08/29/2026
The change we need to keep this place home!
Over the next few weeks, we’re going to be sharing more about an idea we’re calling Keeping Mountain Life Alive.
Around here, mountain life is more than a pretty view. It’s knowing your neighbors, raising a family close to home, looking out for one another, supporting local businesses, and making sure this is a place where people of every generation can build a life and afford to stay. Whether you’re raising kids, working, running a business, retired, or living on a fixed income, we all feel the pressure when housing, taxes, groceries, utilities, and everyday costs keep climbing. We’re all part of the same community, and what affects one generation eventually affects all of us.
Keeping mountain life alive means looking at the whole picture.
It means talking honestly about affordability, childcare, jobs, small businesses, community resources, and how decisions get made in our county. None of those things stand on their own. They all tie together, and they all help decide whether Yancey County stays a place where people can build a life, raise a family, retire, grow old, and still feel at home.
We don’t think county government has to be the answer to every problem. But it ought to be useful. It ought to listen, help connect people with resources, bring folks together, and make it a little easier for good ideas to take root.
That’s really what Keeping Mountain Life Alive is about. Not changing who we are, but making sure the people who make this place what it is still have a future here.
There’s a lot worth holding onto in Yancey County. There’s also plenty we can do better. Keeping mountain life alive means doing both.
It’s time for a change that protects this shared place we call home and keeps mountain life alive for generations to come.
Your neighbors and future public servants,
Amber Westall Briggs, Landon Beaver, & Carol Golightly
