A 'Greener' Development Agenda

By Matt Mittan

To say that Asheville, and the surrounding area, has a large number of green-minded residents would be an understatement. There are numerous green-friendly businesses and many within our communities either help out personally in any way they can or they give donations to environmentally focused organizations. However, one body can do a better job with the opportunities before them then they currently achieve. I’m talking about Asheville City Council.

I know a majority on the council – maybe even the entire body – want to do anything they can to help build a sustainable balance between human development and mother earth in these beautiful God kissed mountains. Today I want to focus specifically to animal habitat preservation.

What is the number one threat to animal habitat in our region? I would argue that it is urban sprawl, deforestation, water supply manipulation and loss of open tracts for movement of animals. It seems that the more regulations we put to try and control these things from happening, the less woodlands there are around Asheville. All the good intentions in the world haven’t seemed to stop the spread of paved fields and gutted hillsides. Maybe it’s time for a new approach. What if Asheville City Council saw their job as enticing people to come inward rather than try to slow the pace of those who are moving outward and upward?  

The first step would require that City Council members accept that humans must have places to live, work and play. These seem like simple enough things but there are some in Asheville that have an unrealistic idea that all development must be stopped. That’s not going to happen. So instead, let’s flip the role around and say that within the City of Asheville we will make it a haven for development.

Start by reducing the regulatory burden on builders. Follow that with a drastic reduction in the property taxes and water rates within the city. Make it so that builders see Asheville as a much better alternative than to build in rural, non-incorporated areas. Lastly, drop all charges for parking down town, garages AND meters.

This would require a major paradigm shift. I don’t have any illusions about how difficult that would be for some. But if Councilman Brownie Newman is right that reducing the monthly cost to ride the city buses will in turn bring about more rider-ship and thus more revenues in the long run – would it not be the same for building development, job creation and property ownership? Reduce the cost to participate and more will come. To put a new twist on an old movie: “Let them build and they will come.”

The end-game purpose of all this would be that there would be less pressure on investors to develop into wilderness areas. The main reason they do it now is so they can make more money off the effort, plain and simple. The county is cheaper; less regulated and carries a drastically lower tax burden. So, the City needs to get more competitive.

So how does the City make up the difference? After all, there would be fewer revenues in theory, increased cost for services and more traffic challenges to overcome. The City lobbies the NC General Assembly to let loose their strangle hold on local governments to build alternative inlay streams. Right now, municipalities are pretty much restricted to raise what money they need through taxing your property. I think a consumption based tax is fairer. A County Commissioner once told me that for a 1 cent increase in the sales tax, property taxes could be dropped up to 20 cents per hundred valuation.

From another point of view, have council members not argued that we must make investments now to reap the rewards later? If that’s true for arts, transit, water systems and education, why not do that toward protecting slopes and wilderness areas from further sprawl? 
 

I believe that Asheville can do a lot more to help the surrounding environment by making the city more attractive than it ever will by trying to regulate and tax people into the behaviors that a majority of City Council desire. Lofty progressive aspirations for the habitat around us can be obtained by dramatically reducing over-burdensome regulation, back-breaking taxes and skyrocketing costs that keep people from calling Asheville 'home'.

 My grandfather always said, ‘You catch more bees with honey.” Put simply... smaller, less expensive, less obtrusive government means bigger and stronger communities.

(Published in The Mountain Xpress)