{"id":1838,"date":"2016-03-10T10:49:05","date_gmt":"2016-03-10T15:49:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/?p=1838"},"modified":"2016-04-03T11:58:52","modified_gmt":"2016-04-03T15:58:52","slug":"buncombe-commissioner-primary-guide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/?p=1838","title":{"rendered":"Buncombe Commissioner primary guide"},"content":{"rendered":"

We put your questions on a range of topics to candidates in the key Buncombe County Commissioner primaries. These officials oversee major services affecting 250,000 locals. Now, get out there and vote.<\/em><\/p>\n

It’s voting time, readers. Last week we tried to clear up<\/a> some mis-impressions about voting in Asheville by providing information about the voter ID requirements (and the exceptions) as well as where and when you could vote.<\/p>\n

Now we’re pleased to bring you the\u00a0Blade<\/em>‘s guide to your local Buncombe County Board of Commissioner races. Voters this year can cast their ballot in the Democratic primary for District 1 (encompassing most of Asheville), the Republican nomination for chair (elected countywide) and the Democratic and Republican primaries for District 2 (encompassing the northern and eastern parts of the county). In North Carolina, unaffiliated voters can choose the primary of their choice to cast their ballot in. In the case of the District 1 primary, this election will likely decide the seat; there’s no Republican candidate.<\/p>\n

While they don’t always get as much attention as their peers in City Hall, the commissioners oversee a larger government including a $388 million budget, most of the public school system, the sheriff’s office, health department, social services and more. They make decisions affecting 250,000 people, including the residents of Asheville.<\/p>\n

We asked questions about land-use, LGBT rights, body cameras, transit and more. Our readers submitted a lot of interesting question topics and if you don’t see one you suggested here, don’t despair: we’ll also be questioning the candidates as they head towards the general election too.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, neither of the Republican candidates for chair \u2014 Commissioner Miranda DeBruhl and right-wing activist Chad Nesbitt \u2014 replied to our questionnaire. The remaining candidates in the other races did (or in one case, took the time to detail why they couldn’t respond). Candidates are in the order they appear on the ballot.<\/p>\n

District 1 \u2014 Democratic primary<\/strong><\/p>\n

Gordon Smith<\/a><\/p>\n

Jasmine Beach-Ferrara<\/a><\/p>\n

Isaac Coleman<\/a><\/p>\n

District 2 \u2014 Democratic primary<\/strong><\/p>\n

Matt Kern<\/a><\/p>\n

Nancy Nehls Nelson<\/a><\/p>\n

Scott Bissinger<\/a><\/p>\n

Larry Dodson<\/a><\/p>\n

District 2 \u2014 Republican primary<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jordan Burchette<\/a><\/p>\n

Mike Fryar (incumbent)<\/strong> (Fryar replied that he was regretfully unable to reply to the questionnaire due to an emergency, and sent his apologies to\u00a0Blade\u00a0<\/em>readers)<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

The Asheville Blade is entirely funded by its readers. If you like what we do,\u00a0donate directly to us<\/a>\u00a0on Patreon or make a one-time gift<\/a>\u00a0to support our work.\u00a0Questions? Comments?\u00a0Email us<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We put your questions on a range of topics to candidates in the key Buncombe County Commissioner primaries. These officials oversee major services affecting 250,000 locals. Now, get out there and vote. It’s voting time, readers. Last week we tried to clear up some mis-impressions about voting in Asheville by providing information about the voter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1869,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,6],"tags":[177,367,173,379,64,24],"class_list":["post-1838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","category-news","tag-buncombe-commissioners","tag-buncombe-county","tag-election","tag-election-2016","tag-government-2","tag-politics-2"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/CourthouseCommish.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1838"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1838\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1876,"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1838\/revisions\/1876"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashevilleblade.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}