Stories written by Mark PellinAn award-winning journalist and former editor of The Rhinoceros Times in Charlotte, Pellin has been called everything from a misguided troglodyte to a professional agitator. He prefers the label of a realist, the guy in the crowd telling everybody that not only doesn’t the emperor have any clothes; he’s trying to steal ours.
Pellin has covered the Char-Meck scene for the better part of two decades, earning his fair share of fans and more than a few critics who wish he’d move to Nome, Alaska, and be eaten by wild bears.
When he’s not writing, he stays busy enjoying time with his wife and two kids. When he can break away for some R&R, he likes to fly fish (even if he doesn’t catch anything) and camp (even if it rains).
Gov. Bev Perdue and Senate leader Marc Basnight, two of the state’s most powerful Democrats, again find themselves wallowing in a pit of ethical slime after being linked this week to about $150,000 in tainted money that had snaked its way into their campaigns. Heavy hitter Democrat fundraiser Rusty Carter entered an Alford plea to […]
May 5, 2010 | Posted in Carolinas,House Blends,Mark Pellin | Read More »

Tuesday’s primary election yielded an abysmally low 7.3 percent voter turnout in Mecklenburg County, but spirits were soaring high at election night party headquarters for Corey Thompson, a Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools teacher who had just aced his first big-time political exam. Thompson ran third in the GOP at-large commissioners race, behind top vote-getters Jim Pendergraph and […]
May 5, 2010 | Posted in Char-Meck Beat,County Beat,House Specials,Mark Pellin | Read More »
Don’t get me wrong: I like sports, even ones that require grown men to wear goofy-looking clothes and chase after a little white ball with a club. But it says something about our culture when the Quail Hollow Championship produces attendance numbers better than those projected for a pivotal Primary Election. There’s a lot at […]
May 4, 2010 | Posted in Char-Meck Beat,County Beat,Mark Pellin | Read More »

In an emotionally-charged decision Monday night, the Charlotte City Council voted 6 to 3 against censuring one of its own members for allegedly sexually harassing city staff. The vote came after Councilmember Warren Turner defended himself against findings reported last week by an attorney the city had hired to investigate the harassment claim, which concluded […]
1 2
May 4, 2010 | Posted in Char-Meck Beat,City Beat,House Specials,Mark Pellin | Read More »
Less than 24 hours before the primary election to retain his seat as a state representative, the North Carolina State Bar suspended the law license of Nick Mackey. Yes, that Nick Mackey; the one who nearly hustled and conned his way into being named Mecklenburg County sheriff in 2008, until the results of a special […]
May 3, 2010 | Posted in Char-Meck Beat,Mark Pellin | Read More »
What else has Warren Turner done? Don’t know. Don’t know for even close to certain if he’s done what’s been alleged, but the fact that the list is growing is not a good sign. Turner, the District 3 rep on Charlotte City Council, was named as the councilmember that at least four city staffers accused […]
May 3, 2010 | Posted in Char-Meck Beat,City Beat,Mark Pellin | Read More »

Photos by: Glen Simmons The Town Green and Main Street turned into a festival of fun on Saturday to celebrate the annual Davidson Town Day. [nggallery id=32]
May 2, 2010 | Posted in Photos | Read More »

Photos by: Glen Simmons High fashion, mint juleps and live music were the odds-on-favorite Saturday at The Pavilion at EpiCentre’s Kentucky Derby Party. [nggallery id=31]
May 2, 2010 | Posted in Photos | Read More »
Mecklenburg County employees who thought their jobs were safe from the budget axe got a rude awakening this week, when County Manager Harry Jones distributed a revised schedule for department reduction-in-force plans. The original timeline called for Jones’s executive team to have the potential layoffs approved by the end of April. That apparently has been […]
May 1, 2010 | Posted in Char-Meck Beat,County Beat,Mark Pellin | Read More »
So I’m in the kitchen washing some dishes yesterday and the TV’s on and I hear that some guy named Bacots had been hired as superintendent of Durham Public Schools. Wash another dish. Heard the name again. Bacots? Couldn’t be, I thought. So I go into the living room and there he is on the […]
April 30, 2010 | Posted in Char-Meck Beat,CMS Beat,Mark Pellin | Read More »