says.

Townsend has responded to the growing demands of her business by hiring more salaried staff, including Stu Helm, graphic designer, food writer and — up until March 17 — a busy guide for Asheville Food Tours. “She needed help, and I needed a job,” Helm says. “Her thing is local, my thing is local, we’ve been friends a long time, and it worked out.”

Since he was hired in late August, Helm’s most public role has been creating prolific daily social media posts. But behind the scenes, he has worked on building menus on the Kickback website — particularly helping restaurants tweak offerings when necessary for a better takeout experience.

“We want to help them figure out how to have a good to-go menu and the best packaging for a better delivery experience, as well as how to be innovative and

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READY TO ROLL: To meet the rising demand for meal delivery to homes and offices, Carlos Banks kicked Get It 2 Go into gear in mid-October. Photo by De’Onna Banks create family meal packs, heat-and-eat and par-cooked meals,” he explains.

He wants to increase participation by local food trucks that have a consistent schedule and location — Blue Collar Diner & Food Truck’s all-day breakfast has been a very popular addition. He and Townsend are also committed to bringing more ethnic eateries on board. “It’s hard when we don’t speak Spanish for example, and Hispanic restaurants don’t speak English,” he points out.

To help meet this challenge, Helm has recruited his friend, professional translator Luis Serapio of Descubre Asheville, to accompany him when he visits places like Pupusaria Patty. Having passed with flying colors Townsend’s recent menu taste test, the Patton Avenue restaurant will soon be added to the Kickback roster, employing a tablet for online ordering to help overcome the language barrier of phone-in orders.

Townsend has also added more dispatchers and is rolling out a new service area in Black Mountain. “One of the biggest reasons I’m opening in Black Mountain is to build some zones to set limits on how far drivers have to go,” she says, adding that the next area to be added will be Hendersonville.

Also looking to expand its service beyond Buncombe County is the new

kid in town, Get It 2 Go. Asheville native Carlos Banks, a former UPS driver who also ran his own transportation business for 14 years, launched his franchise of the national Time to Eat network on Oct. 15. “I know transportation logistics,” he says. “I just decided with everything going on, it was a good time to transition to food delivery.”

Banks’ purchase of the franchise came with support such as training, an individualized website, marketing materials, uniforms, thermal carriers, tablets and participating national chain restaurants.

Banks screens and hires drivers, manages his franchise and recruits local restaurants — there are nearly 30 options now on his roster.

Get It 2 Go also picks up and delivers grocery orders made online, and Banks plans to add pharmacies and pet supply stores soon. He is currently focused on restaurants and delivery in the Arden area, but like Townsend, has his eye on Hendersonville. “Delivery was a growing field before the pandemic,” he says. “I see that increasing as colder weather sets in and not slowing down even when this is over.”

Learn more about Kickback AVL at kickbackavl.com. Details about Get It 2 Go are at getit2godelivery.com. X

Food news

2020’s penultimate month kicks off with good news we can use Rolling into November, we see new cafes, reopened dining rooms, gingerbread houses and Kitchen Mischief.

COUSINS CUBAN CAFÉ

Betty Sperry built a local following through her Farm to Fork food cart, parked weekends for four years at the Silver Fork Vineyard & Winery in Morganton. The menu was seasonal, though the popular Cubano sandwich — an homage to her Cuban heritage — was a year-round constant.

When her cousins, owners of the Dancing Dragonfly gift shop in Black Mountain, purchased the building next door, she seized the opportunity to open a brick-and-mortar restaurant.

“We wanted to introduce the community to Cuban food, but we also just missed the Cuban food in Miami where we’re all from,” she says. “My husband says it would have been a lot cheaper if we had each just bought a personal panini press.”

Sperry and her cousin Liane Martinez started demo on the space pre-pandemic and soldiered on through the shutdown, confident the business’s small physical footprint (there is seating for 12 inside and additional outdoor seating behind the Dragonfly) and reliance on takeout was a winning formula in these times.

Cousins Cuban Café opened Oct. 19, and Sperry reports, “It was crazy! I did not expect so many people, and we actually ran out of food a couple of times, but everything is made from scratch and fresh to order, so when it’s done, it’s done.”

Cousins serves breakfast daily until 11 a.m., then switches to pressed sandwiches, empanadas, Cubano bowls, sides and desserts. Cuban coffee specialties like the cortadito are made all day. Cousins Cuban Café, 108 Broadway Ave., Black Mountain, avl.mx/8n8

OUTSIDE IN

Oct. 21 was a red-letter day for two downtown dining staples as both John Fleer’s Rhubarb on Pack Square and Brian Canipelli’s Cucina 24 on Wall Street reopened their indoor dining rooms just ahead of the end of daylight

saving time and seasonal temperature dips.

Rhubarb had been doing takeout and covered patio dining until Sept. 5, when a small kitchen fire shut down all kitchen operations, adding to the COVID19 woes. Getting through repairs and inspections took much longer than expected, says Fleer.

He has pared down the menu and wine list by about one-third for dinner service from 4-9 p.m. every day but Monday, and brunch weekends from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. With reduced capacity — seven tables outside, 13 inside and no bar seating — Rhubarb recommends reservations and asks that diners limit their visits to 90 minutes. Rhubarb, 7 S.W. Pack Square, avl.mx/8na If the idling cars on Wall Street were any indication, Cucina 24 had been doing a steady takeout business since spring, and in June, it took advantage of the city’s Shared Spaces program to add street and sidewalk seating. The dining room recently reopened with seven tables seating no more than six per table (no bar or chef bar seats).

To assure the best dining experience, Cucina is serving only the four-course, family-style meal, with a choice of main for each guest from the daily changing menu. Takeout service will continue.

Cucina serves dinner 4-9 p.m. TuesdaySunday, 4-10 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

Reservations are required. Cucina 24, 24 Wall St., avl.mx/8n9

BAKING THE BEST OF IT

The Omni Grove Park Inn’s 28th annual National Gingerbread House Competition is, like countless other events and celebrations, going virtual this year. But in an effort to sweeten the disappointment, encourage holiday baking and bring a bit of celebrity razzle-dazzle to your home kitchen, the organizers have created Baking Spirits Bright, a three-part pre-taped series of cooking classes kicking off with “Gingerbread Basics” taught by Carla Hall of “Top Chef” and “The Chew.”

The entire package costs $29 (plus tax) and can be viewed at any time. For more information, visit avl.mx/8nb.

MOTHER LODE: Cousins Cuban Café chef/co-owner Betty Sperry, right, celebrates the grand opening with her mother, Isabel deJong Martinez. Photo courtesy Betty Sperry

MONKEYING AROUND

Hollie West reopened her full-service Sweet Monkey Bakery & Café in Marshall in early September as a scratch-made convenience store with prepared items to go, including takeand-bake pizzas, cheese spreads, dressings, hummus, soups and salads.

“Keeping up with the chicken salad is a full-time job,” she says with a laugh.

Though she no longer offers any indoor seating, she says she is actually able to feed more people than before, thanks in part to the introduction of weekly (Wednesday through Sunday),

themed a la carte dinner menus of appetizers, salad, sides, mains, breads and dessert. So far, West has covered Greek Week, Sliders, Day of the Dead Mexican and from Nov. 4-8, her spin on Chinese takeout.

She has also debuted a very entertaining video blog called “Kitchen Mischief” shot on location in the Sweet Monkey kitchen with instruction for assembling and finishing the themed dinners and other tips for the home chef. Sweet Monkey, 133 S. Main St., Marshall, avl.mx/8ne

— Kay West X

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NEW TREATS IN WEST ASHEVILLE: Whirly Bird recently opened its order window inside Asheville Sandwich Co., piquing the curiosity of people waiting for their sandwiches. Pictured are owners Cheri and Kevin Mullins. Photo courtesy Whirly Bird If you think you’ve had a hard time dealing with COVID-19, Kevin Mullins sees you and raises you by 19 flavors of ice cream. “Testing these recipes has been tough,” he says. “You have to be careful how much you eat.”

On Oct. 1, the owner (with wife Cheri Mullins) of Asheville Sandwich Co. scratched his longtime itch for an ice cream shop with the opening of Whirly Bird Ice Cream & Milkshake Bar. He didn’t have to go far to do it.

“I had my eye on the building next door for a while, but with the pandemic and so much uncertainty, I felt like I needed to get a little more creative,” he says. “Since Asheville Sandwich is closed to indoor dining and doing a walk-up order window only, we had some extra space inside, so why not make it into an ice cream shop?”

A pandemic that has turned the food industry upside down and the imminent approach of cold weather might be two good “why-nots,” but Mullins reasons, “It’s 2020, and nothing is making sense.

Might as well give it a shot.”

A shot is exactly what Whirly Bird’s unique ice cream gets, in the form of a wand that shoots negative-320-degree

liquid nitrogen into a bowl of ice cream base, flavors and mix-ins. “This style of ice cream has been spinning up in Florida and other places. It’s a fun way to make ice cream to order. The engineer in me wanted to try it. It turns out ice cream is really hard,” he admits with a laugh.

After many experiments — and lots of taste testing — Whirly Bird opened its order window and installed its menu on the left rear wall of the Haywood Road sandwich shop, piquing the curiosity of people waiting for their sandwiches.

On the big board are the 19 specialty flavors, among them Campfire S’Mores; Nutella, Strawberries and Cream; Dreamy Mint Cookie; and Cinnamon Dulce de Leche. Build-your-own options offer more than a dozen mix-ins, and vessel choices include bowls, waffle cones or bubble waffles. All flavor combinations can be turned into milkshakes.

“If we keep making good and creative stuff, I don’t think the cold weather will matter,” says Mullins. “We all deserve a treat these days.”

For Whirly Bird’s menu and hours of operation, visit avl.mx/8n7.

— Kay West X

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23

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

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“THINGS YOU WISH EXISTED”: Members of Street Creature Puppets show off their work at the North Asheville Recreation Center. The group is losing its space at that location due to new COVID-regulated programming and is seeking a new locale to rehearse, create and store puppets and props. Photo by Alli Marshall

BY ALLI MARSHALL allimarshall@bellsouth.net As local businesses shutter in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Western North Carolina isn’t losing just eateries and entertainment venues — it’s losing the practice and performance spaces for its creative culture.

“The close of The BLOCK [Off Biltmore] has … created a serious lack in the heart of our city — where community gathered at the intersection of art, activism and good company … letting off some steam, and finding other like-minded people from many different walks of life,” says Gareth Higgins, founder of The Porch Magazine. The literary publication held regular events at The BLOCK that included writers, storytellers and musicians. There, “Cam [MacQueen]’s hosting helped us feel so welcome, so at home and so at liberty to do whatever we wanted.”

Higgins adds, “We don’t have another location in mind at present, as we’re not planning in-person gatherings until it serves the common good to do so.” And luckily for the publication, its

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“online activity has certainly increased during the pandemic — both readers and submissions.”

But other arts groups haven’t been able to turn to the internet for performance and engagement opportunities. And post-pandemic planning has depended on the ability to safely gather for rehearsals.

“We were in such a nice groove at the end of last year,” says Jen Murphy of Street Creature Puppets. The local collective, which started in 2011, had been using porches and basements to meet when an enthusiastic city of Asheville staffer spotted the puppeteers in the Asheville Holiday Parade and offered to help them find a practice space. That kind gesture led to rent-free digs in the North Asheville Recreation Center, complete with a storage closet and enough room to host rehearsals, plus meetings by other groups such as Asheville Fringe Arts Festival, Asheville Second Line and Zed AVL. “It was like the Goddess descended and blessed us,” Murphy says. “From there, we really took off.”

Indeed, Street Creature Puppets has showcased its larger-than-life creations at many LEAF festivals and Asheville Mardi Gras, and also oversaw the Asheville Puppetry Alliance when that organization’s leaders retired. But in March, they had to close down — the rec center is a city building, and Murphy says they couldn’t use it due to COVID-19 regulations.

A few months later, city representatives informed the puppeteers that the rec center space would be housing activities — details of which are still in the works — under new COVID-oriented guidelines, and the group’s lease wouldn’t be renewed. Arts organizations that had benefited from Street Creature’s space wrote letters of support, and Murphy says the collective itself “tried our best to pitch that we could cohabitate.” But ultimately, she and her collaborators had to accept a pending move.

Pulling up roots is nothing new for Asheville Improv Collective. The performance and workshop group was previously based out of Habitat Tavern and Commons. When Habitat closed in early 2019, AIC began making plans for alter-

native meeting, practice, performance and teaching locales. Connections with UpCountry Brewing Co. for shows and Land of the Sky United Church of Christ for classes were in the works. “It felt like we were kind of turning it all around after getting booted,” says collective member Clifton Hall. Then COVID-19 hit.

AIC attempted some Zoom classes but ultimately “felt like there were a lot of people who were Zoomed out,” says Hall.

He also notes that improv “is hard to do online” — there’s an energy in the room that’s key to the collaborative process of creation.

Masked practices present an obstacle, too: “You’ve got to see if somebody’s smiling or if they look mad,” he says. “That’s hard when [part] of your face is covered.”

So, for now, AIC is in a holding pattern.

Hall hopes that the pre-COVID opportunities for performance and workshop space will be available post-pandemic, but he and his colleagues “want to wait until everything is safe.”

Street Creature Puppets, on the other hand, needs to find a new home soon.

“If it came to months and months of not being able to meet, I’d worry people would put their creative energy into other things,” Murphy says. Ideally, the right space will present itself, though Street

Creature’s members describe the perfect combination of location, square footage and storage as a unicorn. But this group has found its unicorn before: “I’m trying to be positive,” Murphy says.

Higgins is also seeing a silver lining.

“Our retreats both in the U.S. and Ireland were all canceled as a result of the pandemic, which has had an enormous impact on income,” he says. “But, on the other hand, the pandemic has caused so many of us to reflect on what really matters in life and to adjust our habits accordingly.”

And the mission of The Porch — to help make the world better through learning and sharing a better story — isn’t going away anytime soon.

“When the pandemic subsides, the questions we ask will be the same: What story are you telling? Is it the truest version you could know? Is it the most helpful way to tell it?” Higgins says. “If the answer to either of those latter questions is ‘No,’ then let’s help each other find a truer story and a more helpful way of telling it.”

Learn more at streetcreaturewnc.wordpress.com, theporchmagazine.com and aicasheville.com X

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25

A&E

Timely rhymes

Josh Blake spotlights local talent on new hip-hop album

Anyone wondering about the health of Asheville’s hip-hop scene need only listen to Josh Blake’s Unemployment Benefits.

Released on Oct. 27, the stunning 13-track album features some of the city’s top MCs, spitting fiery verses over the prolific artist’s old-school beats, rounded out by live instrumentation from noted local players and scratches from a few of Western North Carolina’s most accomplished DJs.

WORDS WITH FRIENDS

True to its name, the project began early in the COVID-19 pandemic when Echo Mountain Recording, where Blake works as a producer, engineer, mixer and session musician, closed for three months. His focus quickly shifted to primarily home-schooling his children, but with his guitar-based, live-performance outlets — namely the weekly Funk Jam at Asheville Music Hall and gigs for the Josh Blake Organ Trio — on indefinite hiatus, he was concerned about keeping his creative side sharp. Though he’s continued to make hip-hop beats throughout his tenure as a professional musician and has amassed several albums’ worth of unreleased material, the extended time at home allowed him to dedicate an hour or two each day to the craft.

“I was listening to some [J] Dilla and thought, ‘You know, I could just put out a beat tape. That would be easy,’” Blake says. “And then as I got into it, I had 12-15 tracks starting to stack up. I was like, ‘I know a lot of MCs, but I want to make it relevant and don’t want to drag my feet.’”

He then called Foul Mouth Jerk and Agent 23 (aka Cactus) — his colleagues in the hip-hop band Granola Funk Express, which toured from 1997 to 2009 — to gauge their interest in contributing rhymes. Both gave enthusiastic responses, so Blake began compiling a list of other rappers and began sending out tracks in late April, setting a mid-May deadline for the collaborations so that he could have the album out in time for summer.

“I would pick three [beats] that I felt would fit [that particular MC], and in my head, one of them is the one that I’m thinking they’re going to choose,” Blake says. The exception was Cactus, to whom he only sent one track, confident that his longtime close friend would be unable to resist a beat so tailor-made for him. Despite his initial commitment to Unemployment Benefits, Cactus hesitated to fully sign on due to a host of other time constraints, but Blake slyly passed him the beat anyway and sat back, awaiting the inevitable. “Literally, 24-48 hours 26

NOV. 4-10, 2020

RENAISSANCE MAN: One of the most connected musicians in Asheville, Josh Blake utilized his many artistic friendships for his star-studded new hip-hop album, Unemployment Benefits. “Providing that platform for collaboration and working with other people to create the art is really inspiring for me,” he says. Photo by Marisa Blake later, it’s done. He sends me the lyrics and everything, and he’s like, ‘Bro, you can’t send me that shit! That’s like rap crack to me!’ And I was like, ‘Oh. Sorry. My bad.’”

REMOTE CONTROL

Other than Spaceman Jones and Virtuous, who laid down their parts at Echo Mountain, all of the MCs tracked their verses in their home studios. The remote collaboration was all but necessitated by the pandemic and facilitated the participation of frequent Asheville performers C. Shreve the Professor from Deep Gap, N.C., and Mike L!VE from Charleston, S.C. It also looped in Miamibased Breez Evahflowin, the lone rapper

MOUNTAINX.COM

without strong ties to WNC, whose talents and strong history with Blake and GFE helped justify his inclusion.

But the project’s satellite nature also led to a series of delays. Blake describes the process as “like herding cats,” and after setting two more deadlines, which were missed by at least four-five artists, he decided it was time to move ahead without them.

“I couldn’t wait anymore. A lot of the stuff people were sending back was current, talking about what we’re doing now, and I couldn’t put it out later,” Blake says.

“Jerk’s talking about this crazy kook in the White House. What if he’s not in the White House? I can’t wait till next year to put this shit out — it won’t make sense.”

While the lyrics — including Blake’s own verses on the unifying “All My Peoples” — capture the modern social and political climate, touching on racial equality, quarantining, defunding police and voting, his production exudes a consistently catchy, throwback vibe that’s sure to get heads nodding without obscuring the witty rhymes. The sonic goodness is further augmented by keyboard contributions from Simon Thomas George and Jamar Woods; percussion from former Asheville resident Johnny Durkin (Deep Banana Blackout) on five tracks; cuts from DJ RaMak, DJ Jet, Jeediem and Nex Millen; and Adam Strange playing a homemade synth on closing track “Ultra Meta,” on which the Moog Factory employee is also the featured MC. Just barely fitting on a vinyl record, Unemployment Benefits additionally gave Blake an approximate level of human connection to which he’s accustomed but has been sorely missing during the pandemic. In addition to the revolving door of musicians at each Funk Jam, he also organizes and plays in the annual Asheville All-Stars concert for Downtown After 5. Though Meghan Rogers, executive director of the Asheville Downtown Association, invited Blake to curate the show for the season finale of DTA5’s livestreamed series at The Orange Peel, the logistical nightmare of responsibly getting 15 people together in one room during COVID-19 proved unappealing. The same went for the prospect of the invited artists performing their songs to an empty venue instead of 5,000 to 8,000 people from the outdoor Lexington Avenue stage.

“There’s something about the collaborative spirit and pulling people together in the sake of art, music and pushing out positivity — that’s my jam. That drives me as a producer and as a musician,” Blake says. “I guess this album does kind of fill that void for this time period.”

And as for the MCs who missed the submission deadlines, Blake plans to include them on the next installment in what he hopes will be an ongoing series that attracts nationally touring artists and other Asheville-area MCs whose skills he’s excited to spotlight.

“I know that the hip-hop scene in this town is more diverse than this record,” he says. “There’s definitely other subsets.

This is just really the people that I’ve been able to rub elbows with. I know it’s bigger than this album, and I know that there’s also plenty of people that I reached out to that I can hopefully squeeze in on the next one.” joshblakemusic.com

— Edwin Arnaudin X

CLUBLAND

Online Event= q WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 4

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5 LAZY HIKER BREWING Open Jam, 5pm

OKLAWAHA BREWING CO. French Broad Valley Mountain Music Jam, 6pm RABBIT RABBIT Outdoor Movie: Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, 6pm SWEETEN CREEK BREWING John Emil (Southern blues, rock), 6pm

THE GREY EAGLE Patio Show w/ Jeff Thompson Trio , 6pm

TRISKELION BREWERY InterActive TriskaTrivia, 7pm

SOVEREIGN KAVA q Poetry Open Mic, 8:30pm, avl.mx/76w THE PAPER MILL LOUNGE Karaoke X, 9pm

SWEETEN CREEK BREWING Open Mic w/ Thomas Yon, 6pm THE 2ND ACT Sunlight Drive (acoustic duo), 6pm

THE GREY EAGLE Patio Show w/ Magenta Sunshine (funk, reggae), 6pm

TWIN LEAF BREWERY Open Mic w/ Thomas Yon, 7pm

OKLAWAHA BREWING CO. Sunset & Soil (acoustic duo), 6pm

ISIS MUSIC HALL Below the Bassline (jazz, reggae), 7pm RABBIT RABBIT • Silent Cinema: Pulp Fiction, 7pm • Slice of Life Rooftop Comedy, 7pm ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Gunslinging Parrots (Phish tribute), 8pm BEN’S TUNE UP Comedy Open Mic w/ Baby George, 9pm

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6 SALVAGE STATION Dr. Bacon & The Snozzberries (Appalachian funk), 5pm SWEETEN CREEK BREWING Judaduo (jam), 6pm THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Mr Jimmy (blues), 6pm GUIDON BREWING Tim Lee (solo acoustic), 7pm ISIS MUSIC HALL Seth Mulder & Midnight Run (bluegrass), 7pm LE PARC AT GLEN CANNON Asheville Music Hall: Drive-in Concert w/ JJ Grey & Mofro, 7pm OKLAWAHA BREWING CO. The Knotty G's (folk, funk), 8pm BEN’S TUNE UP DJ Kilby Spinning Vinyl, 10pm

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 7 BURNTSHIRT VINEYARDS Gene Holdway (solo acoustic), 2pm BATTERY PARK BOOK EXCHANGE Dinah's Daydream (jazz), 6pm

It’s

SWEETEN CREEK BREWING Judaculla Blue (jam), 6pm ISIS MUSIC HALL Jesse Barry & The Jam (blues, funk), 7pm WILD WING CAFE Karaoke Night, 9:30pm

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 8 BURNTSHIRT VINEYARDS Tim McWilliams (solo acoustic), 2pm BOLD ROCK HARD CIDER Mr Jimmy (blues), 3pm SWEETEN CREEK BREWING Dirty Dog (Grateful Dead tribute), 3pm RIVERSIDE RHAPSODY BEER CO. Drinkin' & Thinkin' Trivia, 5pm 185 KING STREET Open Electric Jam, 6pm SALVAGE STATION Doom Flamingo (electronic, rock), 6pm THE GREY EAGLE Patio Show w/ Chilltonic (rock, soul), 6pm TRISKELION BREWERY JC & the Boomerang Band (Irish trad, folk), 6pm ISIS MUSIC HALL Russ Wilson’s Birthday Bash (jazz), 7pm

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 9 ARCHETYPE BREWING Old Time Jam w/ Banjo Mitch McConnell, 6pm HIGHLAND BREWING CO. Totally Rad Trivia w/ Mitch Fortune, 6:30pm OKLAWAHA BREWING CO. House of SYNth, 6:30pm

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 10 OKLAWAHA BREWING CO. Team Trivia Tuesday, 6pm

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 11 OKLAWAHA BREWING CO. French Broad Valley Mountain Music Jam, 6pm SWEETEN CREEK BREWING Billy Mac & Friends (rock, soul), 6pm

SOVEREIGN KAVA q Poetry Open Mic, 8:30pm, avl.mx/76w THE PAPER MILL LOUNGE Karaoke X, 9pm

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 12 LAZY HIKER BREWING SYLVA Open Jam, 5pm THE GREY EAGLE Patio Show w/ The Hot Club of Asheville (jazz), 5pm SWEETEN CREEK BREWING Open Mic w/ Thomas Yon, 6pm TRISKELION BREWERY Jason's Technicolor Cabaret: Music & Comedy, 7pm ISIS MUSIC HALL Christie Lenée (folk, pop), 7pm RABBIT RABBIT Slice of Life Rooftop Comedy, 7pm

TRISKELION BREWERY InterActive TriskaTrivia, 7pm

ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Gunslinging Parrots (Phish tribute), 8pm

TWIN LEAF BREWERY Open Mic w/ Thomas Yon, 7pm

BEN’S TUNE UP Comedy Open Mic w/ Baby George, 9pm

kickoff week!

Help set the pace for Mountain Xpress’ end-of-year giving project to benefit 44 local nonprofits COMMUNITY • • • • • • •

ABCCM 103.3 Asheville FM Blue Ridge Pride Council on Aging of Buncombe County The Mediation Center Open Hearts Art Center Working Wheels

HEALTH & WELLNESS • • • • • •

All Souls Counseling Center Bounty & Soul Girls on the Run Manna FoodBank MemoryCare Western Carolina Medical Society Foundation • WNC Birth Center

EDUCATION

• Asheville City Schools Foundation • Buncombe Partnership for Children • Children First/Communities In Schools of Buncombe County • Literacy Council of Buncombe County • Muddy Sneakers • My Daddy Taught Me That • OpenDoors of Asheville • The POP Project • Verner Center for Early Learning

ANIMALS • • • • • • •

Appalachian Wildlife Refuge Asheville Humane Society Brother Wolf Animal Rescue Friends of the WNC Nature Center Friends2Ferals (Buncombe Humane) Full Moon Farm Wild for Life

ENVIRONMENT • • • • • •

EcoForesters Friends of the Smokies Green Built Alliance MountainTrue RiverLink Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy

SOCIAL JUSTICE • • • • • • • •

Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity Asheville Poverty Initiative BeLoved Asheville Helpmate Homeward Bound of WNC Just Economics Our VOICE Pisgah Legal Services

Give early! See the inserted Give!Local guide, or go to GIVELOCALGUIDE.ORG MOUNTAINX.COM

NOV. 4-10, 2020

27

MOVIE REVIEWS THIS WEEK’S CONTRIBUTORS

Hosted by the Asheville Movie Guys EDWIN ARNAUDIN earnaudin@mountainx.com HHHHH

= MAX RATING

The Donut King HHHH

DIRECTOR: Alice Gu PLAYERS: Ted Ngoy, Chuong Pek Lee, Susan Lim DOCUMENTARY NOT RATED It’s not as bonkers as Tiger King, but The Donut King is still a remarkable story, plus it’s about a much more palatable business.

Cambodian immigrant Ted Ngoy, with his family’s tireless support, single-handedly created a doughnut shop empire up and down California and even fended off an incursion by Dunkin’ Donuts in the 1970s and ’80s — and first-time documentary filmmaker Alice Gu had access to all the players needed to tell the tale. It’s a largely upbeat immigrant narrative about how one man’s determination created a path to success for a whole community of families.

It’s not all sprinkles and cream, though.

To explain Ngoy’s rise, Gu goes back to Cambodia in the early ’70s, when President Richard Nixon’s relentless Vietnam War destabilized the country, which led to the rise of the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime.

The brutality described and the archival images are harsh, and even after Ngoy’s escape and triumph in the U.S., there’s a late twist — and not just in the crullers.

As a small-business success story, The Donut King is at once instructional — find a niche, work hard, reuse the coffee sticks — and also unrepeatable. Labor laws, prices and cultural shifts have since closed down Ngoy’s path to advancement. As a family narrative, however, the dynamics are as true today as ever.

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BRUCE STEELE bcsteele@gmail.com

NOV. 4-10, 2020

There are a few holes in The Donut King — people not fully introduced, fates left foggy. But Gu’s interviews are notably confessional and honest, and she brings the documentary to a smart close with a look at current artisanal doughnut trends, which have been visible even in Asheville.

You might want to plan ahead for your own screening: A fresh dozen from Hole or Vortex could bring the film’s subject matter right up to your face.

REVIEWED BY BRUCE STEELE BCSTEELE@GMAIL.COM

Come Play HHHH DIRECTOR: Jacob Chase PLAYERS: Azhy Robertson, Gillian Jacobs, John Gallagher Jr. HORROR RATED PG-13 Now this is how you stretch a horror short into a full-length film!

Come Play, writer/director Jacob Chase’s expansion of his 2017 calling card, Larry, intelligently upscales its foundation’s technical prowess, slick effects and command of suspense to the big time in a way that suggests he’d been crafting features for years.

Like any respectable genre peer, its monster — a skeletal entity named Larry — is steeped in social commentary. Activated via a creepy Babadook-like e-book that inexplicably appears on the smartphone of lonely, autistic elementary schooler Oliver

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(Azhy Robertson, Marriage Story), Larry prompts viewers to contemplate humans’ screen addictions and the isolation such activity breeds.

The creature’s metaphorically rich predatory doings, accompanied by eerie, bone-cracking sound effects, make even more sense in the context of the pending divorce of Oliver’s parents, Sarah (Gillian Jacobs, I Used to Go Here) and Marty (John Gallagher Jr., 10 Cloverfield Lane), which renders their already secluded, nonverbal child even more susceptible to Larry’s “charms.”

Though the family’s sightings of Larry via screens — be it at home (especially the neat reveal of his origin story) or during Marty’s graveyard shifts as the attendant of a spookily underused parking lot — are consistently jarring, he’s not the brightest demon. Fairly easy to elude, yet also capable of inexplicable supernatural activity, he’s at best a fledgling menace, still learning his powers, and at worst, a victim of inconsistent screenwriting.

Regardless, each Larry appearance is a frightful experience, and Robertson, Jacobs and Gallagher Jr. are superb at selling the scares. None of it, however, would work without Chase’s confident vision, which further parlays its thoughtful scares into an effective rallying cry for building lasting friendships and firmly establishes the filmmaker as a talent to watch.

Now playing at Carolina Cinemark REVIEWED BY EDWIN ARNAUDIN EARNAUDIN@MOUNTAINX.COM

Jungleland HHHH DIRECTOR: Max Winkler PLAYERS: Charlie Hunnam, Jack O’Connell, Jonathan Majors DRAMA RATED R Anyone looking for an upbeat diversion after Election Day might want to watch a movie other than Jungleland.

That’s not to say that the film isn’t worth viewing. But it’s a bleak experience that marks a vast departure for director Max Winkler, whose previous work includes comedies like 2017’s Flower and TV shows “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” “Brooklyn NineNine” and “New Girl.”

Jungleland follows brothers Stan (Charlie Hunnam, FX’s “Sons of Anarchy”) and Walter “Lion” Kaminski (Jack O’Connell, Unbroken) as they pursue success in the underground world of bare-knuckle boxing. Lion was a promising Golden Gloves

Ian Casselberry

Josh McCormack

fighter, but any hopes of a professional career were ruined when Stan tried to bribe a referee.

So instead of gymnasiums and arenas, Lion competes in skeezy event spaces, hoping to win $100-$200 per bout — ugly brawls bereft of artistry or “sweet science.”

Stan boasts of having “spectacular goals,” but for shelter they squat in a foreclosed house and train at a run-down YMCA. It’s a grim, dreary existence that Winkler — dedicated to his vision — keeps free of bright light, nice clothes and clean surfaces.

Stan’s continuing bad choices result in doing business with several unseemly characters, including crime lord Pepper (Jonathan Majors, HBO’s “Lovecraft Country”). Facing major debt after Lion loses a fight outside Boston, Pepper gets them an opportunity for a big payday in San Francisco. But during their cross-country trip, the brothers have to transport a young woman, Sky (Jessica Barden, Netflix’s “The End of the F***ing World”), to a fellow kingpin in Reno.

So, yes — if underground fighting wasn’t low enough, now these guys are human traffickers.

When it seems their situation can’t get any dirtier or worse, the Kaminski brothers get pushed deeper into the grime with fewer options to escape. However, this isn’t entirely a plot-driven story. All the characters are using one another for their own means, whether they realize it or not, giving the talented cast plenty of complex material to play with.

Best of all, what appears to be a predictable narrative works toward an ending that isn’t easily anticipated — which almost feels like a reward for following Jungleland through the muck.

Available to rent starting Nov. 10 via Amazon Video, iTunes and other streaming services REVIEWED BY IAN CASSELBERRY IANCASS@GMAIL.COM

Let Him Go HHHH DIRECTOR: Thomas Bezucha PLAYERS: Diane Lane, Kevin Costner, Lesley Manville THRILLER RATED R “Grandparents attempt to rescue grandson from evil stepfather.” Though a brave and ambitious undertaking for any not-exactly-spry couple, it’s a fairly basic setup for the aptly titled Let Him Go — but under the pragmatic direction of Thomas

Bezucha (The Family Stone), the premise proves surprisingly tense and entertaining.

Seven years after playing Clark Kent’s parents in Man of Steel, Diane Lane and Kevin Costner build on their appealing rapport, this time as Martha and George Blackledge, good 1950s Montana people mourning the sudden loss of their adult son James (Ryan Bruce).

Already not keen on their daughterin-law Lorna (Kayli Carter, Private Life) marrying Donnie Weboy (Will Brittain, Everybody Wants Some!!), they become less so after Martha witnesses him hit Lorna and her young son Jimmy (played by twin brothers Bram and Otto Hornung), and then are driven to action when Donnie uproots his new bride and stepchild without leaving a forwarding address.

While Martha’s plan of tracking them down and bringing Jimmy home is a little far-fetched, George’s law enforcement past and gumshoelike ability to sniff out trouble imbues their quest with a decent amount of hope.

But not even his instincts can keep them from running afoul of Weboy’s family, whose members’ own skills of detection keep them at least one step ahead of the Blackledges and provide them an insidious brand of home-field advantage.

Be it from Donnie’s mother, Blanche (Lesley Manville, channeling some big Melissa Leo energy), uncle Bill (Jeffrey Donovan, reminiscent of his “Fargo” season-two role) or intimidating brothers Marvin (Adam Stafford) and Elton (Connor Mackay), their menacing behavior turns the name Weboy from one of the most innocent utterances possible (“wee boy”) to a word that makes viewers shudder with each mention.

Adapting Larry Watson’s novel of the same name, Bezucha amplifies the suspense of the families’ encounters through workmanlike means, relying on the script’s noirlike dialogue and performances by his talented cast rather than flashy filmmaking.

Paired with majestic Canadian landscapes — convincingly standing in for the American West — Bezucha’s straightforward style fits the nature of the lean narrative while leaving room for surprises from both clans. His approach also proves just how foundational good writing and acting can be and makes a compelling case for a resurgence of modestly budgeted thrillers.

Starts Nov. 6 at AMC River Hills 10 and Carolina Cinemark REVIEWED BY EDWIN ARNAUDIN EARNAUDIN@MOUNTAINX.COM

Possessor HHHS DIRECTOR: Brandon Cronenberg PLAYERS: Andrea Riseborough, Christopher Abbott, Jennifer

Jason Leigh SCI-FI/THRILLER NOT RATED

Elle Fanning, Selena Gomez COMEDY/ROMANCE RATED PG-13

It’s difficult to have a firm opinion on a film like Possessor after only one viewing.

The sophomore feature from writer/director Brandon Cronenberg (Antiviral) — son of the great David Cronenberg — is based around a simple premise: a secret agent who uses brain control technology to influence others to commit assassinations. As the film progresses, Cronenberg’s seemingly boundless ambition complicates matters, resulting in a handful of pacing and plot issues, but the overall mind-bending and bloody cinematic experience is a memorable one.

The aforementioned secret agent is Tasya Vos, portrayed by the always magnetic Andrea Riseborough (Mandy; Birdman). She’s described as the “star performer” by her boss, the brain-invading agency’s director (Jennifer Jason Leigh, exuding her trademark chilliness). Tasya’s violent work and how it affects her home life prove to be some of the strongest elements of the film.

Sadly, the good times come to a sudden halt when our hero first takes control of a young man named Colin (Christopher Abbott, It Comes at Night).

While Abbott’s performance of a man trying to regain control of his abducted mind is tremendous, witnessing Tasya’s inept attempts to fit into his social circles proves quite tedious — especially after the film’s thrilling opening possession sequence.

Sandwiched between a strong start and finish, the film’s laborious middle stretch is a frustrating detour. But even in the film’s weaker moments, Cronenberg’s clinical direction — which occasionally echoes David Fincher — and the sumptuous cinematography from Karim Hussain (NBC’s “Hannibal”) will undoubtedly hold most viewers’ attention.

Making good on its initial promise, Possessor culminates in a challenging finale that’s sure to be a hot topic of debate for genre fanatics for months or even years to come. However, no matter what you make of the conclusion, it’s a shocking and violent coda to this dark, twisted tale of lost humanity.

Available to rent starting Nov. 6 via Amazon Video, iTunes and other streaming services

Edwin Arnaudin: Woody Allen has been on a bit of a cold streak lately.

Wonder Wheel was a largely irredeemable downer; his Amazon “series” (read: film broken into chapters) Crisis in Six Scenes was fun but forgettable; and Café Society felt like a first draft for a more ambitious film. Does A Rainy Day in New York get him back on track, or is it time for the legend to think about retiring?

REVIEWED BY JOSH MCCORMACK JMCCORMA@UNCA.EDU

A Rainy Day in New York HHH DIRECTOR: Woody Allen PLAYERS: Timothée Chalamet,

Bruce Steele: Well, he’s not quite on track, but I’d never count him out. As soon as 20-something Gatsby (Timothée Chalamet) starts the voice-over and then begins a dialogue with girlfriend Ashleigh (Elle Fanning) while walking on the autumn campus of Yardley College, you can hear the voice of Woody Allen from so many movies past — and it’s a little disconcerting coming from Chalamet. It’s also rather flat, like a computer imitating Allen’s language tics and cultural allusions but without the spark of inspiration. Rainy Day is Allen’s attempt to recapture a light, breezy comedy of errors and coincidence, and I’m hard-pressed to remember the last time he succeeded in that vein. Does Magic in the Moonlight (2014) count?

that film has all but vacated my memory beyond a few images. I suspect Rainy Day will linger there longer. Allen feels much more confident here than in the recent efforts I mentioned, utilizing snappy dialogue and putting fresh twists on such familiar tropes as complicated, ultimately childish artists, fraught parent-child relationships and unexpected but seemingly predestined romance.

The darkly comic An Irrational Man had been my pick for Allen’s best work since Blue Jasmine, but it’s been usurped.

BS: Really? Rainy Day won you over?

I’m surprised. It seemed so hollow and mechanical to me. The resolution of the romance is obvious as soon as it’s even vaguely hinted at, and the elaborations of the themes you mentioned struck me as shallow and contrived. Playing Gatsby’s mother, Cherry Jones makes a valiant effort to sell one unlikely revelation, but even her genius seemed like so much mud flung up from spinning wheels.

Read the full review at ashevillemovies.com Available to rent starting Nov. 10 via Amazon Video, iTunes, and other streaming services

EA: Maybe. That was the last time his whimsical style worked well, though

AVAILABLE VIA FINEARTSTHEATRE.COM (FA) GRAILMOVIEHOUSE.COM (GM) Aggie (NR) HHHH (GM) Belly of the Beast (NR) HHHH (FA, GM) Citizens of the World (NR) HHHS (GM) Coming Home Again (NR) HHHHS (GM) Desert One (NR) HHHH (FA) The Donut King (NR) HHHH (Pick of the Week) (FA, GM) Dosed (NR) HHHH (FA, GM) Driven to Abstraction (PG) HHS(FA) F11 and Be There (NR) HHHH (FA) Fantastic Fungi (NR) HHHH (FA) Flannery (NR) HHHH (FA) Herb Alpert Is... (NR) HHS (FA) Jimmy Carter: Rock & Roll President (NR) HHHHH (FA, GM) John Lewis: Good Trouble (PG) HHHH (FA) The Keeper (NR) HHS (FA) Major Arcana (NR) HHHS (FA) Martin Eden (NR) HHH (FA) Meeting the Beatles in India (NR) HHS (FA) My Dog Stupid (NR) HHHH (FA) Oliver Sacks: His Own Life (NR) HHHH (GM) Out Stealing Horses (NR) HHHHS (FA) RBG (NR) HHHH (FA) The Tobacconist (NR) HHHS (FA) Totally Under Control (NR) HHHH (GM) We Are Many (NR) HH (FA) White Riot (NR) HHHHS (GM) MOUNTAINX.COM

NOV. 4-10, 2020

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FREEWILL ASTROLOGY ARIES (March 21-April 19): Aries poet Charles Baudelaire championed the privilege and luxury of changing one’s mind. He thought it was natural and healthy to always keep evolving beyond one’s previous beliefs and attitudes, even if that meant one might seem inconsistent or irrational.

“It is lamentable,” he once proclaimed, “that, among the Rights of Human Beings, the right to contradict oneself has been disregarded.”

I bring these thoughts to your attention, dear Aries, so that you will feel at peace with the prospect of outgrowing rules, strategies and approaches that have worked well for you up until now — but that have outlived their usefulness.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): The horoscopes I write are my love letters to you. As I compose them, my goal is to celebrate your beauty and strength even as I discern what’s lacking in your life and what confusions might be undermining you. In my philosophy of life, that’s how love works at its best: remaining keenly aware of the good qualities in the beloved while helping them deal with their problems and heal their wounds. I suggest that in the coming weeks you adopt my approach for use with your own close relationships. Your allies are in special need of both your praise and your rectifications.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): When Charles de Gaulle was 15 years old, he wrote “General de Gaulle,” a short story in which he envisioned himself, many years in the future, as a general in the French army.

Thirty-five years later, his imaginary tale came true, as he became a general of the Free French Army fighting against Germany in World War II. In the spirit of de Gaulle’s prophecy, and in accordance with current astrological omens, I encourage you to compose a comparable tale about your own destiny.

Have fun as you visualize in great detail a successful role you will play months or even years from now.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): In 1903, archaeologists digging in a cave in Cheddar Gorge, England, found the fossilized remains of “Cheddar Man,” a person who had lived there 9,000 years earlier. In 1997, DNA tests revealed that a teacher named Adrian Targett, who was living a half-mile from the cave, was a direct descendant of Cheddar Man. I propose that we invoke this scenario to serve as a metaphor for you in the coming months. According to my analysis of the astrological omens, your ancestors are likely to play a bigger role in your life than usual.

Connections between you and them will be more vivid and influential and worthy of your meditations.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): According to the film Amadeus, composers Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) and Antonio Salieri (1750–1825) were adversaries who disliked and undermined each other. But there’s evidence that this was not entirely true. In fact, they collaborated on creating a cantata that was performed by Nancy Storace, a famous singer they both admired. It’s unlikely they would have cooperated in such a way unless they had a working relationship. I suspect that a comparable correction is due in your world, Leo. It’s time to dissolve a misunderstanding or restore a lost truth or fix an old story that got some of the facts wrong.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): The coming weeks will be a favorable time for you to ask for help and seek support. I urge you to be forthright in doing so! Resources that have been inaccessible before may be more available now. I suspect you will be able to capitalize on the luck and skill of allies who have benefited from your favors in the past.

Their successes could bring you blessings, and their breakthroughs should inspire you to instigate breakthroughs in your own life. Be straightforward: Ask them to lend their influence in your behalf.

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NOV. 4-10, 2020

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): In the 1970s, an Englishman named Stephen Pile founded the Not Terribly Good Club. It was designed to be a gathering place for mediocre people whose lives were marked by inadequacy and incompetence.

To organize his thoughts about the club’s themes, Pile eventually published a book entitled The Book of Heroic Failures. Unfortunately, it sold so many copies that he got expelled from his own club. He had become too successful! I suspect that in the coming months, you may have an experience akin to his. The odds are good that you’ll find interesting success in an area of your life where you have previously been just average.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): “At every crossroad, be prepared to bump into wonder,” wrote Scorpio poet James Broughton. I believe that’s stirring advice for you to keep in mind during the coming weeks.

Broughton’s words inspired me to come up with a corollary for you to heed, as well: “At every turning point, be ready to stumble into an opportunity disguised as a problem.” I’ve got one more clue for you. Last night in my dream, my Scorpio poetry teacher offered a thought that’s well-suited for you right now: “Whenever you want to take a magic twisty leap into the big fresh future, be willing to engage in one last wrestling match with the past.”

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Actor Gary Busey is quirky and kooky, but his peculiar rants sometimes make good sense. Here’s one that I suspect might be useful for you to consider during the next two weeks: “It’s good for everyone to understand that they are to love their enemies, simply because your enemies show you things about yourself you need to change.

So in actuality, enemies are friends in reverse.”

I don’t mean to imply that your adversaries and nemeses are totally accurate in their critiques of you.

But there may be a thing or two you can learn from them right now that would truly improve your life.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Musician John Coltrane described one of his life goals as follows: “There are forces out here that bring suffering to others and misery to the world,” he said. “But I want to be the opposite force. I want to be the force which is truly for good.” Even if that’s not an intention at the core of your long-term plans, Capricorn, I recommend you consider adopting it during the next few weeks. Being a vigorous and rigorous force for good will be especially needed by the people with whom you associate — and will also result in you attracting interesting benefits.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Known as “the bad boy of bridge,” Aquarian-born Geir Helgemo is a champion in the card game of bridge. At times he has been the top-rated player among Open World Grand Masters. But in 2019, he was suspended from the World Bridge Federation for a year because he tested positive for taking testosterone supplements that are banned. Why did he do it?

He hasn’t said. There is some scientific research suggesting that testosterone may boost cognitive function, but other evidence says it doesn’t. I’d like to use Helgemo’s foolishness as a teaching story for your use, Aquarius. According to my astrological analysis, you’re approaching the peak of your competence and confidence. There’s no need for you to cheat or sneak or misbehave in a misplaced effort to seek an even greater advantage. In fact, righteous integrity will enhance your intelligence.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): “I might really have gone round the bend,” confessed Botswana author Bessie Head. “I mean people who get visions and see a gigantic light descend on them from the sky can’t be all there, but if so I feel mighty happy. If one is happy and cracked it’s much better than being unhappy and sane.” Although I don’t expect your state of mind in the coming weeks will be as extreme as Bessie Head’s, Pisces, I do suspect it will have resemblances to her dreamy cheerfulness. If I had to give a title to this upcoming phase, it might be “Wise Folly.” And yes, I do think your “craziness” will generate useful insights and fertile revelations.

MOUNTAINX.COM

MARKETPLACE

BY ROB BREZSNY

REAL ESTATE & RENTALS | ROOMMATES | JOBS | SERVICES ANNOUNCEMENTS | CLASSES & WORKSHOPS | MIND, BODY, SPIRIT MUSICIANS’ SERVICES | PETS | AUTOMOTIVE | XCHANGE | ADULT RENTALS APARTMENTS FOR RENT DOWNTOWN ASHEVILLE APARTMENT FOR RENT Biltmore Studio apartment heart of downtown Asheville! 1 year lease $1500/mo. all utilities, internet, etc., included. Parking onsite $100/mo, furnished like a top end vacation rental. Contact: Bernie 828 230-0755. www. ashevilledowntownrentals.com.

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EMPLOYMENT GENERAL

MOUNTAIN XPRESS IS LOOKING TO ADD A NEW MEMBER TO OUR SALES TEAM. Ideal candidates are personable, organized, motivated, and can present confidently, while working within a structure. Necessary skills include clear and professional communications (via phone, email, and in-person meetings), detailed record-keeping, and working well in a team environment. While no outside sales experience is required, experience dealing with varied and challenging situations is helpful. The position largely entails account development and lead generation (including cold-calling), account management, assisting clients with marketing and branding strategies, and working to meet or exceed sales goals. If you are a high energy, positive, cooperative person looking to join an independent, community-minded organization, please send a resume and cover letter (no walk-ins, please) explaining why you are a good fit for Mountain Xpress to: xpressjob@ mountainx.com

SKILLED LABOR/ TRADES COMMERCIAL GLASS GLAZIER Wholesale Glass and Mirror Co. Job Description: strong knowledge of commercial glass installation. Must have a minimum of 5 years glass experience. Hours and Travel: Monday through Friday 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, does require some weekend & night work on a very limited basis. Job Duties: installation of storefront, curtain wall, IG replacement, mirror installation, tabletops and display cases. In addition, the candidate will need the skills (and backbone) to install heavy glass items. Job Type: Fulltime Pay: DOE per hour Benefits: Competitive pay, health benefits, 401K and paid vacation. TO APPLY: Email Resume: WGMAVL@gmail. com In Person: 419 Haywood Rd, Asheville, NC 28806.

RESIDENTIAL GLASS GLAZIER/ INSTALLER Wholesale Glass and Mirror Co. is seeking a glazier with strong knowledge of residential glass installation. minimum of 5 years glass experience. Hours & Travel: Monday-Friday 8:00AM to 5:00PM, does require some weekend & night work on a very limited basis. Job Duties: IG replacement

in residential windows, mirror installation, shower door installation, and fitting glass for tabletops and display cases. In addition, the candidate will need the skills (and backbone) to install heavy glass items. Job Type: Full-time Pay: DOE Benefits: Competitive pay, health benefits, 401K and paid vacation.

TO APPLY: Email WGMAVL@ gmail.com or in person at 419 Haywood Rd., Asheville, NC 28806.

SEWING MACHINE OPERATOR Job duties include accurate, consistent, and precise sewing skills, as well as, a working knowledge of commercial sewing machines.

Please contact JJ at 828-458-1097 or email your resume to kiluph1@ gmail.com.

ADMINISTRATIVE/ OFFICE OFFICE/CUSTOMER SERVICE REPRESENTATIVE Wholesale Glass & Mirror. Job description: Answer telephones, greet customers, take sales orders, interoffice duties and provide product/service information. Job Qualifications: Computer literate with data entry skills, excellent verbal communication, math skills, documentation skills, operate basic office equipment & adding machine, multi-task, and work in a fast pace environment. Full-Time Hours: Monday-Friday, 8:00AM-5:00PM Benefits: Health Insurance, Vacation Pay and 401K. PAY DOE To Apply: Email resume to: Wholesaleglass@ 419haywoodrd.com or in person 419 Haywood Rd, Asheville, NC 28806.

RESTAURANT/ FOOD SERVICE MANAGER AT FORESTRY CAMP BAR & RESTAURANT The Service Manager oversees all FOH staff including recruiting, orientation, training, scheduling, etc. The ideal candidate will be able to help develop operational, marketing and business plans with the board of directors.

TAPROOM LINE CHEF AT FORESTRY CAMP BAR & RESTAURANT The Line Chef will be responsible for food prep and menu execution, maintaining a clean and organized workspace, kitchen equipment maintenance, receiving and stocking vendor deliveries.

Ideal candidate is passionate about working with local purveyors, utilizing seasonal ingredients, has commitment to quality.

DRIVERS/ DELIVERY ART BUS OPERATORS WANTED: $2,000.00 HIRING BONUS! Asheville Transit Management is seeking Bus Operators for Asheville Redefines Transit (ART) fixed route public transit service. Must have Class B CDL permit. Apply at https://www.indeed.com/job/ bus-operator-915fb41827eeddd8 WHOLESALE DRIVER FOR BURIAL BEER CO. Driver will pick up/drop off items while on assigned routes/time schedules. Candidate is responsible for customer satisfaction and safe and timely transport of items. Must ensure that items are complete, packed correctly, and safely delivered to correct customer.

HUMAN SERVICES HELPMATE, INC., A DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AGENCY IN ASHEVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA, SEEKS A BILINGUAL PART TIME COURT ADVOCATE. The Bilingual Part Time Court Advocate is a non-exempt position. This position reports directly to the Court Advocacy Coordinator. The Bilingual Court Advocate provides support, counseling, and court advocacy to victims of domestic violence, as well as work to improve language access for survivors with limited English proficiency. Qualified candidates will have a BA or BS in human services or at least two years’ experience in domestic violence or human services/advocacy/social justice field. Strong communication, organizational skills and the ability to speak a language in addition to English are required. Fluency in Spanish, Russian, Moldovan or Ukrainian will be incentivized.

Email resume and cover letter to hiring@helpmateonline.org and put Bilingual Part Time Court Advocate in the subject line.

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Fair, open, and responsive. Buying currency, bonds, maps, documents, etc. Email papermoneybuy@gmail. com, or call/text 865-207-8994.

Member SPMC, NCNA, SCNA, TNA.

SERVICES CAREGIVERS COMPANION • CAREGIVER • LIVE-IN Alzheimer's experienced • Heart failure and bed sore care • Hospice reference letter • Nonsmoker, with cat, seeks live-in position • References • Arnold, (828) 273-2922.

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Contact me for excellent service.

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HOME IMPROVEMENT HANDY MAN HIRE A HUSBAND • HANDYMAN SERVICES Since 1993.

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ANNOUNCEMENTS ANNOUNCEMENTS A COURSE IN MIRACLES A truly loving, open study group. Meets second and fourth Mondays. 6:30 pm on Zoom until further notice.

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1-833-585-1117 (AAN CAN) NEED IRS RELIEF $10K - $125K+ Get Fresh Start or Forgiveness Call 1-877-258-2890 Monday through Friday, 7AM-5PM PST (AAN CAN) NOTICE OF UNCLAIMED PROPERTY The following is a list of unclaimed and confiscated property at the Asheville Police Department: electronic equipment; cameras; clothing; lawn and garden equipment; personal items; tools; weapons (including firearms): jewelry: automotive items; building supplies; bikes and other miscellaneous items. Anyone with a legitimate claim or interest in this property has 30 days from the date of this publication to make a claim. Unclaimed items will be disposed of according to statutory law. For further information, or to file a claim, contact the Asheville Police Department Property and Evidence Section, 828-232-4576.

NOTICE OF DISPOSITION The following is a list of unclaimed and confiscated property at the Asheville Police Department tagged for disposition: audio and video equipment; cameras; clothing; lawn and garden equipment; personal items; tools; weapons (including firearms): jewelry: automotive items; building supplies; bikes and other miscellaneous. All items will be disposed of 30 days from date of posting. Items to be auctioned will be displayed on www.propertyroom.com.

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edited by Will Shortz

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7 Distort LEGAL NOTICES BOY SCOUT COMPENSATION FUND Anyone that was inappropriately touched by a Scout leader deserves justice and financial compensation! Victims may be eligible for a significant cash settlement.

Time to file is limited. Call Now! 844-896-8216 (AAN CAN) NOTICE OF FORECLOSURE SALE NORTH CAROLINA, HAYWOOD COUNTY Under and by virtue of a Power of Sale contained in that certain Deed of Trust executed

by Carlo Gambino, dated July 20, 2018, recorded on July 26, 2018 in Book RB 956, Page 575 of the Haywood County Public Registry conveying certain real property in Haywood County to Unisource Title Company, Trustee, for the benefit of Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc., as nominee for Sovereign Lending Group Incorporated.

Default having been made of the note thereby secured by the said Deed of Trust and the undersigned, having been substituted as Trustee in said Deed of Trust, and the holder of the note evidencing said default having directed that the Deed of Trust be foreclosed, the undersigned Substitute Trustee will offer for sale at the courthouse door of the county courthouse where the property is located, or the usual and customary location at the county courthouse for conducting the sale on November 16, 2020 at 1:00 PM, and will sell to the highest bidder for cash the following described property situated in Haywood County, North Carolina, to wit: BEING LOT 9-B, SECTION “D” (D-PRIME), OF HORSESHOE COVE SUBDIVISION A PER SURVEY AND PLAT OF WESTERN CAROLINA LAND SURVEYING, DATED NOVEMBER 17, 1989, AND RECORDED IN MAP CABINET C, SLOT 647, HAYWOOD COUNTY REGISTRY. SUBJECT TO AND INCLUDING THOSE RIGHTS-OF-WAY OR EASEMENTS FOR STREETS,

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11 Chess whizzes, for short 14 Band follower 15 Prefix with legal or military

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ROADS, WATERLINES, SEWER LINES AND UTILITIES SHOWN ON SAID PLATS OR EXISTING ON THE PREMISES OF SAID SUBDIVISION. THE ABOVE LOT IS SUBJECT TO THOSE RESTRICTIVE COVENANTS SET FORTH IN AN INSTRUMENT RECORDED IN DEED BOOK 401, PAGE 661, HAYWOOD COUNTY REGISTRY. Save and except any releases, deeds of release or prior conveyances of record. Said property is commonly known as 402 Creekside Drive, Maggie Valley, NC 28751; Parcel #: 7697-11-8309 A cash deposit (no personal checks) of five percent (5%) of the purchase price, or Seven Hundred Fifty Dollars ($750.00), whichever is greater, payable to Bell Carrington Price & Gregg, PLLC, will be required at the time of the sale. Following the expiration of the statutory upset bid period, all the remaining amounts are immediately due and owing. Pursuant to N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.30, if the highest bidder at the sale, resale, or any upset bidder fails to comply with its bid upon the tender of a deed for the real property, or after a bona fide attempt to tender such a deed, the clerk of superior court may, upon motion, enter an order authorizing a resale of the real property. The defaulting bidder at any sale or resale or any defaulting upset bidder is liable for the bid made, and in case a resale is had because of such default, shall remain liable to the extent that the final sale price is less than the bid plus all the costs of any resale. Any deposit or compliance bond made by the defaulting bidder shall secure payment of the amount, if any, for which the defaulting bidder remains liable under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.30. Third party purchasers must pay the excise tax and THE RECORDING COSTS FOR THEIR DEED. Said property to be offered pursuant to this Notice of Sale is being offered for sale, transfer and conveyance “AS IS WHERE IS.” There are no representations of warranty relating to the title or any physical, environmental, health or safety conditions existing in, on, at, or

relating to the property being offered for sale. This sale is made subject to any and all superior liens, including taxes and special assessments. To the best of the knowledge and belief of the undersigned, the current owner(s) of the property is/are Carlo Gambino.

An Order for possession of the property may be issued pursuant to N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.29, in favor of the purchaser and against the party or parties by the clerk of superior court of the county in which the property is sold. Any person who occupies the property pursuant to a rental agreement entered into or renewed on or after October 1, 2007, may, after receiving the notice of sale, terminate the rental agreement by providing written notice of termination to the landlord, to be effective on a date stated in the notice that is at least 10 days, but no more than 90 days, after the sale date contained in the notice of sale, provided that the mortgagor has not cured the default at the time the tenant provides the notice of termination. The notice shall also state that upon termination of a rental agreement, the tenant is liable for rent due under the rental agreement prorated to the effective date of the termination [N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.16(b)(2)]. Upon termination of a rental agreement, the tenant is liable for rent due under the rental agreement prorated to the effective date of the termination. If the trustee is unable to convey title to this property for any reason, the sole remedy of the purchaser is the return of the deposit. Reasons of such inability to convey include, but are not limited to, the filing of a bankruptcy petition prior to the confirmation of the sale and reinstatement of the loan without the knowledge of the trustee. If the validity of the sale is challenged by any party, the trustee, in their sole discretion, if they believe the challenge to have merit, may request the court to declare the sale to be void and return the deposit.

The purchaser will have no further remedy. Cape Fear Trustee Services, LLC, Substitute Trustee ___________

19 Cable’s ___TV 20 Ire 21 Berry often blended and served in a bowl 22 Worst poker pair 23 It might have a lattice crust 24 Disgustingly wealthy 28 Quarterbacks, e.g.

30 Hurried look 31 Opposite of pro32 Mont Blanc’s range 35 Some buns 36 Wonderfully high number of years to have lived 40 Kind of ringshaped cake 43 Gives a new color 44 Makes a sharp turn 48 Patriotic chant 50 Something spotted on a safari 52 Arm-flapping dance of the early 1970s 56 Mrs., in Mexico 57 Liberate 58 “And there you have it!” _______________________, Attorney Aaron Seagroves, NCSB No. 50979 W. Harris, NCSB No. 48633 5550 77 Center Drive, Suite 100 Charlotte, NC 28217 PHONE: 980-201-3840 File No.: 19-44580 NOTICE OF FORECLOSURE SALE NORTH CAROLINA, RUTHERFORD COUNTY Under and by virtue of a Power of Sale contained in that certain Deed of Trust executed by Foy W. Gibson and Linda D. Gibson, dated August 20, 2009, recorded on August 20, 2009 in Book 1053, Page 293 of the Rutherford County Public Registry conveying certain real property in Rutherford County to MTNBK, LTD, Trustee, for the benefit of Carolina First Bank. Default having been made of the note thereby secured by the said Deed of Trust and the undersigned, having been substituted as Trustee in said Deed of Trust, and the holder of the note evidencing said default having directed that the Deed of Trust be foreclosed, the undersigned Substitute Trustee will offer for sale at the courthouse door of the county courthouse where the property is located, or the usual and customary location at the county courthouse for conducting the sale on November 16, 2020 at 10:00 AM, and will sell to the highest bidder for cash the following described property situated in Rutherford County, North Carolina, to wit: Tract One: Situate, lying and being in Rutherfordton Township, Rutherford County, North Carolina, and being the same and identical property described in Deed recorded in Deed Book 398, Page 409, Rutherford County Registry, and being described according to said Deed as follows: Situate, lying and being in the Town of Spindale, Rutherfordton Township, Rutherford County, North Carolina, and BEGINNING on an iron pin, said iron pin lying on the East side of Courtland Street and being the Southwestern corner of Lot Number Forty-One (41) and the Northwestern corner of Lot Number Forty-Two (42) as shown on a

No. 0930 59 Religion in which suras are recited 61 Right on the money 62 Profanity … or what 17-, 24-, 36and 52-Across start with?

65 Call from a chair umpire 66 Hathaway of “Ocean’s 8” 67 Not widespread, as a film release 68 Work of Horace 69 Mosquito guards 70 What “radio wave,” “foregone” and “main event” all hide

DOWN 1 From Qom, e.g.

2 Like “Cleopatra,” among all Best Picture nominees 3 ___ Bryan, “American Idol” judge 4 Few and far between plat thereof recorded in Plat Book 2 at Page 90, Rutherford County Registry, from said BEGINNING point; thence North 5 deg. East 22 feet to an iron pin in the margin of Courtland Street; thence South 85 deg. E. 150 feet to an iron pin; thence South 5 deg. West 22 feet to an iron pin; thence North 85 deg. West 150 feet to the point and place of BEGINNING, containing .076 acres more or less. Courses and distances above given all according to map and survey by Clyde C. Sorrells, R.L.S., in June, 1978. Also herein conveyed is all of Lot Number Forty-Two (42) as the same is shown on a plat thereof said plat being recorded in Plat Book 2 at Page 90, Rutherford County Registry, reference to which plat is hereby made for a more full and complete description. Tract Two: Situate, lying and being in Rutherfordton Township, Rutherford County, North Carolina, and being the same and identical property described in Deed recorded in Deed Book 415, Page 07, Rutherford County Registry, and being described according to said Deed as follows: Situate in the Town of Spindale, North Carolina, adjoining the lands of Hugh J. Moore and wife on the North, other lands of S.K. Yelton and wife on the East, the lands of James B. Rollins on the South and other lands of Foy Winston Gibson and wife on the West; and being a part of a parcel of land which was conveyed to S.K. Yelton and wife, Alda E. Yelton, by Mrs. J.H. Burwell, by deed dated March 9, 1971, and of record in Deed Book 332 at Page 342 in the office of the Register of Deeds of Rutherford County, North Carolina; and BEGINNING on an iron pin which is the southwestern corner of an 0.44 acre parcel conveyed by S.K. Yelton and wife, to Hugh J. Moore and wife, by deed of record in Deed Book 414 at Page 524, said iron pin also being the northeastern corner of the lands of Foy Winston Gibson and wife; and runs thence with the line of said conveyance to Hugh J. Moore and wife, South 74 deg 02 minutes East 54.18 feet to an iron pin at a hickory; thence South 13

puzzle by Erik Agard and Andy Kravis 5 Gamer’s asset, maybe 6 Congressional approval 7 Bit of dust 8 Neighbor of Oahu 9 Making the wrong choice 10 “What had happened ___ …”

11 Learned (of) 12 Country whose flag is solid red with an emerald pentagram 13 Chides into silence 14 Italian brandy 18 Color of peanuts 22 High bar?

25 Lint collector 26 Dot of land 27 Water cooler noise 29 Stevie Wonder’s tribute to Ellington 33 Pack of whales 34 Foxlike 37 Teeny 38 Punch out 39 He was named 1992’s Sportsman of the Year, despite retiring from tennis 12 years earlier

40 Sacred creature to many Native Plains people 41 Unrightfully seized 42 Hit 2018 Netflix stand-up special for Hannah Gadsby 45 “Wow, look at the time! I should really be going” 46 Auto-tune sites?

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deg 3 min 30 sec West 113.26 feet to an iron pin; thence North 82 deg 53 min West 44.57 feet to an iron pin, Gibson's southeastern corner; thence with the line of Foy Winston Gibson and wife, North 8 deg 25 min 30 sec East 121.02 feet, passing an iron pin at 99.69 feet, to the BEGINNING, containing 0.13 acres, more or less.

Save and except any releases, deeds of release or prior conveyances of record. Said property is commonly known as 405 Courtland Street, Spindale, NC 28160 n/k/a 197 Courtland Street, Spindale, NC 28160; Parcel #: 1210702 A cash deposit (no personal checks) of five percent (5%) of the purchase price, or Seven Hundred Fifty Dollars ($750.00), whichever is greater, payable to Bell Carrington Price & Gregg, PLLC, will be required at the time of the sale. Following the expiration of the statutory upset bid period, all the remaining amounts are immediately due and owing. Pursuant to N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.30, if the highest bidder at the sale, resale, or any upset bidder fails to comply with its bid upon the tender of a deed for the real property, or after a bona fide attempt to tender such a deed, the clerk of superior court may, upon motion, enter an order authorizing a resale of the real property. The defaulting bidder at any sale or resale or any defaulting upset bidder is liable for the bid made, and in case a resale is had because of such default, shall remain liable to the extent that the final sale price is less than the bid plus all the costs of any resale.

Any deposit or compliance bond made by the defaulting bidder shall secure payment of the amount, if any, for which the defaulting bidder remains liable under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.30. Third party purchasers must pay the excise tax and THE RECORDING COSTS FOR THEIR DEED. Said property to be offered pursuant to this Notice of Sale is being offered for sale, transfer and conveyance “AS IS WHERE IS.” There are no representations of warranty relating to the title or any physical, environmental, health or

safety conditions existing in, on, at, or relating to the property being offered for sale. This sale is made subject to any and all superior liens, including taxes and special assessments. To the best of the knowledge and belief of the undersigned, the current owner(s) of the property is/are the Heirs of Foy W. Gibson. An Order for possession of the property may be issued pursuant to N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.29, in favor of the purchaser and against the party or parties by the clerk of superior court of the county in which the property is sold. Any person who occupies the property pursuant to a rental agreement entered into or renewed on or after October 1, 2007, may, after receiving the notice of sale, terminate the rental agreement by providing written notice of termination to the landlord, to be effective on a date stated in the notice that is at least 10 days, but no more than 90 days, after the sale date contained in the notice of sale, provided that the mortgagor has not cured the default at the time the tenant provides the notice of termination. The notice shall also state that upon termination of a rental agreement, the tenant is liable for rent due under the rental agreement prorated to the effective date of the termination [N.C. Gen. Stat. § 45-21.16(b)(2)]. Upon termination of a rental agreement, the tenant is liable for rent due under the rental agreement prorated to the effective date of the termination. If the trustee is unable to convey title to this property for any reason, the sole remedy of the purchaser is the return of the deposit. Reasons of such inability to convey include, but are not limited to, the filing of a bankruptcy petition prior to the confirmation of the sale and reinstatement of the loan without the knowledge of the trustee. If the validity of the sale is challenged by any party, the trustee, in their sole discretion, if they believe the challenge to have merit, may request the court to declare the sale to be void and return the deposit.

The purchaser will have no further remedy. Cape Fear Trustee Services,

51 Puzzle 53 Frequent hangout spot 54 Loafs 55 Berkeley school, for short 60 Job for a lawyer … or outfit for a lawyer 62 Enthusiast 63 Ice Bucket Challenge cause, for short 64 Trivial objection

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LLC, Substitute Trustee ____________ ______________________, Attorney D. Max Sims, NCSB No. 54080 5550 77 Center Drive, Suite 100 Charlotte, NC 28217 PHONE: 980-201-3840 File No.: 19-44467

CLASSES & WORKSHOPS CLASSES & WORKSHOPS BUNCOMBE COUNTY BEEKEEPERS VIRTUAL 2020 BEE SCHOOL BCBC will be hosting our 2020 bee school on line with 3- 2 hour sessions and a follow up session. We are starting on Tuesday Nov. 17th and Dec 1st and 8th, with a followup in early January. Please check out our website wncbees.org or our facebook page wncbees for all the details and schedule.

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Stellar Counseling Services.

Christy Gunther, MA, LCMHC. (828) 258-3229.

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Call 866-535-9689 (AAN CAN)

NOV. 4-10, 2020

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Elections bring out our differences.

To live together in community, we need to find common ground.

Whatever the outcome of this year’s elections, let’s keep engaging with our neighbors and working toward a better shared future.

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NOV. 4-10, 2020

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