Author: Jeff Aydelette

Gym re-location sees immediate $8,000 savings ALLIANCE – When the move finally happens, Champion Sports & Fitness may well be paying a lesser rent at its new location (just a quarter mile west on Hwy.  55) because future landlord, Mike Wynne, showed up last October…

RALEIGH – Even powerful, liberal-leaning WRAL-TV proved no match for the state’s newly elected Lt. Governor. After Tuesday’s press conference in which Mark Robinson lambasted Capitol Broadcasting for its website post of an inflammatory cartoon depicting Robinson and other GOP members of the State Board…

RALEIGH – Here’s your chance to complain! Once every three years, state law requires regular reviews of groundwater water quality standards. Next week’s Feb. 2 public hearing is ‘virtual;’ however, written comments can also be submitted by email or through regular Postal Service channels. Last…

News Analysis WASHINGTON, DC – Funky times, to say the least. Uncle Sam’s printing press is going crazy, flooding our locked down economy with plenty of cash. Government is spending money like a bunch of drunken sailors, and it is all being created from thin…

Pesky ‘hardness’ of aquifer likely to remain a problem All of Pamlico County – with the exception of Oriental and homes with their own wells – relies upon the Water Department. The utility operates as an ‘enterprise fund’ — a fancy term for a government-owned…

GRANTSBORO –  Billy Flockhart, who owns two Piggly Wiggly stores in Pamlico County, confronted economic reality Monday morning.  “I will be closing down the Grantboro store on February 28,” wrote Flockhart, in a press release to this newspaper,   just hours before meeting with staffers….

WASHINGTON, N.C. – Sharper than a tack, Richard Pitts, 74, has been preparing tax returns for more than five decades. There may be someone, somewhere, somehow who has a longer track record — but no one anywhere has more concern for a still-growing roster of…

GRANTSBORO – Steve Thompson, a new resident of our area, sent me an email last week. You guessed it – Thompson had a quick story to tell: “Last night (June 30) my wife and I saw a very big black panther about to cross Hwy…

EASTERN N.C. – Last week’s front-page story, which asked for reader feedback about the possibility of black panthers in our area, generated dozens of responses. The Nov. 10 story also featured a photo taken in 2001 by Reelsboro resident, Robert ‘Cody’ Griffith, that lacked sufficient…

Several years ago, this reporter wrote a news story about Maureen Bivona’s encounter with what she believed to be a black panther. At the time, Bivona was riding her bike on Janeiro Road near its intersection with Kershaw Road in the southeast corner of Pamlico…