“It’s infuriating to see so many people complain about lack of affordable housing and then in the same conversation oppose new developments.”
Tag: Affordable housing
Showing 85-105 of 346 results
City forum highlights Asheville’s growth despite pandemic
This year’s event — the first since the start of the pandemic — covered affordable housing, hotel regulations, Urban Place Zoning and more.
Q&A with Vicki Meath, executive director of Just Economics of WNC
Many issues are close to Vicki Meath’s heart. She has spent her life in community organizing, working on environmental justice with Western Colorado Congress and striving to raise Ohio’s minimum wage with Cleveland Jobs With Justice. In 2010, she joined Just Economics of Western North Carolina, a nonprofit that advocates for a living wage, as […]
Why we help: Witnessing families gain safe, affordable housing
“Witnessing all of the wonderful outcomes for all involved in Habitat’s greater mission of providing safe and affordable housing to area families really resonates with me and remains a source of inspiration.”
Q&A with Shannon Kauffman, homeowner services manager for Habitat for Humanity
In 2013, after years of struggling, Kauffman became a first-time homeowner thanks to Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity. Today, she helps other area residents become homeowners themselves as Habitat’s Homeowner Services Manager, where she says her personal experience not only informs her work but inspires others.
Mobile home
Letter: Short-term rentals are harming neighborhoods
“There absolutely should be zoning rules, restrictions and regulations in Buncombe County that prevent investors, who have no interest in an area beyond making money, from creating these stand-alone STRs in established neighborhoods.”
Buncombe to preserve branch libraries
In a unanimous vote, the county Board of Commissioners directed staff to maintain the county’s current library branches — including those in Black Mountain, Oakley/South Asheville and Swannanoa — and explore other ways to improve the system.
Formerly homeless residents discuss path toward self-sufficiency
To move clients from reliance on shelters and services to self-sufficiency, homeless advocates say, community support and permanent affordable housing are key — and their lack is the main barrier to reducing the homeless population in Asheville.
Council approves funding for Haywood Street development
The proposed location for the affordable development is located in the West End/Clingman Avenue Neighborhood. All of the apartments would be reserved for people earning less than 80% of the area median income ($60,100 for a family of four); up to half of those units could be available for those earning 30% AMI or less.
Council to review Haywood Street housing contract
Council will consider revising an agreement with the nonprofit after the group decided to drop one affordable housing proposal after significant community pushback.
What else ya got?
Council approves hotel expansion in 4-3 vote
The approval allows the existing Four Points by Sheraton hotel to more than quintuple its current size with a mix of uses including apartments, condominiums, extended stay hotel rooms, parking and ground-level commercial space.
Rooms to grow
Letter: Charlotte Street project will actually help Asheville
“Preservation at all costs is not the answer.”
Letter: ‘Out-of-towners’ label leads nowhere
“That phrase is blamed for housing, traffic, education, hotels, the homeless, the price of golf and other recreation, and on and on and on.”
Letter: The big picture of being priced out of Asheville
“The ‘housing boom’ that has upended Asheville is the inevitable outcome of the same economic policies that have created historically unprecedented income inequality in this country — specifically the relentless tax cuts granted the rich since 1980.”
Council debates COVID relief spending plans
Highest on city staff’s list of potential funding priorities were affordable housing, public engagement, homelessness, public and mental health, small business recovery and workforce development.
I accuse: Channeling Emile Zola in today’s Asheville
“I am certain the French author would take no offense at a less talented voice borrowing his ‘J’Acuse’ model. What better way to challenge a home community that is similarly darkened by discounted vanities, harms and pretense?”
Out-of-town interest drives local real estate market
According to Redfin, a nationwide real estate brokerage, the average real estate budget for an outsider moving to Asheville was $615,500 as of April, 31% higher than the average local budget of $469,000. That disparity between outside and local buyers was greater than in either Charlotte or Raleigh.
Letter: Charlotte Street development won’t destroy neighborhood
“The development is to be built on a main road, in the middle of a long-established commercial strip; it will not destroy some quiet neighborhood.”