The Southern Highland Reader

Note: This post was made in August of 2008, but has been read consistently since then. Here it is again, with comments, and this new link to a story from National Public Radio.

An excerpt from the NPR story:

“People fear roundabouts in America — they’ve been called ‘Circles of Death,’ Vanderbilt says. “And nothing could be further from the truth.”

The geometry of a roundabout eliminates one of the most dangerous moves you can make in driving: a left turn against fast-moving oncoming traffic. Also, since traffic circles involve a lot of other drivers and a driver is not relying on signs and symbols, drivers must make their own decisions and be aware of other traffic.

If that sounds stressful for drivers, Vanderbilt says a little stress might not be a bad thing. “I think they tend to act more cautiously, which is a positive result,” Vanderbilt says.

Here’s the original post:

RALEIGH/STATEWIDE-I lived in Waynesville for a while a little less than a decade ago, and during that time residents were pushing the North Carolina Department of Transportation to build more thoughtfully planned roads.

That was when the first roundabout intersection that I’d seen anywhere near my native state first came up. It’s long since been installed and works well, and another one or two have been added, but at the time, you’d have thought by the uproar that the DOT was asking us all to give up cars and ride kangaroos to work.

(Story continues below)

Learn more about Roundabout intersections

Examples:

A wikipedia overview
Distracting Miss Daisy: Why stop signs and speed limits endanger Americans; The Atlantic Monthly
Roundabouts USA

(Continued from above)

Meanwhile, the smart roads folks — myself included — would argue ad nauseam — mostly to people who already agreed with us — that skinny roads don’t cause traffic, bad intersections do, and so intersections that require full stops must by nature be bad intersections. When we were really on our high horses, we’d wonder how people who spent their weekends watching a sequence of hundreds of left turns on some racetrack or another couldn’t handle the prospect of a simple roundabout.

Lift quote from an article in the Raleigh News and Observer:

How a roundabout works:

In place of a red light or a stop sign to hold some drivers while others turn left or drive through the intersection, a roundabout pulls everybody into a circle.

When traffic is heavy, you pause at a yield sign until you can enter the counterclockwise flow. When the circle is clear, drivers on each street can move through the intersection without stopping.

It’s a little slower than moving through a green light — but a lot faster than stopping for a red one. That little slowdown is one reason roundabouts reduce crashes.

Here’s another lift quote from the same article:

North Carolina has built about 60 roundabouts in the past decade — not counting all the little ones in subdivisions and shopping centers, says Jim H. Dunlop, DOT state congestion management engineer. He said we could see 600 more in the next 10 years.

And here’s the article itself, written by staff writer Bruce Siceloff.

WAYNESVILLE–Officials from Haywood Regional Medical Center and WestCare Health System today announced a joint operating agreement to include Haywood Regional Medical Center, Harris Regional Hospital, Swain County Hospital and other healthcare facilities serving a four-county area in Western North Carolina. The JOA is now official, as WestCare’s governing board approved the JOA on October 13. The new organization will be known as “MedWest Health System.”

Representatives of the two healthcare organizations have been working on the JOA since spring, when plans were first announced to integrate operations. Mark Clasby, chair of Haywood’s board of commissioners, said the agreement “reflects a strong consensus within our local communities that integration of facilities and resources is the best way to ensure the continuation and growth of comprehensive healthcare services.”

Fred Alexander, chair of WestCare’s board of trustees, echoed these sentiments, adding that the JOA will help ensure that high quality services remain available close to home. “This new relationship,” he said, “will enhance our ability to attract the very best physicians, nurses and technicians to our area. Additional benefits include increasing access to care, reducing healthcare costs to patients, and improving patient outcomes.”

Alexander helped to unveil the new MedWest logo, featuring a blue and green mountain-themed design. He said the logo will be increasingly visible to the public, and adopted officially when a Joint Operating Company is in place to manage combined activities.

Clasby said the Joint Operating Company is expected to be up and running in January 2010. At that time, he said, Haywood Regional and WestCare will execute a management services agreement with Carolinas HealthCare System, based in Charlotte.

Hospital officials said ultimate responsibility for oversight will be vested in a newly formed governing board; however, the existing hospital boards will remain in place with authority to oversee specific reserved functions. For example, the individual boards will continue to approve credentials for their respective medical staffs; to make decisions regarding sale, lease or distribution of current assets; and to approve new members of the Joint Operating Company.

Clasby expressed thanks to members of a joint study commission that has been working since spring to oversee the details of integration and prepare the accompanying legal documents. “They have worked in a very cooperative spirit that has enabled us to keep pace with deadlines and maintain a sharp focus on enhancing healthcare delivery for the people of our region,” he said.

Michael C. Tarwater, chief executive officer of Carolinas HealthCare System, said his organization was pleased and honored to be a part of the new affiliation.

He noted that it is a growing trend for smaller hospitals to maintain some type of affiliation with a larger system, “because the economics of the times make it very difficult for small, independent hospitals to keep up with current demands.”

“A management services agreement,” he added, “helps to ensure access to a much broader array of resources, which are needed to meet the challenges they face today. Advantages include group purchasing opportunities and sharing best practices in areas such as financial management, staff recruiting, safety and quality improvement.”

Tarwater attributed Carolinas HealthCare’s growth to a firm commitment to local needs and sensitivities. “Decisions about growth, medical services and customer relations,” he said, “need to be guided by the people whose families will be affected by those decisions. We have a proud tradition of respecting that principle, and we are somewhat unique in that respect.”

About the partners

Haywood Regional Medical Center (www.haymed.org) was established in 1927. The current facility opened in 1979 and is licensed for 170 acute care beds. It is the third largest employer in Haywood County with more than 900 employees.

WestCare Health System (www.westcare.org) was formed in February 1997 when Harris Regional Hospital and Swain County Hospital combined to develop a full spectrum of health services. WestCare employs almost 1,200 full and part time employees and has a medical staff of more than 90 physicians representing 22 specialties.

Haywood Regional and WestCare have announced plans to affiliate with Carolinas HealthCare System (www.carolinashealthcare.org), one of the leading healthcare providers in the Southeast. The newly integrated network, to be called MedWest Health System, will enhance its commitment to the people of Western North Carolina by improving the quality of available services, offering new services, and providing more people with access to needed care. Carolinas HealthCare has 29 affiliated hospitals in North and South Carolina,

KNOXVILLE-11th District Congressman Heath Shuler on Wednesday denied knowledge of the working of a land deal between the Tennessee Valley Authority — over which he has some oversight in Washington — and a land development company in east Tennessee in which holds interest.

The Tennessean’s lead:

North Carolina Rep. Heath Shuler said Wednesday that he did not contact the Tennessee Valley Authority while the agency was considering a water access deal that was key to a housing development in which he was an investor.

The Waynesville, N.C., Democrat’s statement appears to contradict the conclusion in a report by TVA’s inspector general released Tuesday, and it further clouds a complex and politically charged issue.

The Tennessean’s story is here.

SYLVA–A friend with a mountainside farm near Waynesville recalls when a couple of Cherokee men came by the house on a Sunday afternoon and asked if they could hunt rattlesnakes on her property.

“Knock yourselves out,” she told them, “I’ve never even seen a copperhead as long as I’ve been here.”

Later, as they passed back through, one held up a full, seething, squirming, buzzing sack.

There’s no shortage of rattlesnake lore in the mountains, nor rattlers themselves, although they’re pretty shy and tend to stick to the high ground. We’re blessed with only one species, the timber rattler, and although that snake is potentially quite dangerous — it’s large, has long fangs and lots of venom — it has a relatively mild disposition.

The Cherokee relationship with the serpent is a complex one.

Eminent anthropologist James Mooney wrote that snakes were perceived as supernaturals by the Cherokee, with intimate ties to the rain and thunder gods.

“The feeling toward snakes is one of mingled mixed fear and reverence,” he wrote, “and every precaution is taken to avoid killing or offending one, especially the rattlesnake.”

That was some 125 years ago, but it’s a feeling that many on the boundary still hold; when rattlers are found close to town, they’re often taken elsewhere and released.

Scots-Irish setters, whose creation myths took a dimmer view of serpents, weren’t so charitable and aren’t to this day. But while that’s bad news for crotalus horridus, it’s good news for us, because it makes for good stories.

There’s a settler’s legend about a family that built its home on a stone outcropping that had a hole in it, and they placed the hearth near the hole so they could use it to get rid of ashes.

In the middle of the night after their first fire, they awoke to a cabin full of rattlers, whose den was down the hole, and who were roused out by the warmth.

Of course there are more recent literary references, including many fine ones in Ron Rash’s recent “Serena”. There, the protagonist, a timber baroness, imports an enormous bird of prey from the far reaches of Russia to deal with rattlers around the logging camp. Later, her murderous sidekick, Galloway, adds adders to his arsenal as he tries to dispense with one of Serena’s many enemies.

In “Cold Mountain”, Charles Frazier wrote this:

“…Finally, after climbing high, up where the black balsams grow, [Stobrod] ran upon a great old timber rattler, laid out on a flat slate to sun. It was not enormous in length, for they do not get terribly long, but it was stouter through the body than the fat part of a man’s arm. The markings on its back had all run together until it was black as a blacksnake, almost. It had grown a set of rattles as long as Stobrod’s index finger. In telling this to Ada he held out the finger and then with the thumbnail of the other hand he marked off a place right at the third knuckle. He said, They was that long. And he snicked the nail repeatedly across the dry skin.

“Stobrod had walked up near the stone and said to the snake, Hey, I aim to take them rattles. The big snake had a head like a fist, and it raised up off the stone and evaluated Stobrod through slitted yellow eyes. It shifted into a part coil, declaring it would rather fight than move. The snake quivered its tail a moment, warming up. Then it went to rattling with a screech so dreadful as to make one’s thinking seize up in all its units.”

Former state legislator Herbert Hyde, of Madison County, had a farm near Hayesville but didn’t get to spend much time there. Still, he made regular trips to Clay County to keep the place up. Once, when he was there mowing, a neighbor asked him why he bothered, since he and his family only got out there every so often.

“I do it for the same reason I got into politics,” Hyde told him, “to protect the children from snakes.”

Here’s a story about a championship rattlesnake hunter in west Texas. Different kind of rattlesnake, different place. Nice pictures, though, and a good piece. The photos I’ve posted here are from a slideshow that accompanies the story. They were taken by Erich Schlegel.

SYLVA–In September of 2008, citing a struggling economy and the challenges associated with providing community health care, WestCare Health System of Sylva and Haywood Regional Medical Center of Waynesville chose to work together to evaluate the options of affiliations with larger health care networks.

They signed a Memorandum of Understanding in October to formalize this agreement and sent out the Requests for Proposals in December.

On January 31, two comprehensive proposals were received from Carolinas Healthcare System and Mission Health System. Novant Health chose not to submit a proposal.

Each proposal is now being reviewed by the consultants for presentation to the Joint Study Committee meeting on February 16. The committee will look over the proposals and report back to the Boards of both hospitals.

After a period of stringent review, the Boards of WestCare Health System and Haywood Regional will jointly decide whether to negotiate with one of the systems or, at their option, to turn down both proposals.

Mark Leonard, CEO of WestCare states, “Although we are bound by confidentiality agreements to not give out details of the proposals, we will continue to let the community know about the evaluation process and where we are in it.”

WestCare made the decision to look at possible affiliations almost a year ago. Several reasons lead to this decision. The growing demands of providing health care have jeopardized the mission of small rural hospitals.

In order to continue to improve the quality and cost effectiveness of healthcare in western North Carolina, small hospitals have to consider whether to align themselves with larger health systems. The current state of the economy has increased the challenges to these small hospitals as charity care at WestCare has risen significantly from last year.

RALEIGH-North Carolina lawmakers returned to Raleigh after the holidays yesterday to face an extraordinary chore – a “grinder” of a session one newspaper called it – as they seek to combat an enormous budget shortfall with array of programs cuts.

North Carolina faces a shortfall of about $2 billion.

The mood was unsettled. Governor Beverly Perdue has asked for at least 2% more cuts on top of the 5% requested by previous Governor Mike Easley last fall. Perdue was presented with a list of possible cuts yesterday, but she was unsatisfied with that list and sent it back for more work, complaining that some cuts were implausibly harsh and others were not deep enough.

The cuts on the list would be enacted only if included in the Governor’s budget.

Adding to the general uncertainty was news from Washington, where President Obama’s team released a list of general priorities to be included in it’s stimulus plan — a plan that was ultimately passed as the day wore on. The plan includes $150 billion to improve education nationwide, a significant amount of which would be aimed at universities. Another significant amount is earmarked for transportation infrastructure, which would help North Carolina’s Department of Transportation deal with a 14% income shortfall, caused by the downturn in automobile sales and gas tax revenue. North Carolina could expect help with Medicaid costs, which are skyrocketing, and which burden state coffers in good times.

Still, leaders cautioned that hand-me-downs from Washington should be taken with a grain of salt. The down economy is liable to last far longer than the funds from the stimulus.

Among some of the larger cuts that would impact the southern mountains, if enacted:

• $14,673,598 reduction in Smart Start funding.
• $ 2,394,744 reduction from the Home and Community Care Block Grant for the Division of Aging and Adult Services
• $13,689,289 cut from a broad range of Health and Human Services programs, including many health programs for the needy
• $16,889,076 cut from a range of Division of Social Services programs, including over $9 million in state assistance to individual counties
• $224,172,808 cut from the Division of Medical Assistance
• Almost $50 million from the Division of Mental Health, more than half of which would come from cutting community services.
• Almost $91 million from the Department of Corrections, damaging many programs and closing the North Carolina minimum security prison in Waynesville.
• Almost $110 million from the Department of Transportation, which would impact road maintenance and law enforcement, among other things. The DOT has already cut back on winter event road clearing, and has made noise for some time now about shifting responsibility for some road building and maintenance back to individual counties.

CULLOWHEE – Western Carolina University’s Mountain Heritage Center will host a public reception from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 12, to celebrate the opening of a new exhibit that showcases Haywood County history.

Images such as this one that depicts logging activity in Haywood County in the 1930s are included in the new exhibit, “Haywood County: Portrait of a Mountain Community.” (Photo courtesy of the Haywood County Historical Society)

“Haywood County: Portrait of a Mountain Community” went on display at the WCU museum Monday, Jan. 26, and will be shown there through Friday, May 29. After that date, the exhibit will be on display at the Haywood County Library in Waynesville until it becomes part of the Haywood County Historical Society’s history room at the courthouse in Waynesville, which is being renovated.

Developed in conjunction with the society, the exhibit features themes and images that also will appear in a forthcoming Haywood County history book, which is scheduled to be published in July. The exhibit examines the development of agriculture, industry and tourism in Haywood, and also looks at the townships and villages that have made up the county since its founding in 1808.

The Mountain Heritage Center, open to the public free of charge, is located on the ground floor of WCU’s H.F. Robinson Administration Building. The museum is open 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

For more information about programs and special events, call (828) 227-7129 or visit www.wcu.edu/mhd on the Web.

I add this “pre-script” several days after the original post. I’ve known Scotty for going on a couple of decades now, and wish she wasn’t going through this. Certainly her board does, too, given that her leadership has helped Haywood County to a huge slice of the tourism development pie in WNC. Scotty has said she isn’t leaving her home county, and that’s good, because she’ll surely go on to benefit plenty of her fellow residents, regardless of how she spends her off hours.

WAYNESVILLE-Scotty Ellis, longtime director of the Haywood County Tourism Development Authority in Waynesville, and before that the Chamber of Commerce in Jackson County, was cited in a grocery store parking lot last weekend for possession of marijuana.

It was her second such infraction in a relatively short time, so she’s liable to be put through the wringer for it, though a common refrain from people around the tourism bidness goes something like this: since it’s Scotty’s job to mediate the yearly squabble between go-karty Maggie Valley, hoity-toity Waynesville and blue-collar Canton over a big pot of tax money dedicated to tourism, its remarkable she’s been able to limit her chemical intake to weed alone.

UPDATE: Ellis, director of the TDA since 1995, resigned today (Friday, 10.10.08)

SLOW-SOFTBALL-DOWN-THE-MIDDLE-ALERT: The Winston-Salem Journal used the story to help fill editorial page space on Saturday, and asked whether Haywood County planned to used “Smoky Mountain High” as any sort of tagline.

State Attorney General Roy Cooper’s office has given the NC Department of Transportation an OK to reopen 1,896 miles of state roads previously off-limits (in theory) to 53-foot semi trailers.

Of those miles, two significant routes are within our corner of the southern mountains. U.S. 64 from Murphy to Hendersonville, and U.S. 19 from Waynesville to Cherokee are both on the list.

Oddly, the DOT and the Attorney General’s office say that the changes might not be permanent, depending on the Highway Patrol’s opinion (which apparently wasn’t solicited before the change).

The NC Truckers’ Association is one of a number of trucking lobbies that seem to be influencing this decision, although Association President Charlie Diehl did offer a caveat in this news story. “Any road that is not physically dangerous for any particular length of truck ought to be open to 53-foot trailers,” he said.

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