AltWeeklies Wire
Soccer Tournament Brings Immigrants and Refugees Togethernew

Andrew Young and his wife Betsy Renfrew have been working with immigrants and refugees in Greensboro, particularly the Montagnard community, connecting with an array of people and organizations to build relationships and collaborate to address some of the issues immigrants and refugees face. YES! Weekly sat down with Young to learn more about what these communities are working on and how he’s been connecting with people he wouldn’t otherwise come in contact with.
YES! Weekly |
Eric Ginsburg |
12-15-2011 |
Politics
Government: Unpaid Payroll Taxes Diverted for Personal Benefitnew

The United States government rested its case against Greensboro businessman Greg Harrison last week, following testimony from an IRS revenue officer that the defendant’s staffing companies failed to pay nearly $16 million in payroll taxes to the federal government over a five-year period, and that $6.2 million was transferred from staffing company accounts over the years to entities for Harrison’s benefit, including homes, movie productions, a yacht and other businesses. What the testimony didn’t explicitly point out but what is deducible through basic math is that those transactions still leave almost $10 million unaccounted.
YES! Weekly |
Jordan Green |
12-15-2011 |
Politics
Pres. Hall Leader on Big Easy Christmasnew

For all that hurricanes and oil spills can take away, tradition isn’t among them. At least not while institutions like Preservation Hall exists. After a series of commemorative shows at home, the famed jazz club’s house band is preparing to celebrate 50 years as the standard bearers for New Orleans jazz by doing what they do best: hitting the road for a special performance at Carnegie Hall in January. Until then, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band is evangelizing other Big Easy musical traditions with their Creole Holiday tour, coming to SECCA in Winston-Salem this Friday. Below, Preservation Hall Cre- ative Director and tuba player extraordinaire Ben Jaffe, son of hall founder Allan Jaffe, waxes on NOLA holiday traditions influenc- ing seasonal music and how relationships formed during the recording of the band’s 2010 benefit album have shaped the institu tions future.
YES! Weekly |
Ryan Snyder |
12-15-2011 |
Music
Latin Kings Indictment Stuns Supportersnew
Dozens of FBI agents and officers with the Greensboro Police Department and Guilford County Sheriff’s Office swarmed over a house on Dec. 6 to arrest Jorge Cornell, AKA King Jay, and Charles Moore, both members of the Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation, on racketeering charges.
YES! Weekly |
Jordan Green, Eric Ginsburg |
12-15-2011 |
Crime & Justice
Tags: Greensboro latin kings
Hall & Oates: Guilt, Pleasurenew

In a more reasonable world, no one would ever have to closet their love of Hall & Oates.
YES! Weekly |
Ryan Snyder |
12-14-2011 |
Reviews
Tags: Hall & Oates, Guilty Pleasures
Greensboro Businessman on Trial for Federal Tax Fraud

A Greensboro staffing agency executive whose opulent lifestyle once included the adornments of luxurious homes, a yacht and the financing of movies and nightclubs has been reduced to answering charges of tax evasion in federal court with the assistance of a public defender.
YES! Weekly |
Jordan Green |
12-08-2011 |
Politics
Big Time in New Orleans
The bar has anchored this corner in the French Quarter of New Orleans for more than 150 years, and very little has changed — no neon, no Jagermeister machine, not a naked-lady-shaped novelty cup or set of plastic beads in sight. Though it’s still morning, time was when I would belly up to this old, cypress bar — there has never been a barstool in Tujague’s, ever — set my foot on the bowed brass rail and begun the day’s chase.
YES! Weekly |
Brian Clarey |
12-08-2011 |
Commentary
Winston-Salem Municipalities Grapple With New Carry-concealed Law
Hanes Park in the city’s West End Historic District displayed a weathered sign at its West End Boulevard entrance that stated, “No weapons or fireworks.” However, under House Bill 650, a law that went into effect on Dec. 1, people with carry-concealed permits are now permitted to bring concealed weapons into municipal parks in North Carolina with the exception of swimming pools, playgrounds and athletic facilities. To inform the public of the change in the law, the city has ordered more than 300 signs at a cost of $7,600.
YES! Weekly |
Keith T. Barber |
12-08-2011 |
Politics
Rewriting the Racial Justice Act

Supporters of a proposed North Carolina Senate call it a rewriting of the Racial Justice Act. Passed by the N.C. General Assembly in 2009, the Racial Justice Act sought to ensure that "no person shall be subject to or given a sentence of death or shall be executed pursuant to any judgment that was sought or obtained on the basis of race."
YES! Weekly |
Keith T. Barber |
12-07-2011 |
Race & Class
Tags: racial bias, racial justice act
Laurelyn Dossett’s Gathering

From the Green Room in the basement of Meymandi Concert Hall in Raleigh, a cascade of banjo notes can be heard trailing down the hallway from the dressing room shared by Joe Newberry and Mike Compton. Soon, the virtuosic voice of Rhiannon Giddens Laffan — classically trained but steeped in traditional music practices — fills the air with operatic scales.
YES! Weekly |
Jordan Green |
12-03-2011 |
Music
Tags: Banjo, Laurelyn Dossett
The holiday bait and switchnew
No, my annual grumbling set in around the same time it usually does: just after Thanksgiving, when the moneyed interests unleash a full blitzkrieg on our weaker impulses with the goal of stripping us of more money that we want to spend. The trigger was a piece on the television news, a spot report issued the day before Thanksgiving from the front lines of the battle on our bank accounts.
YES! Weekly |
Brian Clarey |
12-03-2011 |
Commentary
Occupy Winston-Salem Negotiates With City Over Campsite

Occupy Winston-Salem members met with Assistant City Manager Greg Turner on the eve of Thanksgiving to discuss possible sites for a campsite.
YES! Weekly |
Keith T. Barber |
11-30-2011 |
#OCCUPY
Tags: #OCCUPY, Occupy Winston-Salem
Rob Halford Hammering Away on Well-Tempered Metal
With screaming twin lead guitars, jackhammer rhythm, songs glorifying reckless badassedness and a four-octave-range frontman clad in more leather than Ron Burgundy’s book collection, Judas Priest have been objects of profane idolatry for nearly four decades.
YES! Weekly |
Ryan Snyder |
11-28-2011 |
Profiles & Interviews
Occupy Movement Burgeons Across North Carolina Amidst Nationwide Crackdown
Encampments sprung up rapidly around the country a month before Zuccotti Park was cleared, including one in Greensboro. Unlike the original site, Occupy Greensboro chose to end its physical occupation once permission from the YWCA ran out.
YES! Weekly |
Eric Ginsburg |
11-28-2011 |
#OCCUPY
Tags: #OCCUPY, Occupy greensboro
Mermaids in Greensboro
They move inside the cavernous Greensboro Aquatic Center with feline grace, the US Women’s Synchronized Swimming Team, gliding across the deck like a single organism at the city’s newest swimming pool. Beautiful.
YES! Weekly |
Brian Clarey |
11-23-2011 |
Commentary
Tags: crashing the gate