🗞️ Our Little League All-Stars won state, and haven't given up a run

🗞️ Körner's Folly lands a $10,000 grant

🗞️ JetZero could tap $3 billion more to build its PTI plant

🗞️ Rural Forsyth neighbors are fighting a proposed landfill

⛈️ Hot, humid, and stormy | High: 88°F | Low: 69°F

A stalled cold front keeps us unsettled again today. Showers and thunderstorms are likely, some heavy, with a near-total chance of rain and another 1 to 2 inches on the way. Localized flooding is possible, so give yourself extra time and do not drive through standing water. It stays hot and sticky, near 90 with a feels-like in the mid 90s.

Start your Thursday with this one, because it is a good one.

The Kernersville Little League All-Star Intermediate (U13) team won the state championship Friday night at the Swaim Complex right here in Kernersville, and they did it without giving up a single run in three games.

Look at the scores. Kernersville opened with a 15-0 win over South Little League, called after five innings on the 10-run rule. Then they beat East Surry 13-0 to reach the title game. Then they beat East Surry again, 8-0, to take the state title. Three games, zero runs allowed.

Colton McLendon was a problem for everybody, pitching complete-game shutouts and hitting a pile of triples. Austin Newcomb threw out eight runners trying to steal in the championship game alone. Coach Andrew Allison pointed to the defense that made it all work.

"That is a pretty stellar infield," Allison said. "If it was a ground ball to anyone in the infield, it was an out. That is a frustrating thing when you are putting the bat on the ball, and with Max, Austin and Colton pitching, it makes for a special team."

Here is why today is the day to mention it: the team starts the South Regional today, July 23, in Clarksville, Tennessee, running through the 27th. They will face teams from Florida, Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, South Carolina and Alabama. Kernersville earned a first-round bye, so they play Saturday. Win the regional, and they are off to the Intermediate Baseball World Series in Livermore, California, August 2-9.

The full roster: Austin Allison, Chance Hicks, Wyatt Lineberry, Aaron Thompson, Chasin Tarpley, Cole Casale, Colton McLendon, Max Garber, Owen Allison, Austin Newcomb, Brody Wedrychowics and Tabor Green, coached by Andrew Allison, Barry Newcomb and Lance Casale. Send them off with some hometown noise.

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One of Kernersville's crown jewels just got a boost.

The Kernersville Foundation has awarded a $10,000 grant to the Körner's Folly Foundation to support its educational and community programming. If you have lived here any length of time you know the place: the eccentric, three-story house that Jule Gilmer Körner built in 1880, now a National Historic Landmark that pulls visitors from far beyond town.

And it is busier than you might think. In 2025 alone, more than 10,500 people took part in tours, performances, lectures, workshops, Family Days, school field trips and free Community Day celebrations at Körner's Folly.

"Körner's Folly has been cultivating wonder since 1880," said executive director Suzanna Ritz Malliett. "The Kernersville Foundation's support helps ensure that a child's first museum experience, a family's weekend adventure, a lifelong learner's curiosity, or a teacher's search for meaningful educational connections can continue to flourish for generations to come."

The Kernersville Foundation supports local nonprofits that address community needs and improve life for residents. Malliett called the grant "a vote of confidence in the idea that history belongs to everyone." You can see the programs it supports at kornersfolly.org.

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The aviation plant rising at Piedmont Triad International Airport keeps getting bigger news.

JetZero, the manufacturer building a $4.72 billion plant and headquarters at PTI, disclosed this week that it could gain access to up to $3 billion in financing backed by the federal Export-Import Bank. The company signed a letter of interest with the bank, known as EXIM, under its Make More in America initiative. If that financing comes through, JetZero's total support and commitments would top $4 billion.

One important caveat: a letter of interest is not a done deal. As the parties themselves noted, it "does not constitute a financing commitment, an obligation of federal funds, or approval of any loan transaction." Site-selection expert John Boyd called it "another credibility milestone" while cautioning that actual EXIM financing is "always problematic," requiring extensive underwriting and board approval.

Why this matters for us: JetZero has pledged to employ at least 14,564 people at full production on its 8 million-square-foot campus, nicknamed "The Hub." That is a generational number of jobs in our backyard. Work began on the site in June, and the state has authorized up to $1.57 billion in job-development grants over 37 years.

The company also announced a new satellite engineering office at Wichita State University and, at the Farnborough Air Show, a letter of intent from Gulf Air to buy its Z4 aircraft, a blended wing body design promising up to 50% lower fuel burn. First test flight is targeted for 2027, with commercial service around 2030.

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Drive down Salem Chapel Road in rural Forsyth County right now and the yard signs tell you where people stand: no to a proposed landfill.

A company called LandGuard LCID is asking the Forsyth County Commissioners for a special use permit to turn 102 acres off Salem Chapel Road into a land-clearing and inert debris landfill. Owner Eric Dolan is quick to say it is not a trash dump. "LCID is land clearing and inert debris. It's trees, brush, stumps, concrete block, asphalt and brick," he said. "No trash." He argues the county needs a local place to put that material "so we don't have to burn it, we don't have to bury it," and says environmental studies shrank the project's footprint to protect sensitive areas.

Neighbors are not sold. They worry about noise carrying through the hills and valleys, heavy trucks tearing up roads that were not built for them, and the impact on the aquifer that feeds their wells. "The safety concerns of that, not only trucks that don't fit the road, too heavy for the road, but the impact on the aquifer that serves all our wells," said neighbor Garry Kauffman. Daniel Weis, a retired disabled veteran who moved next to the site a year ago for the quiet, and neighbor Cindy Cook, echoed the concerns.

Here is how the decision works. The county commissioners will hold what is called a quasi-judicial hearing, meaning they act like judges: they can only weigh testimony given during the hearing and cannot talk with citizens about it outside that room. Residents can sign up to speak. The hearing date has not been set yet, so if this is your part of the county, this is the moment to pay attention.

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