Asheville City Council candidate interview — Marc Hunt

by David Forbes October 30, 2015

One of the biggest tasks facing Council in the next four years is the changes to the UDO. If you’re re-elected, what’s going to be your priority in those changes?

I’ve perhaps been the strongest voice on Council for getting into updating our comprehensive land use plan — the 2025 plan as it’s called now, it will be called something different — and then it’s only after that reform of the UDO would be in order. I think those things are necessary.

The first thing about the UDO is that our current UDO is not in synch with our current land use plan, Particularly we don’t have enough multifamily housing designated, our zoning classifications along transit corridors is not consistent with our land use plan. My view is: update the land use plan then update the UDO so the zoning classifications in the land use plan, which is not the case now and it hasn’t been the case for as long as I’ve lived here, for 20 years.

There’s another element in the UDO update, and that’s the migration towards form-based code. It’s something we did on Haywood Road and we’re talking about here in the River District. I think form-based code needs to be a bigger feature in our development ordinance.

From the standpoint of community needs, increased multifamily housing and increased dense housing is a key goal I want to see from all of this.

Of course, affordable housing’s been a big issue. One of the other things that’s been brought up lately is the possibility of an inclusionary zoning policy, possibly similar to the ordinances Davidson and Chapel Hill have on the books. What are your thoughts on if you would support a measure like that?

I’m very pro-inclusionary zoning at the conceptual level. The places that have done it, that are able to do it well, it’s been successful. That’s mostly in other states, of course. In North Carolina there’s some question about how much legal authority we have — or not — to do that. I am all for testing the limits on that from the standpoint of research and understanding.

But I think we need to step carefully when it would be time to consider writing an ordinance. One of the risks that we always face with the legislature in this state is that even though something may be legal or debatably legal, if we make policy aggressively that is counter to what the legislature might prefer they can make it worse for us and other towns. Just to be quite honest, I want to make sure that we do the most productive thing within range but not have it lead to a negative backlash that would be a much bigger loser than what we might gain. So I’m going to step cautiously.

Speaking of the state, there has been a continuing emphasis on forging a relationship with Raleigh. If you look at this legislative session, there was a bill proposed last-minute that would have taken not just Asheville but many other cities’ power away. Is there a point in pursuing that conciliatory approach with the legislature if that’s possibly going to happen anyway?

There are cases where having open, honest communications with people in Raleigh has paid off. The most recent example in my experience was that there was a measure included in a bill that would have disallowed bike lanes on certain roads in the state. If this provision in this law had survived, Haywood Road through West Asheville would have been prevented from ever having a bike lane, no matter how badly we wanted it, it would have been the law of the state that no bike lanes can go there. The bike lanes that we have on Riverside Drive, even though they’re not great bike lanes, would be precluded under this law.

It was through honest dialogue that several of us had — Asheville on Bikes was involved, I was involved — and we had good, direct engagement with Republican members and Democrats in the legislature and that provision was pulled out as a direct result. It wasn’t just Asheville, it was a statewide effort. So there are important things that can be accomplished despite the tension. I don’t think it’s productive to be dismissive and say ‘oh gee, we’re so far apart ideologically we can never work together.’ You’ll never find me doing that; I will always look for the space to work on things that we can together.

When we just falt disagree, like on the water system taking, then we’ll fight like crazy. I’ve been a real warrior, I think, along with everyone else on City Council on that front. So there’s space to have it both ways. It does require being straight and honest and transparent and try to maintain trust with people as long they’re willing to do that from the other side. I think we’ve got some of that to work with.

It’s interesting, on that last-minute legislation you referred to, that was a Senate bill, there was really a pushback, not from Democrats, but from municipalities that peeled all of that away at the last minute. It was an alliance of Democrats and Republican City Council members in cities across the state that made that happen. Now that was clearly a last-minute effort to ram some very horrible stuff into cities and the proponents of it sure wish it had passed. But now we’ve at least created the space to step back and talk about it. I’m sure the same ideas will be back up in a year or two when the legislature reconvenes or in the long session [in 2017]. So I don’t believe that the discussion is over with any of that, but I do think we’re actually building a little bit more credibility and political force in Raleigh for municipal issues. I’ll continue to spend time travelling to Raleigh and engaging with the League of Municipalities, I know [Mayor] Esther Manheimer is very eager to see the Metrop Mayors Coalition be effective. That’s very important work. The moment we get dismissive and abandon those efforts I think we’re in even more trouble.

Also on the affordability front, some of the proposals raised during this campaign are for either tax incentives or a different use of the city’s housing funds to possibly help smaller landlords. What do you think about those proposals?

I’m very open to that. We reformed our accessory dwelling unit part of the ordinance to allow for more liberal development of garage apartments and so on with the hopes that the would be affordable. So I hope that, while it may be more complex to administer, but I’m open to looking at that. I don’t think we’ve had enough discussion about that to be certain just how viable it would be. One of the challenges we have with seeing affordable units developed in this town is the economics of the project. It’s one thing for a developer to be looking a 100-unit multifamily complex, making the numbers work there. It may be a sweeter spot or more viable thing to , in a dispersed way, allow homeowners to develop those accessory dwelling units.

On the other side of that is the concern that accessory dwelling units might convert to short-term rentals and I think the short-term rental debate here will go on for years to come. I’m not going to fool myself into thinking we’re going to settle it this year. The economic pressure and the laws of economics are still going to play out in this arena for a long time to come. I joke that in 20 years it will still be an intense debate in some permutation.

You;ve been a vocal supporter of strengthening the fines and enforcement on the ban on short-term rentals in residential areas and taking this look at homestays. What’s your response to the critics who worry about the enforceability of that ban and say it’s not really viable?

I think that the enforcement challenges are going to be great no matter what the ordinance says about allowing some limited number of short-term rentals, no matter what the homestay ordinance says I think the economic pressures, the market demand from visitors to stay in those kind of units is so powerful that unless we just offer unlimited short-term rentals with very little regulation we’re going to have enforcement problems.

So yes, it’s going to be hard to enforce, even very hard to enforce. It’s going to cost the city lots of money int eh coming years to enforce whether we like it or not.

So the question then comes to: are short-term rentals good for the city or not, good for our community or not and what kind of homestays might be.

My perspective on this has refined to a view that visitors staying in residential districts are fine as long its’ a passive and secondary use of a home. So a permanent occupant, someone that is legitimately living in a place that’s looking to subsidize their income, help pay their rent or subsidize their mortgage, renting out a bedroom or maybe two every occasionally to benefit from the tourism economy, that is great.

But it must be secondary and a passive, not active deployment of home.

The whole home?

Not necessarily. There are scenarios where a homestay, renting out three bedrooms, 365 with a resident who’s not really a resident but sort of an innkeeper who’s functioning there for free rent or being compensated, that is an enterprise. It makes it so the economic value of that home is determined by the earnings and cash flow of a lodging enterprise.

So if we’re talking about a home crossing that threshold, wehre it’s primary use is as an enterprise and not a dwelling for long-term residents then we’ve got a problem. That does two things. It changes the nature of our neighborhoods from places of peaceful, quiet living where neighbors know each other and live together in community into something else that is something like a quasi-lodging community. The second thing it does is that it indexes land values to their value as business enterprises and not homes for occupancy by long-term residents. Those are the big concerns: hollowing out neighborhoods and driving up land values, exacerbating our affordability problem.

The Southside Advisory Board has brought a petition to prioritize the renovation of the Walton Street pool. What’s your position on that?

Our current five-year capital plan has a lot more money in it — I think it’s $2 million, it may be more than that — over next five years to invest in swimming pools. The Walton Street pool is one we’ve talked about for a long time as one of the ones in most serious need of repair. So I’m all for that. I would want to do that in the context of balancing it within our five year plan.

I know some of that money was also intended for other pools so I’d really have to look at that. Walton Street pool stands out in my experience as the swimming pool most in need of attention.

Somewhat related, there’s been concerns about historically African-American neighborhoods not receiving the same attention for infrastructure , going back through redlining and that era. Burton Street and Shiloh have both developed plans but say they haven’t seen the plans carried out to the degree they’d like. Does the city need to change the way it deals with infrastructure in these areas that may have been historically neglected?

My experience is that just about every neighborhood in town feels underserved, but I will readily say that neighborhoods that know how to organize and know how to make noise and adept at doing that can, in the end, get more attention. So I think City Council does have a duty to make sure resources are allocated fairly and that neighborhoods that tend to have less voice are not overlooked.

I think we’ve had some great steps in recent years. Just last week on Council, we adopted a neighborhood sidewalk policy that just based on rational data and demonstrable need allocates money across the community based on real need and not based on how effectively a certain neighborhood may have lobbied for that.

That’s just sidewalks. We’ve done similar things for traffic calming. When we re-did our traffic master plan about three years ago now, I think that was done in a more objective way so the needs of the whole community were served. I think I’ve been ager to take the pressure element out of that and have a more objective approach.

Having said all that we can’t do everything by metrics and objectivity. We still have the duty on Council to allocate funds equitably and I’m eager to see us look into that.

How have the Burton Street and Shiloh plans specifically been incorporated into the city’s capital planning?

I would say that neighborhood plans in general have not yet integrated well into our capital planning process. It was three years ago at a Council level that we really did a five-year capital plan and we’ve gotten better at it each year. I think neighborhood plans being more represented in that process is important. I think broader community participation is important. When we do our capital improvements work session at City Council we typically have very little participation. We need more.

We have our annual strategic planning meeting in late January, I’d love to see more participation there. I’m not blaming anybody whose needs aren’t being addressed. It helps, though, to improve communication but I also think our methods need to incorporate neighborhood plans better. Those are two neighborhoods I’m certain have not connected in the process of the capital improvement plan enough.

A proposal you’ve emphasized repeatedly is the need, in your view, to redevelop public housing to break a cycle of generational poverty.” Specifically, one of the main points on that is the Lee Walker Heights redevelopment. At the same time that’s taking place in a context of disagreements between residents and the Housing Authority about evictions, about transitions to the RAD conversions. Going forward, how would the concerns about displacement or eviction be dealt with?

There needs to be an absolute guarantee on the front end that every resident in Lee Walker or any public housing neighborhood that might be up for redevelopment is guaranteed a similar size, better quality unit in the redeveloped outcome. That has to be a given, that has to be a promise that can’t be violated. I know part of the fear is that people would lose their homes here, so that’s very fundamental to me. There are challenges for transitional living, if you’re constructing in some parts then you’re demolishing other parts. It’s got to be a very seamless transition from the current space to the new space. There may have to be an interim space in between but we’ve got to manage that the best we can.

Remember that this is the housing authority and there may be a partnership with a private developer and the city will not be operating a housing community like this. At the end of the day the city does need to be a financial partner. As long as we get good partnerships going and good execution with the redevelopment I’d like to see us make a 25-30 year commitment and keep renewing that through our capital spending over many years so we see redevelopment of most or all of our public housing neighborhoods.

There is abundant research that illustrates the negative effects of poverty in public housing neighborhoods. Ours are more geographically and topographically isolated than most cities, so there is more de facto segregation that results. We are sadly much too segregated a city racially as a result. Segregation translates economic disparity and high rates of poverty among African-American families. This is very serious and the problem will not fix itself without some real change in the approach. It’s going to be a little expensive, but I think it’s money well-invested.

Starting with Lee Walker Heights, would you be in favor of making any deal the city was a part of contingent on the approval of the Residents Council?

I’d like to think that at the end of the day, a project would not move forward over the great protests of the residents there. I’d much prefer that we work through this. But would the Residents Council have veto authority? I hadn’t thought about that. I don’t know enough about how that’s made up, who it represents, things like that.

You’ve been a proponent of a possible sale to redevelop the property across from the Basilica, as opposed to some of the proposals to turn it into a park. Why do you favor that?

Let me make sure my broad view on this is characterized accurately: if there were a civic effort underway to develop a full-scale park there that had broad backing and money from partner sources, I think we would have had a park there long ago if those things had materialized in the past. If they existed today, we’d be talking about a parks project.

The truth is: we don’t have funding partners that are interested or eager to put a park in. If you look at the evolution of Carrier Park, of Hominy Creek greenway, of Reed Creek greenway, of Pack Square Park, of the Beaucatcher parcel behind McCormick Filed or masters Park in Haw Creek — I’m just rattling off the parks I’m aware of in the last 10 years — in every case the vision was created from within the private sector and across the broad community and investment was rounded up so that the city ended up putting a modest amount of the investment in as a follow-on to money that was already assembled.

Of the Haywood Street parcel, there’s not money coming together to try to make that happen so the proposition, as I have experienced it, is that the city needs to build this park. That’s not the normal way we build parks, we do it in partnership. We can’t afford to spend every dime for every park we build. At the $4-6 million price tag here, I am still not willing to divert money from affordable housing or paving streets or building sidewalks or the other projects we have [on the Capital Improvements Plan] to do everything for this park.

On the potential sale aspect, even saying ‘this is public space, we’re going to do something city-owned here at some point’ versus a sale, what do you see as merits or problems with those [routes]?

I view land as an asset, as a resource. We’ve got land we’re inventorying right now to build affordable housing on. There’s a big push from council that we need to nto regard property we have as excess property that has no future and so we’re actively looking at what is the highest and best use.

That property has a value of $3 million that happens to be land. It’s not cash or we’d be spending it. The fact that it’s land is a different kind of asset. I know that lands is precious, but we can also buy land if we want to have parks when they’re warranted.

I’m not sure that it’s rational to think that five years from now, money will be easier to come by for a park than it is today. We may be in a recession. I think it’s very telling that funding partners aren’t coming together today to fund the park.

In the event of a sale would there be any stipulations about what should or shouldn’t go there?

Oh absolutely. The property is not on the market for whomever will pay whatever level of price. The city owns the property, we can negotiate with an interested party and negotiate in a very specific way what goes there and what doesn’t. We can negotiate in a very specific way that part of the property will be retained by the city as a public plaza. It’s got to work for the developer and it’s got to work for the city.

Since we don’t know exactly who that developer would be or exactly what their design or requirements would be, I think we’re better off staying flexible but being insistent once we get into negotiation and being sure that we’re dutiful to a threshold of acceptability there. I am confident that no one on this current City Council wants to see a hotel there. I’m confident no one wants to see a towering high-rise as my political opponents suggest I want.

Our existing policy at City Council lays some of this out: a development that encourages street-level vibrancy, that respects the architecture of the Cellular Center and the Basilica, the public plaza aspect, consistent with the goals of the downtown master plan. I know those parameters seem a little loose, but we do have to have some latitude to negotiate.

Something that is greatly hindering our ability to do anything at all with the property is the political controversy being driven by people who would prefer not to see me on City Council. It is absolutely a political effort on their part. It is defeating the opportunity to get a productive use of that property as a full-use park or a mixed-use. The controversy that is underway is making it impossible to move together. We need to come together on Council and unify as to the future of this property.

Talking to a number of people downtown, one of the concerns raised was that the last two proposals [for the site] were a parking garage and a hotel. What would be different this time?

The parking garage proposal was from the city itself. The hotel proposal was in response to an RFP [a request for proposals from the city] at a time when we didn’t have seven other hotels coming up right away. I’ll remind people that at the time a hotel didn’t seem like a bad idea. Downtown has changed dramatically.

So what would be different? I think we’ve got a much better City Council and our city staff have a much better idea, thanks to the community dialogue, what would be acceptable and what wouldn’t be acceptable. The Council policy that was adopted in 2014 lays out more detail than ever in the past what the future should be. As a sitting member of Council, and if I’m re-elected, I’ll have a certain amount of authority and influence over that. I can’t speak for people that preceded me, nor can I speak from others that will serve in the future. At some point the citizens have to put faith in their elected leaders.

Moving to another issue you touched on: hotels downtown. There’s been some concern about the sheer number that are going up. As the city looks at zoning changes, would you support any restrictions or changes to respond to those concerns?

I think the different pressures for use come and go based on market demand. Because there are seven hotels planned now doesn’t’ mean we’ll have a wave of hotels five or ten years from now. We may have a wave of who knows what, convenience stores or gas stations or whatever. I think that for our comprehensive land use plan and our zoning ordinance to try to react to all the specific uses may be a little challenging to do in a way that we’re confident we can control things.

I believe that our downtown area is facing a certain amount of threat from being so popular from visitors — and a lot of locals go downtown as well — that it’s driving the types of activities that occur there and the crowds and types of businesses there in ways that are a bit unsettling. The whole discussion of chain stores coming is the result of the popularity downtown. Chain stores love to be where they have lots of people and can sell. So a lot of people would say that all this activity is a better problem to have than the days when nobody went downtown. It is very challenging to figure out how to manage uses.

Back to the discussion of the UDO, there clearly would be a discussion of limting the number of hotels. I’m up for having that discussion. There probably is a number of hotels calculation that correlates to what a nice balance downtown is like between visitors and locals. I’m very much opent o that discussion. My points about prescriptive approaches in the zoning code is to highlight that there’s risks in thinking we can make all areas of our city perfect, because we really can’t see the future coming.

An issue that’s attracted a lot of attention recently is I-26. You were part of an ad-hoc committee that crafted the proposal to move the interstate forward. In the process, the proposals that have come out have elements like lane expansion and other aspects that seem to run counter to what the city and local groups have proposed over the years. Going forward, what do you think are the city’s chances of changing that in the wake of the state’s wishes seemingly running counter?

In terms of changing certain things, we are in a difficult position. The key question of the number of lanes through West Asheville — six versus eight — I believe that the inputs from the community on that have been very forceful, very well-researched, very well-presented. I’ve been in two separate meetings with the Secretary of the Department of Transportation — not just he and I, but in groups — with community representatives from Asheville talking to him. So DOT and the Federal Highway Administration are clearly aware of our preferences there and the proposal remains eight lanes. I’m disappointed by that.

At the end of the day this is a project whose importance from the standpoint of the DOT and the FHA is defined more by transporting people and goods from South Carolina to Virginia and beyond than it is about local needs. It is too unbalanced that way, frankly. At the end of the day, the city has got exert all the pressure it can on the outcomes and the question becomes: will the project ultimately be built, one way or the other? My guess is that it will. I think, no matter what the community does, this project will ultimately be built.

I think the congestion that exists at certain times in certain parts of the project has exceeded reasonable levels. I think the safety, clearly, is an issue that needs to be corrected. So the project, in some form, is going to move forward. If that takes halting the project forever off the table, the challenge becomes how do you shape it the best possible way. The best possible way requires negotiation and getting things out of it as best we can. Much of the effort of the working group and of City Council and the county commission has been to try to help shape the project and the various iterations it might take in the future and to try and influence that as best we can.

It will be controversial, it may be very controversial. I’m not sure the fate and the pace of the project have been determined. There’s different funding amounts required for different sections of it.

You were mentioning that some version of this project will be done. Is it your belief that would happen regardless of the stance the city takes. If the city were just to say ‘no, no I-26 connector’ would some version of this get built anyway?

Let’s think technically about the authority the city has. We know well that in terms of influencing outcomes politically in Raleigh versus the city that we’re not listened to very well politically.

At a more technical level the Metropolitan Planning Organization [which oversees highways in WNC] has the authority to include things on prioritization and funding lists or not. The city has two votes out of what must be a 22-member board at the MPO. Some of the other people at that table include Henderson County and Haywood County and the town of mIlls river and the town of Montreat, Hendersonville and Fletcher, all the municipalities and county governments have a seat at that table.

If the city of Asheville has two out of 22 votes on the body that does have more or less veto power, can the city swing nine other votes to do it? I’m not sure. Many of the other people at the MPO table really want this project to happen. Many of them see it more as a transportation need for automobiles and trucks and commerce whereas Asheville sees it from more of a community impact standpoint because it’s our community it’s coming through. Jan Davis and I are the two representatives on that board. Brownie Newman and Ellen Frost sit on that board from the county. So the residents of the city are their constituents too. We regard our duty there very carefully and we honor it and we work really hard to negotiate this. The MPO agreed to our resolutions [that the city and county passed] in March 2014.

So we are all on the same page and I’d like us all to remain on the same page and remain insistent on whatever specific requirements we would have for how the project might evolve. There are scenarios, probably, where the proposals for the project just can’t be found acceptable and maybe City Council would vote to oppose it. We are not there yet at all. I think our effort has to go towards influencing positive outcomes based on the assumption that whether we want it or not the project will be built in some form some day.

One of the biggest duties of Council under the city charter is to oversee and monitor the conduct of the city manager. Currently Gary Jackson’s been in office for 10 years and that’s seen everything from a AAA bond rating to woes in the police department. What’s your view on Jackson’s performance and how, specifically has Council and yourself held him accountable?

I’ve been very much in the middle of insisting on annual performance reviews for Gary since I’ve been on Council. We’ve done that twice now since I’ve been on Council. They weren’t done, prior to that. In my experience in organizational leadership they’re absolutely essential, I believe both we and Gary are getting more comfortable with the process. We’re able to share more feedback sincerely. I believe that Gary has received constructively critical advice on ways we think he might improve.

I will tell you, I think good city managers are hard to find. If you decide to make a change, there’s a very great risk that you go out and hire someone worse than the one who just left. I basically regard Gary as a very good city manager. We’re lucky to have him, especially at the scale we’re able to pay. I think, as with any employee, with any organizational leader that’s at the staff leader no one is perfect, everyone has things to work on.

I have no interest at all in seeing Gary go anytime soon. Instead I want to continue to constructively support him and provide feedback so he can do his job better in the future.

What’s an example where — through this process you mentioned — that Jackson or his office have changed the way they did things in response to Council’s feedback?

There are the formal annual performance reviews, but on an ongoing,e very week basis there’s a dynamic and flow of communication that results in great things.

One thing si the move we talked about a few moments ago, the move to better strategic financial planning. The worst bureaucracies and the more poorly-run municipal governments have little flow of information between management and Council, with Council serving to rubberstamp the things management decides on. So the move toward a very dynamic process of capital planning is the result of a positive, constructive communicative engagement that went on with Gary and with the Finance Director. That wasn’t part of an annual performance review, but it’s part of something that was very much work in progress, probably a little stressful for both sides. But because of the trust we have with Gary and the finance directors and the interest in Council in engaging in it fairly and honestly.

So that’s an example of something that has evolved in a way where Council initiated and wanted change, staff responded positively and I think Gary would say to you that our function is greatly enhanced. It’s arguable that if we hadn’t moved into good capital planning, we wouldn’t have been able to put together the River Arts District project that way we have. It was only with the confidence that we could see what we have coming five years down the road and everybody agree on it and the community to understand whether we could afford it or not and what kind of revenues would be required to do it. That’s also what enabled us to do the tax increase.

I watched Council function six and eight and 10 years ago. I don’t believe there was the level of trust within Council and the level fo trust between Council and the city manager where that kind of progress could be made in a constructive way. When there’s conflict and there’s mistrust and weak communication it’s very difficult to come together and get things done to some degree.

Since 2012 and the departure of Diane Ruggiero, the city has not had a staffer dedicated, full-time to the arts. Does that need to change? Is there anything else in the city’s approach to the arts that needs to change?

I’ve been involved with the Buncombe Cultural Alliance and that’s a coordinating body that has as its goal to advance arts and culture economically and from a standpoint of community experience and culture. I view advancement of arts and culture as a civic endeavor first. It will only be effective if its embraced as a broad endeavor that includes city government and county government and other interests, especially in the grass roots. An approach that has the city operating it or leading it or on the hook to be responsible for it to be at the top of pyramid I think is not the best approach to advance arts and culture generally.

I’m from Chattanooga originally and there’s a very strong non-profit there that is in the lead role of advancing arts and culture and including public art. The city is a willing partner and provides generous annual funding, but so do other private sector donors and corporations. It has a multi-million dollar budget every year and the public art you see around Chattanooga is the result of that, not because the city government decided it wanted it to happen unilaterally.

On other fronts you’ve heard me talk about the need for public/private partnerships and for certain initiatives to be embraced as civic endeavors. If there’s a park on Haywood that’s how it’s going to have to be. If there’s an effective and powerful advancement of public arts and arts and culture I think it’s better-led in a broad civic effort rather than relying on city government to make it happen.

One thing to remember about city government is that we’re always conflicted politically, even though we happen to live in a town that is mostly progressive, City Council is not regarded by many people in this community as the civic leaders of the community. There are people who think we are the civic enemies of the community. There are cases, like the one I described in Chattanooga, where there is much more power in civic authority than there is in political authority. That’s a mistake we make here often, assuming that since City Council is in the paper all the time and we were voted in, that we really control or lead all the civic activity in this town. It is absolutely not true.

Who else are you voting for in this election?

I’m voting for Julie Mayfield and Lindsey Simerly. I’ve said that to my supporters.

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