After yesterday’s news, things feel oddly different, yet the same. Let’s look at the headlines and try to figure out why:
Zoning, at last
Buncombe County commissioners, after years of wrangling, voted Wednesday night to install a basic form of zoning in the unincorporated parts of Buncombe County. WLOSer Cherub Charu was witness to the historic vote. Lots of people turned out to complain that zoning is an unfair taking of their property rights, while others said with all the development we’re seeing, some form of zoning needs to be installed for orderly growth.
Garbage dump
There’s a major dump behind McCormick heights and Windswept Views condos. Holly Headache said that at the roadside dump, you’ll find couches, a TV and gasp even an old toilet. County officials say they’re working on cleaning it up.
What to do with Pritchard Park?
A group of residents rallied on the steps of City Hall in a call for City Council not to kick out the homeless there, despite a lot of public drunkenness and peeing and such. Rev. Amy Cantrell organized the group and got on a city committee to look at how to clean up the park without messing too much with the street people.
Music at Biltmore
Here are the acts that will play this summer at the Biltmore Estate: Clay Aiken, Chicago, Kenny Rogers, the B-52s and Chris Isaak. We saw Tony B in concert there last year – very cool.
Work less…
WLOSers said the Asheville Chamber of Commerce has some sort of fake web campaign to institute a five-day weekend. It’s all just a marketing ploy to get tourists to come to Ashvegas.
Steep slope rules for Ashvegas
City Council talked about the proposed rules, but put off a vote.
Ashvegas budget surplus
Asheville City Council has a budget surplus of $2 million. That money comes from cost-cutting and increased tax collections, WLOSers said. Ideas for spending the money include using it for police and sidewalks and such, or an $80-per-family tax refund that Councilman Brownie Newman proposed. Can you tell he’s running for re-election?
Murder victim remembered
The mother of Jay Yerkes and a small group of people gathered on Lexington Avenue to put up a plaque in the dead man’s honor and call for a change to the judicial system. Yerkes mom said prosecutors plea-bargained the case and her son’s killer got 16 months in jail, no probation.
ABC comes to Weaverville
Voters in Weaverville voted to approve the location of an ABC store, aka liquor store, in their town, but voted down liquor-by-the drink. The thinking went something like this – everybody in Weaver-vegas saw that Woodfin had its own ABC store, so they decided instead of giving Woodfin all that tax money, they’d open their own and keep that liquor tax money for themselves. The liquor by the drink issue failed by three dry votes.
13 Comments
Ash,
Where are you lately? Have you eloped with one of the Avetts?
Where did you go?? I miss my ashevegas news x.x
I have a gripe. Where is Ashvegas? Is this a timely blog or what? Nothing posted here in more than week! What up with that?!?
Another gripe I have is the camera angles.What’s up with up the nose shots and laying the camera on the ground? Also, why do they show the same footage over and over in the same little segment? Sad,sad sad.
you should check out wlos job listings. looks like ole bob is out.
Weaver-vegas sounds a little awkward…
Weaver-eno?
Weavas?
Respectfully submitted,
A Mountain Polo Girl
see, that’s what you get for listening to them… they are more entertaining with the sound off.
Not that it’s right, or necessarily even logical, but here’s my *theory* of why they do that: with 20 counties (or however many are in the NC part of their coverage area), perhaps they give their viewers so little credit that they think, for example, a person in Sylva would change channels if the story said "a Weaverville church," thinking "that’s not about a church in my town, so why should I watch?"
OK, maybe it is at least partly logical, and/or I’m just that shallow, because I find myself doing that a lot, particularly if it’s the top story that’s specific to a different community. If the best they can do is something about the town of Spindale changing its sign ordinance (or whatever), I’ll spend my time with King of the Hill or some version of Law & Order, thank you.
I don’t watch anymore, but when I did, my main trivial gripe was beginning each sentence with the word, "well."
"Well, Tammy, snow will kill us all eventually."
I have some experience in broadcasting and my goal was always to avoid null sound words.
Same in news writing. If it is there to make the sentence sound better or more conversational – get rid of it, you are wasting my time. some examples – "in fact" "you know" "when asked"
hey jer –
we already do that –
hey ash –
kassandra covered the vote
Jer,
I’m not just the man…I am "Mountain Man"
BTW what a bunch of hypocrites in Weaverville voting in an ABC store but no liquor by the drink, WTF is the difference?
They do actually use "local" and "area" a lot.
But the reason for these adjectives is inclusion.
If someone says "a weaverville church", and you live is Black Mountain…then whats the point in you watching?
But if they say "a mountain church" suddenly the whole viewing area could be affected.
You write for as wide an audience as you can. The narrower you get, the less people will be interested ( at least when it comes to location).
Now, there is no excuse to do it very often in the actual story, since people are already tuned in, but it makes a lot of sense in the teases and what not.
Y’know, one of my biggest gripes with WLOS — and this may seem trivial…okay, it IS trivial — is their overuse of the word "mountain" as an adjective. Everything is "a mountain man," "a mountain church," "a mountain football player," "a mountain business," etc. To me that just sounds…hokey. And is "mountain football" somehow different from regular football?
Dear WLOS: How about mixing it up a bit and saying "a local man," "a Weaverville church," "an Asheville High football player," "an area business," etc.?