Author: Scott D. Yost

It’s not known which, if any, of the Guilford County commissioners like to smoke marijuana from time to time, but, if they do, they’ll certainly get the chance on next month’s taxpayer funded trip to Colorado, famous for its mountains and its wide selection of cannabis products. 

the Guilford County Family Justice Center – which is now its own county department – and the Board of Commissioners will be celebrating the center at its Thursday, June 16 meeting. 

Since Halford became county manager in January 2021, he has made it a quest to raise the pay and brighten the working conditions of the county’s employees.

On Wednesday, June 15, from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., at the BP Gas Station at 2620 Phoenix Dr. in Greensboro, Americans for Prosperity will do a “gas station takeover,” and, for two hours, they’ll reduce the price of gas to $2.38 a gallon – the national average price of gas in January 2021 before President Joe Biden took office.

At the Thursday, June 2 Board of Commissioners meeting, Guilford County Sheriff Danny Rogerss had one dominant theme he wanted to get across – Guilford County needs to do whatever it can to attract and hire new detention officers.  Rogers addressed the board after several jail guards had spoken from the floor about jail safety, long hours, low pay and other factors that made the job very difficult and the positions hard to fill.

Former Guilford County Manager Marty Lawing is a long way from Guilford County – he’s now the city manager of Fort Myers, Florida.  However, Greensboro, High Point and the county he once ran are clearly still on his mind. Lawing recently gave a speech on the current state of Fort Myers and he referred to his old stomping grounds in comments picked up by southwest Florida’s “Gulf Shore Business” magazine,

On Wednesday, June 8, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) announced two new funding opportunities meant to address behavioral health in the criminal justice system across the state.

In light of recent revelations on how business has been conducted in the small town of Sedalia, several past instances of highly questionable behavior by government bodies have come to light. In one particularly strange and egregious proceeding that occurred in November of last year, former Sedalia Planning Board Member Ed Piotrowski was denied right to be chairman of that board because a sixth person was allowed to vote in the proceedings – when, in fact, the Planning Board has only five voting members.

The sleepy little town of Sedalia, North Carolina, for instance – with a population of 676 – was one town that for decades saw virtually no news coming out of it.  But that has changed in recent months, and the small town is now ground central for a plethora of allegations of bad governance.

The Carolina Pines Retirement Community is set to hold its groundbreaking ceremony on Thursday, June 16 at 11:30 a.m. at Sedgefield Country Club, 3201 Forsyth Drive.

The giant school bond referendum that Guilford County voters approved in the May primary election narrowly escaped more scrutiny at a Tuesday, June 7 inquiry by the Guilford County Board of Elections. 

On Tuesday, June 7, the Guilford County Sheriff’s Department issued a fraud warning for the residents of the county, noting that scammers are now taking an unusual and disturbing approach to bilking people. The bad guys are, a Tuesday press release from the department stated, pretending to be law enforcement officers in order to swindle them out of money.

As many people know by now, the Guilford County Sheriff’s Department is seeking qualified applicants to join its detention staff, which runs and patrols the county’s two jails – one in downtown Greensboro and one in downtown High Point. The information sessions will be held on Wednesday, June 15, at 6 p.m. and on Thursday, June 16, also at 6 p.m. Both sessions will be held at the Sheriff’s Department Administrative Office at 400 W. Washington St. in Greensboro.

The Guilford County commissioners often get to hear about the work of the county’s Emergency Services Department. However, this week, District 6 Commissioner James Upchurch got an all-day, up-close, first-person view of the workings of the department – and he said he learned a whole lot of valuable information thanks to the experience.

On May 17, the voters of Guilford County approved a $1.7 billion school bond – the largest bond referendum for education in the history of the state of North Carolina.

However, there’s a new threat to the bond that could mean school officials never see a dime of that money Former Guilford County Commissioner Alan Branson, who won his effort in the May primary to be the at-large Republican candidate for the Guilford County Board of Commissioners, has filed a new complaint against the $1.7 billion school bond on the grounds that Guilford County government and Guilford County Schools illegally used taxpayer funded resources to push for passage of the school bond referendum. 

it looks like Guilford County Manager Mike Halford, Chairman of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners Skip Alston and the Democrats on the Board of Commissioners will get everything they’ve hoped and dreamed of for years.

You may not know it, but this week isn’t just any week – in Guilford County, it’s the annual event known as “Guilford Creek Week.” 
The week runs from Saturday, June 4 to Saturday, June 11 – technically making it a week and a day. It’s held to “celebrate the importance, impact and influence of the creeks and waterways of Guilford County and the municipalities within,” and the week is meant to “raise awareness about the vital role of local waters and how the health of that water can have a direct impact on communities.”

A lot of families in Guilford County were left high and dry on Memorial Day weekend after pools at Guilford County parks didn’t open in time for what’s usually the first day of the year of swimming at those pools.  The Guilford County Board of Commissioners met on Thursday, June 2, and county staff had some explaining to do for the county commissioners who had gotten some complaints and questions about the very popular county service.

The Guilford County Board of Commissioners had planned to spend the majority of the Thursday, June 2 meeting talking about the upcoming 2022-2023 county budget. However, due to the recent mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas that left 19 students and two teachers dead, the commissioners devoted much of their meeting to address gun violence.  Several commissioners spoke on the issue before the board adopted a resolution declaring gun violence in the county a public health crisis.

The Guilford County Board of Commissioners was laser focused on addressing gun violence when the board met on Thursday, June 2. There are a lot of things county leaders want residents to do, but one that became the catchphrase of the new effort is this: “If you see something, say something.”

A lot of strange things have happened in Guilford County government this century, but one of the strangest happened to Guilford County Commissioner James Upchurch this week when Upchurch received his box of county government business cards.  The cards offer his contact information and identify him as a Guilford County commissioner. 

There will be a lot of political races on the ballot in November but one of the most interesting will be the contest between Democratic Guilford County Commissioner Kay Cashion and Republican former Guilford County Commissioner Alan Branson. 

The three have contributed a great deal to High Point over the years and have all recently announced that they’re heading off into retirement: High Point Market Authority President and CEO Tom Conley, High Point Arts Council Executive Director Debbie Lumpkins and High Point City Clerk Lisa Vierling are calling it quits after successful careers.

Families in Guilford County and around the state who are in the state’s “Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children” – better known as “WIC” – can now purchase more sizes and types of Gerber formula, according to a Wednesday, June 1 press release from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS).

week, High Point City Manager Tasha Logan Ford – who’s still fairly new in that position herself – announced two new hires for the city: Damon Dequenne (on the left above), who’s accepted the assistant city manager position and will start that job on Tuesday, June 21 and Sushil Nepal (above right), the city’s new planning services director will start on Tuesday, July 5.

The Guilford County Sheriff’s Department recently bought a slew of new vehicles to chase you down with, and – as everyone knows when it comes to law enforcement vehicles – they have to be packed to the brim with gear and equipment.  

this month, the Board of Commissioners is adding a new twist. The board is singling out female veterans for recognition at the board’s Thursday, June 2 meeting.

On Tuesday, May 31, the NC Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) announced a round of significant funding for mental health services in large population centers across the state. However, unfortunately for Guilford County residents, no services in the third most populated county in the state are supported by this round of funding – while services in Mecklenburg County, Wake County and other counties do get a boost.

Guilford County officials stated that its public pools wouldn’t be opening this Memorial Day Weekend as usual due to a staffing shortage. The affected pools are at Bur-Mil Park at 5834 Bur-Mill Club Road in Greensboro, Northeast Park at 3441 Northeast Park Drive in Gibsonville and Hagan-Stone Park at 5920 Hagan-Stone Park Road in Pleasant Garden.

News 2 Evening Anchor Julie Luck, who’s been fighting colon cancer this year, had some very positive news for her friends and viewers that she conveyed in a Facebook post: The disease is in remission and she expects to return to the airwaves soon.

High Point University (HPU) has High Point in its name, but that doesn’t mean the students are trapped in Guilford County’s second-largest city. In fact, sometimes they get to go to England’s largest city – London.

Starting this week, North Carolina will have the Winston-Salem-based “Carolina Cowboys” team – which is one of eight founding teams in the new Professional Bull Riders Team Series, known as “PBR” for short.

Messages of love, support and prayer have poured into the small town of Uvalde, Texas, after the horrific mass shooting in an elementary school there. On Thursday, May 26, the Guilford County Sheriff’s Department joined in with that chorus of voices by releasing a statement on the shooting. The department also advised Guilford County residents that it is stepping up patrols of the elementary schools in the county to help reduce the chance of something similar happening here.

Wednesday, May 25, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) put out a lengthy press release reminding everyone that they’re still in danger of getting COVID.

PTIA Executive Director Kevin Baker this week said that purchasing the Pawnee Road residence and land is another step in a long, ongoing process of accumulation.

In all, the Guilford County manager’s budget would mean nearly $20 million for GTCC for fiscal 2022-2023 – $19,657,500 to be exact.  That represents a 9 percent increase over the amount of funds the county provided the community college in the 2021-2022 budget that expires on June 30.

According to Guilford County Manager Mike Halford, Guilford County recently completed a workplace study and found a big complaint among its employees….

Guilford County Manager Mike Halford had a lot of facts and figures to give out during the message on his proposed fiscal 2022-2023 county budget, which he gave last week. But he started off that message in an unusual and touching way. Halford began by paying tribute to former Guilford County Commissioner Carolyn Coleman who passed away…

The airline industry and airport operations around the country have come a very long way since the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic – and that trend continued to be evident in new stats released by Piedmont Triad International Airport (PTIA)…

The High Point Public Library is hoping for great weather this weekend – no more of this rain – when it hosts the 2022 outdoor Community Festival in the library parking lot at 901 N. Main St. in High Point.

Guilford County announced the details of that public hearing on the manager’s budget.  The public hearing on the proposed budget will be held on Thursday, June 2, at 5:30 p.m. in the Commissioners Meeting Room in the Old  Guilford County Court House, in downtown Greensboro. The official stated reason for the hearing is “for the purpose of discussing the proposed FY 2022-23 budget and to give all interested citizens the opportunity to make written and oral comments on the budget.”

For more than a decade, Guilford County and the City of Greensboro have been trying to figure out the best use for Bryan Park North and now they’re asking the public for further input. 

Food recalls happen often but it’s rare that the product is so popular that the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) makes a special announcement.  But that’s what happened on Monday, May 23 when there was a recall of the popular peanut butter Jif.  The old ad campaign said that choosey mothers choose Jif, but NCDHHS officials pointed out that certain Jif brand peanut butters shouldn’t be eaten or served right now.

Launch Greensboro’s business accelerator program – LaunchLab Growth – will be focused on 10 new area companies on Monday, May 23 at what’s known as “Spring 2022 Demo Day.”  At the event, business entrepreneurs will give their pitches and get a chance to connect with the local entrepreneurial community.

On Friday, May 20 Guilford County announced a new communications and public relations director. The county named Julie Smith – who previously worked for the Denver Department of Finance in Denver, Colorado – to oversee Guilford County’s communications and public relations efforts.

Chairman of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners Skip Alston has a message for the voters of Guilford County: Thank you, thank you, thank you. Alston made his effusive remarks at…

On Thursday, June 2, the Guilford County Board of Commissioners will hold a public hearing to consider approval of the sale of $700 million in bonds by Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital and its affiliates…

Multiple times in the past, Guilford County voters have told the county commissioners that they don’t want a quarter-cent sales tax hike. The county’s voters sent that exact same message in the Tuesday, May 17 election when nearly 55 percent of those voters said, once again, keep the sales tax rate where it is. So, the county commissioners have finally heard that message and – and ignored it once again.

The Guilford County Board of Commissioners have been putting a great deal of time and effort into job interviews to find the next top attorney, and the board spent most of the day Thursday, May 19 doing so again. The Board of Commissioners has been looking for a new county attorney ever since longtime former Guilford County Attorney Mark Payne (seen above) announced last year that he was stepping down on December 31.  

On Thursday, May 19, Guilford County Manager Mike Halford stood up before the Guilford County Board of Commissioners and delivered his proposed budget for fiscal 2022-2023.