ASHEVILLE — Rents are soaring, people with low and modest incomes are getting priced out of the city and high housing costs are turning Asheville into a less vibrant place.
Those are the complaints of many who live in this city or who want to move to a place now recognized as one of the best spots to live. But what can an average resident do about it? Here’s one thing: Pick which city leaders will confront the affordable housing crisis, as it’s been called.
Early voting in the City Council primary is now underway and runs through Saturday. Voting will continue on the actual primary day, Oct. 6.
Voters get to pick up to three candidates. There are 15 candidates in the nonpartisan race. Sixteen actually appear on the ballot, but, one, Holly Shriner, dropped out because of health issues and said she would not serve even if she got enough votes.
The top six vote-getting candidates in the primary will advance to the Nov. 3 general election. From there, three winners will emerge and take seats on the seven-member council.
It’s that elected body that will make decisions about housing affordability in upcoming years. To help voters choose on the housing issue, the Citizen-Times has compiled this comparison.
Each candidate was asked for solutions to affordability. They were given 120 words to answer. Only one, Lavonda Nicole Payne, did not respond. The Citizen-Times on Sept. 15 compiled a similar comparison of candidates on the question of taxes and fees.
Make developers build affordably, cut taxes
Nearly every candidate talked about the need to allow denser development, loosening rules and giving incentives to encourage more units per acre.
But on a scale ranging from government mandates on the left to tax and regulation cutting on the right, there was wide divergence. In the middle, several candidates, backed ideas from different sides of the ideological spectrum.
Candidates Julie Mayfield, Joe Grady, Lindsey Simerly and Brian Haynes said they want “inclusionary zoning,” a mandate that apartment builders or subdivision developers include a certain percentage of affordable units. But legal challenges by developers in North Carolina make it uncertain that mandate would work.
Haynes and Rich Lee, meanwhile, said the city should encourage or require businesses pay a “living wage.” The city has tried such an effort with municipal contractors but was stymied by Republican lawmakers.
Other ideas were buying and reserving municipally owned land for housing. Keith Young suggested the city donate land for a development. Dee Williams wants a land trust where rents are held at affordable levels. Lee suggested tax breaks for small landlords. Several candidates, including Vice Mayor Marc Hunt, want to see Section 8 taxpayer subsidized housing for poor residents moved from project-style development and scattered among neighborhoods of different income levels.
A few suggested adding to the city’s Housing Trust Fund, a low-interest loan program to affordable housing developers. John Miall, who in other ways supported a market-based approach, backed a bigger trust fund. Simerly, chairwoman of the city’s Affordable Housing Advisory Committee, suggested a formula that could double the fund’s normal $500,000 allotment to more than $1 million.
Miall, Carl Mumpower and Ken Michalove said taxes and fees are passed on in the form of higher rents and should be cut. In general, Mumpower, a former vice mayor, said regulations were excessive.
Miall and Corey Atkins said the answer lies in recruiting businesses that offer higher wages.
While some said public transit was part of the solution, Mumpower said the bus system should no longer get parking fee revenue, which is a large chunk of the system’s funding.
Candidates are arranged by the general ideological theme of their answers, liberal to conservative, and by the order they responded.
Government should lead
Julie Mayfield: There are proven strategies we can adopt: 1) gear policies, incentives and the development process to significantly increase housing density for low- and middle-income residents downtown, within a one-mile radius of downtown and on transit corridors; 2) support the Housing Authority’s transition to increased density/mixed use developments; 3) increase funding to the affordable Housing Trust Fund and for related capital improvements; 4) build affordable housing on appropriately sited city-owned land; 5) acquire (land bank) key parcels; 6) continue partnering with nonprofit partners and look for new, private partners; 7) work with Buncombe County, especially in discussing inclusionary zoning; 8) expand the reach and frequency of our transit system; and 9) view affordable housing as inseparable from transportation.
Joe Grady: If we want Asheville to remain a place in which all people can afford to live, we must remove all obstacles and barriers to adding housing in the city by: 1) Making it easier to actually build buildings that conform to rules, we’ve decided on, like increasing density, lowering square footage, etc.; 2) Building units quickly that are affordable by design; 3) Creating new designs using less space, fewer amenities; 4) Unlocking land that is available in the city; 5) Requiring permanent inclusionary planning on all future developments; 6) Focusing on energy efficiency, driving down the cost of maintaining and operating homes, condos, and apartments once occupied; 7) Forging public, nonprofit and private partnerships now.
Lindsey Simerly: I serve as the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee’s chair and am running for council because I believe that we must create more opportunities for working people to live here. I was once homeless and worked service and labor jobs for years, and, like many in Asheville, I often found myself unable to meet my basic needs. Strategies: Increase funding to our affordable Housing Trust Fund to 0.01 of every $100 of property tax value; Increase housing density citywide; Mandate all new housing developments include truly affordable housing; Improve density bonus policies, especially on our major transportation corridors; Waive fees and offer rebates for high levels of affordability; Increase the amount of land available for affordable housing through land banking.
Grant Millin: Affordable housing is an anti-poverty matter for those Asheville citizens at greatest risk. As a matter of fact, when I requested City Hall produce its anti-poverty strategy as soon as possible this summer, what I got was a lot of affordable housing and homelessness policy documents. There are tens of thousands of our citizens in poverty or hovering near poverty according to the 2015 COA Bowen housing assessment. Lack of affordable housing is a central poverty driver here in Asheville, just like rising rents and poor opportunities for income growth are poverty drivers across North Carolina and the nation. The following federal and state actions need to be resolved while we do what we can inside city limits…(Provided more detail)
Keith Young: The city would need to build affordable workforce housing units similar to what the county did for teachers on a scale that would increase supply enough to lower rent prices. A project this large would probably be best handled by a bond referendum so that it would be in the hands of the voters. I would support such a referendum. Working with the county on these issues are key. Also let’s explore the use of land banks/trust.
Brian Haynes: Affordable housing is a problem shared by almost every city in the country and Asheville is no exception. As a tourist destination, low-wage jobs predominate, creating enormous wealth gaps. Asheville needs to continue to insist and advocate that a living wage be paid whenever the city has the authority. Living wages are an essential remedy. When zoning variances for apartment complexes are approved, a larger percentage must be dedicated to affordable housing and developers must be required to keep them affordable for longer periods if not indefinitely. Landlords should be encouraged to rent properties at affordable prices, with tax relief or incentives. Section 8 housing should be increased and landlords need to be actively encouraged to participate.
Hybrid approach
Dee Williams: Community land trusts need to be set up for perpetual housing affordability for both rentals and home ownership opportunities. To achieve scale and to address the shortage to meet demand, Social Impact Bonds are a ” Pay for Success” model where private investors manage and invest in capital projects which build affordable housing. The Asheville Housing Authority must be re-tooled to become more customer focused with an emphasis on building low income/workforce affordable housing: 1. Develop a nonprofit arm which holds title to the properties and maintains them in perpetuity as affordable; 2. Develop a for-profit arm that develops scattered site Section 8 housing; 3. Develop a nonprofit arm which has metrics which measure customers’ self-sufficiency.
Marc Hunt: The current council has elevated affordable housing as a very high priority and has laid out very focused aims and goals, and I am fully supportive. We are doing more than ever to address what has become a deep crisis — one that threatens community character and our economic growth. We must continue to increase our funding for affordable housing initiatives, update our regulations to allow for greater density especially along transportation corridors, provide incentives to partners for affordable housing development and improve collaborations with other levels of government and the private sector. I want us to embark on a multidecade initiative in partnership with the Housing Authority to smoothly transition all public housing into mixed-income neighborhoods.
Rich Lee: Half the rental units in Asheville are single houses, basements or small apartments with low margins. When taxes and fees go up, they raise their rents. That’s an avenue we haven’t explored yet as a city. A program helping small-time landlords, maybe with a tax discount, reduced fees, or assistance in building backyard and basement apartments, has a twofold effect: It helps the landlord afford to live here as well as the tenant. But costs are only half the equation, the other half’s our low local wages. Asheville has the ability to grow jobs in a wide range of fields and insist they pay a living wage. A bigger push on real, sustainable job creation needs to come first.
‘Intentional communities’
Richard Liston: The world’s population has more than doubled in 50 years. We are multiplying faster than we can handle it. So we’re going to have to cozy up a little closer. My responsibility on Council will be to allow a diverse range of solutions to emerge that are sensitive to the needs and desires of our current residents. These may include allowing property owners to place micro-homes on their properties to rent cheaply (as long as they demonstrate that their neighbors will not be unreasonably inconvenienced), and ensuring, through simplified legislation, an environment in which intentional communities can support themselves financially by producing food, clothing and other goods — creating more enjoyable jobs than the typical service industry job.
Free market with a twist
John Miall: In short, vote out the current council. One candidate claims to be chair of the Affordable Housing Committee since 2011. If the current people and plan were working, Asheville would have made more progress. I propose to strengthen funding for, and re-define the Housing Trust Fund. I propose to aggressively recruit business/industry paying above tourism wages in order to raise incomes to afford housing. And, I propose to stop the drain on owners/developers with ever higher taxes and fees which merely add to the cost of housing. “Affordable Housing” is largely a myth created by politicians pandering for votes. We need results. We need affordable living.
Corey Atkins: While I support density bonuses and incentives for new developments to include portions for low income housing, the city cannot single-handedly solve the affordable housing crisis. It will take public-private partnerships and community coalition-building. The affordability issue in Asheville is also a symptom of the broader cause of lack of diverse, high-wage jobs. The city will be better suited to put resources towards active recruitment of good paying jobs in a wide spectrum of industry. We cannot rely solely on tourism and service industry jobs and expect people to be able to maintain a decent standard of living. This approach better serves the community long term when dealing what is mainly a free market issue.
Taxes, fees hurt renters
Carl Mumpower: Expanding taxes, fees, regulations and gentrification policies while simultaneously supporting housing affordability is like taking a bath without getting wet. Real world solutions will find us reaching out with two hands — one to stop government overreach and the other to nudge private developers. The opportunity in the misery is found in three words — incentives, density and micro — providing incentives for entrepreneurs to build apartments that maximize density potentials while reducing apartment size. Micro apartments — around 250 square feet — have sustainable affordability less likely to be eaten by the gentrification bug. While we’re at it, supporting secondary apartments in residential neighborhoods and returning to our historical model of using parking revenue to build parking resources will further aid housing affordability.
Ken Michalove: Stop council from adopting unnecessary taxes, rate and fee increases (their actions the last two out of three years); and, they gave themselves a raise every year. These council decisions become pass-throughs that go from landlords to tenants, thus higher rents. This council, Marc Hunt, is part of the problem. Support the initiative by the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce, deal with affordable housing through a public/private initiative. The city appropriated several million dollars and there are at least 12 organizations working this issue. The city needs its emphasis on providing basic services and infrastructure improvements. The chamber group recognized affordable housing doesn’t stop at the city limits and only nonprofit and government support. I applaud their initiative.
Important voting info:
Early voting: Asheville residents can register and vote 8 a.m.-5 p.m. weekdays through Friday and 8 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday.
Where: Buncombe County Election Services, 77 McDowell St. (Northwest of Mission Hospital, enter on Choctaw Street)
What to bring: If you’re registering, bring a document with your name and address, such as a utility bill, apartment lease, driver’s license or other government document. Registering voters must have lived in Buncombe County 30 days prior to the primary. NOTE: Voters already registered are not required to bring documents.
Primary day: Asheville residents who are already registered can vote Oct. 6 at their neighborhood polling site.
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