Western.

• Position: REGIONAL REPORT - Mills Manufacturing laysoff its employees - Cherokee Casino Hotel will open a new tower - Anne Ponder to become chancellor of University of North Carolina (Asheville

Project gives retirees rooms with a view

Pending approval by the Asheville City Council, Charlotte-based Brownlyn Associates will begin marketing a $200 million retirement community on Beaucatcher Mountain. Construction likely will start in about a year. Kenilworth Heights will have at least 160 condominiums and villas with 1,700 to more than 3,500 square feet priced from $650,000 to $1.2 million. The 71-acre project is planned for the east side of the mountain, one of the region's landmarks, and will employ about 100 people. Council action could come as early as this month.

ASHEVILLE -- A native will return to become chancellor of UNC Asheville. Anne Ponder, whose mother and grandmother were local schoolteachers, will start work here in October. The president of Colby-Sawyer College in New London, N.H., she taught English at Guilford College and what is now Elon University. She holds a bachelor's, master's and doctorate in English from UNC Chapel Hill.

ASHEVILLE -- Mills Manufacturing, a family-owned parachute maker, laid off 89, about half its work force. Sixty-three are expected to be recalled when orders...