Gwen Frisbie-Fulton highlights the stories that shape our communities. In this clip from The Cultivator, she and Mayor White reflect on Ahoskie and how small efforts build lasting impact.
Hear more on Do You Even Live Here?, a new podcast with Beacon Media.
Beacon Voice Gwen Frisbie-Fulton highlights the people and stories that make our communities thrive. In a long-form piece, she explores “The Cultivator,” a bookstore and community hub in Hertford County, and reflects on rural resilience.
Hear more on Do You Even Live Here?, a podcast w/ BeaconMedia
"Right now, Suzy is being held in Stewart Detention Center, one of the largest immigration detention facilities in the country... No one should have to go through that alone. Suzy has spent decades showing up for others. Now it is our turn to show up for her."
Read full column at the link down below
"The last time I saw her was at a dinner after a meeting of the Governor’s Advisory Council earlier this year. We ate, we laughed, we took photos. We committed to keep working together to improve the lives of our communities.
I did not think that would be the last time I would see her..."
"And today, Suzy, a Mexican trans woman and longtime North Carolina resident, is in prison in Stewart, Georgia after being arrested by immigration authorities in Franklinton last month."
"It makes sense to me that Suzy chose North Carolina as home. For more than 30 years, she has built a life here. She has built community here. She has shown up for people across this state again and again."
"We can acknowledge the impact of Chavez, the organizing, the movement-building, the doors that were opened for farmworkers and Latinos in general. And we can also name what has been overlooked, what has been silenced, and who carried the weight of that silence." Read Iliana's column on Substack:
"Violence against women is not an anomaly. It is an epidemic that cuts across race, class, and geography. And still, when it is found out, it is minimized. Questioned. Dismissed. And ultimately normalized."
"March 31, is César Chavez Day, a federal commemorative holiday. In the wake of allegations published in the New York Times about Chavez’s abuse of women and girls, it is more important than ever to consider what his true legacy means."
"The day of the first drag brunch arrived. Proud Boys had called for a protest outside her restaurant, but it never forumulated. Instead, East Main Street’s sidewalks were flooded with supporters – young people waving small rainbow flags, old folks in Love is Love t-shirts." Read more here:
"When customers said that they would sometimes drive an hour away to Charlotte to attend drag shows, Tiffany had an idea: Why should local people have to drive and bring their money that far away when we could just do that here?"
"It was 2022, and Tiffany’s small business was still reeling from the pandemic. She had been trying to think creatively about how to bring people back into downtown Albermarle, which had all but become a ghost town."
"Masked men were marching up the street in downtown Albermarle, North Carolina. Cars slowed down at the spectacle, but zipped away before the children in their backseats could see. It wasn’t exactly the sort of thing you want to run into on a sleepy Saturday small town afternoon."
"Restricting the flow of forms would effectively disenfranchise many of these voters, as other registration options come with their own roadblocks."
Read more of Kate Fellman's column here:
"On February 27, citing budgetary constraints, the State Board instructed county boards of elections to stop distributing voter registration forms in bulk – a long-established practice all over the country."
"North Carolinians have a pivotal part to play in the midterms. Troublingly, our State Board of Elections is working to undermine them."
"Public schools in rural communities are more than educational institutions. They are community centers and large employers. They are gathering places on Friday nights and sources of pride year-round. When a rural school struggles, the entire community feels it."
Read more at buff.ly/Kvyzj95
"North Carolina ranks last in the country when it comes to “funding effort,” the measure of how much a state or district invests in K-12 public schools relative to its overall economic capacity."
Kimberly Jones comments that, "...rural schools are not struggling because of a lack of passion or talent. The reason they are struggling is a lack of resources."
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"Someday, Southern white homes [...] must hear the wisdom in many of the things Jackson said. The system isn't strictly anti-Black or anti-Brown. It is anti-working class, anti-poor. And no one group will make it better without the others, without the "patchwork quilt" Jackson spoke of."
Read more:
"In his marathon 1984 address at the Democratic National Convention (DNC), Jackson promised that "the linchpin of progressive politics in our nation will not come from the North," but from the South."
Billy Ball writes: "In the years that followed his presidential campaigns, Jackson became a joke in white homes like mine, especially in his native South. This, even though he picked up 13 primaries and caucuses in the 1988 Democratic primary race — and came in a close second in North Carolina."
Mocked in the South but revered on the national stage, Rev. Jesse Jackson challenged the South and the Democratic Party to face hard truths about race, poverty, and power. His message still resonates more than 40 years later.
Preston Blakely and George Dalton write: "Our new show will shed light on what binds communities together, and it will challenge both of us and our listeners to think about what North Carolina is and can be. How will we do that? Storytelling."
Read full column at buff.ly/kXCA2Dn
#weliveherepod #nc
So starts the story from @rdrhoney.bsky.social and from our media partner @cardinalandpine.bsky.social about a college student from Cleveland County whose life was upended by ICE — who were looking for someone else. Read more: cardinalpine.com/2025/08/01/n...
"Allison Bustillo Chinchilla came to America as a child from Honduras and grew up to be a certified nursing assistant. Under President Donald Trump’s mass deportation policy, she’s spent the past five months in ICE detention." /1
Melissa’s column is free to republish, along with all other Beacon Media NC columns.
Editors and publishers, check out our guidelines here: www.beaconmedianc.org/republish-ou...
Decades of bipartisan promises to undocumented immigrants are unraveling — and the message reaching migrant farmworker families is devastating: “Don’t get noticed. Don’t fill out the forms. Don’t get help,” writes Beacon Voice Melissa Castillo.
#ImmigrationPolicy #ICE #NCPol #NCNews
