A new National Park Service report shows that 13,297,647 visitors to Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 2023 spent $2.2 billion in communities near the park. That spending supported 33,748 jobs in the local area and had a cumulative benefit to the local economy of $3.4 billion.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park fire officials and fire investigators have determined that the Flint Gap Fire was started by lightning from a recent summer storm.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park continues initial attack efforts on the Flint Gap Fire. Two suppression modules are assisting with initial attack today, Thursday, Aug. 29. An additional module will arrive tomorrow.

The Indian Health Service (IHS) has reached a historic agreement with the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians in Oklahoma (UKB) that the UKB will use to establish the UKB Tribal Health System.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park received a report of a small wildland fire near Hannah Mountain, south of Abrams Creek, the evening of Monday, Aug. 26.

The School Board of Cherokee Central Schools (CCS) met on Monday, Aug. 15 in the Central Office Board Room. The meeting was called to order at 4 p.m. by Chairperson Jennifer Thompson.

Last year, area partners received a grant from the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation to provide two artistic welcome signs to be installed designating the Cherokee Cultural District on the Qualla Boundary (Cherokee, N.C.).

Ernest D. Pheasant, Sr., 47, a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI), pleaded guilty on Friday, Aug. 16, 2024 to first-degree murder in Indian Country, announced Dena J. King, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. Pheasant entered his guilty plea before U.S. Magistrate Judge W. Carleton Metcalf.