Welcome to The Line, a newsletter for Cary and Western Wake from The Assembly Network. The Line connects the dots of local life with timely info, relevant news, interesting people and expert guides. 

🚉 Arriving now:

  • A new space for Haitian cuisine and culture 
  • Election takeaways
  • What’s next for pro soccer in Cary? 
  • Question of the week

I want to hear from you: If you haven’t yet, please fill out our reader survey! Tell us about what’s important to you. Thanks so much to those who have already filled it out–I read every response. 

–Sarah Day

Beyond Who Won: Election Takeaways 

🗳️ Cary elections analysis: As INDY‘s Chloe Courtney Bohl writes, voters came out in greater numbers than past elections.

  • 32,700 people voted in the town-wide at-large race compared to about 13,700 in 2022, a comparable ballot with the same district seats and at-large seat.
  • It was a nonpartisan race, but now the Cary Town Council will be all Democrats, with “new voices” motivating voters.
  • Newly-elected candidates spoke about the need for affordable housing, more so than the current town council, which could show a shift in what voters care about. More takeaways are on INDY‘s site.

🗳️ In Apex, incumbent town councilmember Ed Gray won reelection, along with newcomers Sue Mu and Shane Reese. 

  • The results show a consensus: The top three candidates each received between 8,184 and 8,499 votes, or nearly 4,000 more than the next highest vote-getter per unofficial results. Read more at INDY.

🗳️ In Morrisville, Mayor TJ Cawley was reelected for a third term. It didn’t seem to matter to voters that some town council members supported other candidates, including Satish Garimella, who had been a councilmember for 10 years. 

  • Cawley received 64 percent to Garimella’s 31 percent, while Richard Rheinhart received 5 percent. 
  • From INDY: What looked like a tough race for the incumbent actually translated to a wider margin of victory than 2021.
  • What else: Incumbent Councilmember Vicki Scroggins-Johnson was reelected, and newcomers, Harrison Kesling and Ashit Patel also won seats.

🗳️ More Wake takeaways: “In Fuquay-Varina, Holly Springs, Wake Forest, and Zebulon, four sitting mayors lost their seats, most to challengers from their own town council or boards of commissioners. And though the contests are all officially nonpartisan, Democratic candidates dominated across the board.”

💬 For discussion: Are nonpartisan races a thing of the past? Across the state, municipal celections–even those intended to be nonpartisan–are seeing a shift, The Assembly reports.

‘Cultural Hub’ for Haitian Hospitality Opens

Dafney Tales-Lafortune remembers the first time she visited the katyé, or the neighborhood, in Haiti.

“I got out of the car and everyone on the kayté came to welcome me, family members and people who I’m not related to … Everyone knew who I was, because everyone on the katyé knows each other,” she said. “I never forgot that. I want a nugget, a fraction of that, for people to feel that hospitality.”

Now Tales-Lafortune, an event planner and daughter of Haitian immigrants, and her husband Chef Andre Lafortune, who was born and raised in Belair, Haiti, have built that in Katyé.

They also own a popular Haitian food truck, Bon Fritay. Katyé, which opened last week in Morrisville, is a social space where they can share their love of Haitian culture and cuisine with the community.

I talked with Dafney Tales-Lafortune ahead of the grand opening.

Tell me about how you decided to go from the food truck to the event space.

The overall mission of what we do is to promote Haitian cuisine and culture, but we are a subset of a subset. There aren’t a lot of us here in the Carolinas, but those of us who are here, we are starving for community, something familiar. 

When we started the food truck it instantly became a pillar in our community, but one of the main complaints was “when are you guys going to open a space?” It’s not easy. The whole point of this space is to be a central location for the community. And not just for Haitians–the majority of our customers are not Haitian–but they appreciate the culture and the food.

This is the reason why we call it Katyé, it translates to neighborhood or community. When people walk through those doors, we want them to feel like ‘we’re home,’ it’s familiar. This space is still a work in progress, we’re still putting things on the wall, but the essence of it is what we want people to feel.

 What is the significance of the neighborhood mural in the space?

When I came across this, it’s the perfect depiction of the katyé. This is the hills of Pétion-Ville, a suburb of Port-au-Prince, the capital. 

I just love how real it is. Oftentimes people who suffer from a lack of positive images, like the Haitian community, we tend to gravitate only toward super-positive, very heroic images–which is fine, but I believe in embracing realism. You can see there are not the best looking homes, but they’re home. You think about the (neighbor), how close they live. It speaks to the closeness of Haitian people. That’s why I fell in love with this image.

Find it: 2121 TW Alexander Drive, Suite 108, Morrisville. November hours are 5-9 p.m. Thursdays and 5-10 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays. Check their website to find out what’s happening.

🗓️ Upcoming events include a Rhythm and Soul Brunch this weekend and a DJ night with global beats later this month.

In Brief | What I’d Tell You Over a Spice Ghouls Ale

⚽ What is the future of soccer in Cary? North Carolina FC (NCFC) president Steve Malik announced Tuesday that the club is applying for the new United Soccer League’s Division One League, a new league launching in 2027-28 with aspirations equal to (but not associated with) Major League Soccer. The men’s team will not compete after the 2025 season. 

The women’s NC Courage will continue with home games at the Cary stadium next year–but current capacity falls under the average attendance for National Women’s Soccer League games, NCFC’s director of communications, Jake Levy, said in an email. 

“Our goal is to be best-in-class in that category, and we are exploring all available options for the long-term success of the club.”

  • What else: The area has “proven itself a major league sports market,” Malik said in the release. “With the right infrastructure in place, Raleigh can become a world-class home for the sport for years to come.”
  • Size matters: The Division One selection requires a minimum of 15,000 seats, but the current stadium only seats 10,000. The NC Courage, meanwhile, broke its single-game attendance record on November 2 with 11,170 fans. 
  • Raleigh or Cary? Back in 2019, Malik and his partners proposed an entertainment district in Raleigh, Downtown South, with a 20,000-seat stadium. Malik told WRAL that would be a “great location,” but left other options open: “We’re one of the largest metro areas in the country without any kind of downtown stadium, so it does make a lot of sense. But there are other locations as well.”

❤️ More mental health resources for kids: The Lucy Daniels Center is expanding in Cary, with plans to triple its capacity to 1,500 kids age 12 and under. The increase will primarily be in a new outpatient clinic, supported in part by a grant, and will allow it to  offer speech and occupational therapy. This will allow the center to “achieve more holistic and integrative children’s mental health care,” Executive Director Emily Odjaghian said in an email. The organization is close to its fundraising goal. 

🇺🇸 Veterans Day: A few events are planned to honor members of the military in Western Wake County:

  • Morrisville is holding a breakfast 8-9:30 a.m. Friday. Registration is required.
  • Apex will hold a ceremony at the Downtown Service Memorial, located at the corner of Saunders and North Salem streets, 9:30-10:30 a.m. Tuesday.
  • Cary’s observance will take place at Veterans Freedom Park from 11 a.m.-noon Tuesday. 

What else?

🍎 Give feedback on school assignments: Check your address in the 2026-27 draft enrollment proposal here and view the current draft plan before the school board votes on November 18. Additional feedback will be collected online through Sunday. 

🍴Yelp’s list of top 25 places to eat in the Triangle includes Fratelli’s Delicatessen and Akami Sushi in Apex;  Sassool, Saap, Lucky 32 Southern Kitchen, Taipei 101, Five Spice BBQ, and Lugano Ristorante in Cary; Milo’s Cafe in Morrisville; and Scratch Kitchen & Taproom, which has locations in both Apex and Cary.

Reader question: Share your breakfast faves

I’ll be sharing some creative new spots to grab breakfast in an upcoming newsletter. 

We want to know: What’s your favorite breakfast spot in Cary, Apex, Morrisville or Western Wake? 

Reply to this email or send your pick to line@theassemblync.com for possible inclusion in a future newsletter!

The Line will be back in your inbox next Tuesday.  

Sarah Day Owen Wiskirchen is the head of newsletters for The Assembly Network and editor of The Line.