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CIAA Tournament Week Tips Off In Charlotte; Funeral For Erica Parsons Set For Saturday

The CIAA tournament gets underway Tuesday, kicking off a week long series of basketball games and headaches for Charlotte commuters.

In a press release, city officials warned residents that heavy pedestrian and motorist traffic is expected in uptown and near the Bojangles Coliseum through Saturday as a result.

This is the 12th consecutive year the week-long tournament has been held in Charlotte. City leaders say last year, the event generated $57.4 million in economic impact.

The CIAA chose to keep the signature event in North Carolina even while pulling eight other championship events out of the state last year in reaction to House Bill 2.

Erica Parsons Funeral Set For Saturday

A funeral for Erica Parsons, the North Carolina teen whose remains were found in South Carolina last year, has been scheduled for Saturday.

The public funeral at First Baptist Church in Salisbury will take place one day after what would have been Parsons' 19th birthday.

Parsons was 13 when she disappeared from her Salisbury home in 2011. She was not reported missing until 2013. Her remains were found in a grave in Chesterfield, South Carolina, last October.

No one has been charged in her death, which remains under investigation. Her adoptive parents, Sandy and Casey Parsons, are in federal prison on fraud charges.

GOP Wants Trial Court Races Officially Partisan Again

The North Carolina House elections committee voted Tuesday along party lines to revert races for Superior Court and District Court judgeships back to partisan affairs.

Trial and appellate court judgeship elections officially become non-partisan starting in the mid-1990s, meaning candidates had no party labels next to their names on the general election ballot and didn't run for party nominations. Democrats sought non-partisan races as Republicans increasingly won judicial elections.

GOP lawmakers argued Tuesday that voters want easy access to partisan labels because they have little information otherwise about the candidate.

The bill's next stop is the House floor.

Two Local Breweries Seeking To Expand

Two Charlotte-based breweries are pursuing expansion plans this week. The first, Heist Brewery, received approval from the Charlotte City Council on Monday night to flip a 22,000-square-foot industrial building into a brewery, bakery, and butcher shop. The new location is off Woodward Avenue a few miles north of uptown.

The second, Olde Mecklenburg Brewery, announced plans this week to open a second brewery and beer garden in Cornelius, though that plan may face legal hurdles. The company's anticipated increase in beer distribution would require a change in the North Carolina law regulating craft breweries.

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