Lights… camera… action. Friday evening a touch of Hollywood came to the area as the movie “Grizzly Park” premiered at the Abingdon Cinemall.

For at least 30 years by one estimate, people have tossed tires, appliances, household trash and other refuse down a slope of Nebo Mountain overlooking the beautiful Crawfish Valley in northeastern Smyth County. The resulting cascade of trash below the mountain road was the result of behaviors that starkly contrast to efforts to preserve the roadless scenic and wild qualities of the valley below.

Neil Castrodale doesn’t want to build palaces. He does, however, want to help construct simple, decent homes for the community’s poorer citizens.

“You need to know you have $100 million in school facilities needs.”

Audience members for Sunday’s Reach 2008 in Marion were expecting a star-studded lineup of Christian inspirational leaders, but the appearance of a meteorological phenomenon during the event made audience members and international celebrities alike take notice.

The questions got harder as the conversation progressed, but neither the intensity nor the scope of the queries stopped a group of area leaders from sharing their ideas about how this region’s communities can improve.

You’ve never seen faster rounds of charades.
When Marion Senior High School’s Destination Imagination teams gathered in the school library for a photo and interview Wednesday, some of the students were in no hurry to go back to class when it was over. Their advisers, Sheila Glenn and Liz Gailliot, suggested they demonstrate their considerable communication skills by playing charades.

The disappearances within a month of Justin Martin of Smyth County and Israel Smith of Wytheville and formerly of Marion have renewed awareness of two other active missing person cases in the county.
Barbara Jean Pauley Hunt went missing Jan. 17, 198,5 at the age of 25, according to records from the Smyth County Sheriff’s Office and the Smyth County News posted by the Doe Network, the International Center for Unidentified & Missing Persons, online at http://www.doenetwork.org.

Improvements in technology and parental involvement emerged as the county schools’ two key needs as identified by a review team recommending the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Council on Accreditation and School Improvement award accreditation to the Smyth school division.

A second rabid raccoon was reported last week by a health department official.