News

Decades after the beginning of the war on drugs, America's desire for illicit substances has not abated. North Carolina has become a hot spot of both drug activity and sex trafficking, and state leaders are coming together to address the problem. The conference, “Reducing Harm and Building Communities: Addressing Drug Use in the South," will be held in Durham tomorrow and Friday at RTI International. Host Frank Stasio talks about drug use, sex work, and the conference with Jill Brenneman, a Raleigh sex worker and program coordinator for Sex Workers without Borders; Robert Childs, executive director of the NC Harm Reduction Coalition; and Lieutenant Colonel Marty Sumner, deputy chief of the High Point Police Department.

Dr. Nortin Hadler says the human body has an end date – about 85 years old – and thinking you’re going to live much beyond that is mostly wishful thinking. But the health care industry wants to convince you otherwise, he says. They want you getting heart bypass surgery in your 80s, being treated for cancers that won’t kill you and worrying about a host of problems that aren’t as dangerous as they seem.

Marketing executives say they’re hiring and they’re increasing social media budgets.

Chief Marketing Officers questioned for the bi-annual C-M-O Survey, say they plan on spending about 10-percent of their budgets on social media.  That’s an increase of three-percent.  Christine Moorman is a professor at Duke’s Fuqua School of Business and director of The C-M-O Survey.  She says the increase shows companies are trying to figure out how to integrate social media with the rest of their strategy.

Most school districts in North Carolina are county-wide. Mergers of county and city schools occurred mostly in the 1970s through the 1990s, driven by cost and desegregation orders.

But one county remained steadfast against consolidation. Halifax County in northeastern North Carolina has three separate school districts… Roanoke Rapids, Weldon City, and Halifax – for just 8,000 total students. By comparison, if Wake County was divided into a comparable number, there would be 53 different school districts.

Electric cars like the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf are coming onto the market. And charging stations for them are starting to pop up as well. The state Department of Commerce awarded Raleigh-based Praxis Technologies a 240-thousand dollar grant. Praxis has partnered with Silicon Valley-based Coulomb Technologies to install around 20 electric car charge stations across the state. Praxis CEO Skip Kurz says their goal is to raise awareness about the technology.

A utility based in Chicago is proposing an 80-megawatt wind farm in eastern North Carolina. The company Invenergy sent an application to state officials last week for a facility with 49 turbines at a site in Beaufort County. Jay Lucas is an engineer with the state Utilities Commission. He says an 80-megawatt farm could power 20,000 homes, depending on wind capacity.

Before North Carolinians became Caniacs or Panthers’ fans, back when NASCAR was the only professional sports most Tar Heels cared about, the Charlotte Hornets enjoyed a few seasons in the sun. A new video game from 2K is celebrating the legacy of the 1992/93 Hornets. Host Frank Stasio talks about the new game and the old team with Owen Good, who writes about sports video games for Kotaku, the video game site of Gawker Media, and Dane Huffman, who covered the Charlotte Hornets for The News & Observer in Raleigh.

Lewis Shiner’s latest novel is a blend of historical fiction, romance and crime, and it all revolves around tango. Protagonist Rob Cavenaugh is a recent transplant to Buenos Ares. On the dance floor, he falls in love, but his relationship exposes him to Argentina’s dark history. Thousands of citizens disappeared in the country’s dirty war, and Rob’s new crush was somehow involved. Host Frank Stasio talks with Shiner about his new novel, "Dark Tangos" (Subterranean Press/2011).

Filmmaker Julie Dash made history with her movie, “Daughters of the Dust.” In 1991, it became the first full-length feature by an African-American woman to receive a general theatrical release. The critically acclaimed movie tells the story of the Peazant family, a clan of Gullah Island dwellers who are divided by the decision to leave their isolated life and move to the mainland. “Daughters of the Dust” will be screened at The Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University on Thursday as part of the new “Seeing Black” film series.

The city of Greensboro is taking a lesson from Atlanta on how to help spur job growth in its community. 

Deborah Hooper is president of the Greensboro Chamber of Commerce.  And she says the feed-back has been positive since announcing the new initiative – "One Job For Greensboro.”  The idea is for all 16-thousand employers in the city to add at least one full-time worker to their rolls in the next year.