Author

Christopher Chavis

Commentary: Suburbanite Promotes Racial Tension to Sell Guns in Rural Area

Christopher Chavis · Aug 23, 2019

The owner of a North Carolina gun store appropriates American Indian images to promote racism. It’s part of a trend of metropolitan outsiders exploiting racial tension in some rural areas to advance their agenda.

Commentary: The Cost of Rural School Consolidation

Christopher Chavis · Aug 2, 2019

On paper, consolidating South Robeson County High School in rural North Carolina might make sense. But how do we account for the intangible losses like community identity, cohesiveness, and social investment?

Commentary: The Historical Roots of ‘Send Her Back’

Christopher Chavis · Jul 19, 2019

The racially charged chants that President Trump elicited this week in Greenville, North Carolina, didn’t arise in a vacuum. Trump is tapping the remnants of the Jim Crow white supremacy movement that seized power from African Americans and…

Economy

Analysis: In Rural New England, a Crisis in Legal Representation

Christopher Chavis · May 28, 2019

As the number of lawyers dwindles in rural New Hampshire, Maine, and Vermont, residents face an increasing threat to their constitutional legal rights. States can do more to help.

Rural Voters

Speak Your Piece: The Last Federal Election Re-do

Christopher Chavis · Apr 4, 2019

More than four decades have passed since the last time a state conducted a re-do of a congressional election. North Carolina’s 9th District race and New Hampshire’s 1974 Senate contest have a lot in common, including an above-average number…

Rural Voters

Speak Your Piece: Voting Corruption in the N.C. 9th

Christopher Chavis · Mar 20, 2019

After years of voter-suppression activities posing as combatting fraud, North Carolina’s real-life voter corruption case shows you what actual fraud looks like. Hint: It’s not about fake IDs, felons, and unregistered voters. It’s about…

Rural Voters

Speak Your Piece | The Very Recent History of Blackface

Christopher Chavis · Mar 1, 2019

While Virginia Governor Ralph Northam was posing in blackface, other parts of the South were also slogging through the swamp of Jim Crow. Suspicious murders, outrageous comments from law enforcement, and the notorious Jesse Helms-Jim Hunt…

Rural By Choice

Speak Your Piece | Go for the Vacation, Stay for the Worker Subsidy

Christopher Chavis · Feb 14, 2019

Vermont is offering $10,000 to workers who move with their remote job to the state. It’s part of larger efforts in Northern New England to attract more young people.