Andy museum finds its financial backer

So the prospect of a Surry Arts Council building just for the Andy Griffith Memorabilia Collection is back from the ashes after falling apart last year. The big difference is that the largest chunk of the funding is not from local taxes, but from the N.C. Rural Economic Development Center. The center is no doubt [...]

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Macon Sammons’ farewell

Whatever term you want to use (fired, let go, dismissed, relieved of responsibilities), County Manager Macon Sammons is no longer in the top Surry government post. Sammons did issue a statement when we attempted to reach him for comment, but it was emailed too late to make deadline on our Wednesday story. So I’ve pasted [...]

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A fair with higher fares

As written up in last Friday’s Messenger, the return of the annual Surry County Agricultural Fair is marked with a few changes, namely the inclusion of farm-themed events after a two year absence and an increase in the ticket price. Blog discussions on Mount Airy’s other two big fall events — Mayberry Days and Autumn Leaves — [...]

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What’s needed for a SCC bonus

Those of you that take an interest in Friday’s story about how SCC doesn’t qualify for state bonus money this year (and I’d think the many employees who would have gotten a cut of those dollars are at least curious) can find all the full results of the evaluations online here.
For comparisons sake, I’ve scanned [...]

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Business in the neighborhood?

The planning department map on the right frames in red the center of what has become an emotional rezoning dispute, as evidenced by the public hearing last Thursday. Owners of that parcel want to build a dry cleaners on the site, but first that requires turning the yellow of a residential district to the blue [...]

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Tourism spending: here and down the road

There are two ways to look at the news that Surry County’s tourist spending went up 6.9 percent to $83.3 million in 2007: A. It’s a great indicator of local growth in the tourism sector; B. Surry is just keeping pace with the rest of the state.
For those inclined to take more interest in B [...]

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What to build at SCC

 
Our Tuesday editorial delves into Surry Community College’s plans to request $12 million in state funds for a 1,000 seat auditorium. The project, which you can read more about here, would be the second phase of the school’s Viticulture and Enology Center.
In this case the question is what project(s) to list as the top priorities [...]

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