Local Features

While Farmville has committed $12,740 to clear its local Meals on Wheels waiting list, town leaders warn the expansion is at risk without a surge in volunteer drivers and stricter accountability for how taxpayer dollars are managed.

How a controversial bankruptcy strategy known as the Texas two-step froze thousands of civil lawsuits and left terminal cancer victims fighting for their day in court.

A devastating combination of federal funding cuts, eligibility rollbacks, and rising inflation has pushed food insecurity in central and eastern North Carolina to its highest level in a generation, forcing local non-profit pantries to operate beyond capacity as nearly 630,000 residents—including one in five children—struggle to access their next meal.

The newly introduced trade policy is intended to lower consumer grocery bills by 25 percent by opening U.S. borders to 300,000 metric tons of tariff-free foreign ground beef over the next 90 days. However, the sudden flood of cheap international competition has blindsided domestic agricultural communities, sparking a fierce bipartisan backlash from rural lawmakers and local cattle ranchers who warn the influx will trigger domestic market crashes and permanently devastate family-owned farms.

The court has scheduled pre-trial status conferences for September 10 at the federal courthouse in Raleigh. According to the court's scheduling orders, trials in those cases will be scheduled for 30 to 45 days following the pre-trial conferences. That would put those trials on the court's calendar sometime between October 10 and October 25.

Veterans and grieving families gathered in Jacksonville Wednesday, urging Congress to speed up compensation for people affected by Camp Lejeune’s contaminated drinking water. The group also marched from the Freedom Fountain to Baby Heaven, an infant cemetery at Lejeune Memorial Gardens.

A finalized federal overhaul of the Endangered Species Act has narrowed the definition of wildlife "harm" to exclude habitat destruction, prompting concern from conservationists regarding local species like the Neuse River water dog and Tar River spiny mussel. Sound Rivers experts warn this rollback could trigger habitat loss, degrading water quality for regional fisheries and drinking water, leading to legal challenges from environmental groups.

Advocates and families plan to gather at Jacksonville's Freedom Fountain for a solemn walk to the children’s cemetery known as 'Baby Heaven.' Wednesday's protest is intended to put a human face on a legal battle often reduced to statistics, settlements, and court filings, and continue to push for passage of the Ensuring Justice for Camp Lejeune Victims Act.

In a national lawsuit, parents claimed taking acetaminophen during pregnancy caused their children to develop autism or ADHD. A higher appeals court recently issued a major ruling on how strictly trial judges must vet medical experts and scientific data before a jury is allowed to hear it. Now, federal lawyers have formally flagged that case for the Camp Lejeune judges, hoping to tighten restrictions on what science is allowed at trial.

A newly published study has successfully demonstrated that analyzing residual plant and animal DNA in municipal wastewater can deliver accurate, real-time population nutrition data. Researchers say this breakthrough could fundamentally change how public health officials monitor dietary habits, food insecurity, and economic health.