Gene Freeman, Asheville City Schools superintendent, gave contradictory statements regarding the potential sale of Asheville Primary School at several meetings over recent months. Xpress has also experienced delays in obtaining basic records of the school system’s discussions.
Amid internal upheaval following the sudden departure of CEO Antony Chiang, the COVID-19 pandemic and economic uncertainty, the $1.5 billion foundation held its first annual meeting virtually on Oct. 28. Highlights included funding updates and a discussion about organizational transparency.
Amid calls for increased public access to policing data, Asheville City Council left the city’s volunteer board dedicated to hearing residents’ concerns about law enforcement in place for now. At the same time, the elected officials noted many vacancies on the Citizens Police Advisory Committee and signaled their longterm intent to dissolve the body once the newly forming Human Relations Commission has gotten up and running.
ASHEVILLE, NC
Asheville, N.C.
Tensions ran high at the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners’ April 7 meeting, as board members butted heads over a proposed policy change concerning closed sessions.
Local organizations, municipal bodies and citizens groups across Western North Carolina have partnered to empower community members to play a direct hand in the management and accessibility of public records, and help create a virtual landscape where responsibility for the dissemination of these records is shared by everyone.
The race for Buncombe County District Attorney is heating up, with incumbent Ron Moore touting his accomplishments to a local business group (and taking to Twitter), while challenger Todd Williams accumulating endorsements from some local politicians and judges. Photo by Alicia Funderburk
At a special meeting today, Asheville City Council announced that an internal investigation had found no evidence that Asheville Police Department Chief William Anderson engaged in a coverup surrounding a March car crash involving his son, as alleged by an APD lieutenant. However, the inquiry also found that when Anderson ordered the officer to meet with him, he acted inappropriately. Council members promised improvements to the general management of the department.
Does the city of Asheville have some information you’d like to see made available to the public? Let them know, as they’re now taking nominations on the city’s open-data catalog.
More information has emerged about the oversight of the APD evidence room and what might be required to solve its current disarray. Also: Mayor Terry Bellamy has not replied to questions about when she became aware of a contract clause mandating that the city receive a redacted copy of the evidence room audit.
Readers, we’d like to know your experience with local government transparency, especially with regards to open records.
A petition presented by URTV producer Dale Joyner calling for the removal of outspoken board member Davyne Dial at the last meeting of the public-access channel’s board of directors constituted a call for a special meeting of the channel’s membership, URTV attorney Scott Dillin asserted in an e-mail today.
URTV will hold a special meeting of the public access channel’s membership on April 29 to vote on the dismissal of Davyne Dial, a member of the station’s Board of Directors who has been outspoken in her criticism of management.
Outspoken URTV board members Davyne Dial and Richard Bernier kept their seats — for now — despite a recommendation from the public-access channel’s executive committee that they be dismissed. The board also voted to increase the number of annual meetings and scrap a controversial oath.
Thursday’s meeting of the URTV board will deal with a number of controversial issues, and Xpress is inviting attendees to assist our reporting on the events by joining in on the MXNow Twitter feed.
For journalists, keeping government operations open to scrutiny—and keeping public records public—is a year-round endeavor. But once a year, during Sunshine Week (March 15 to 21), Mountain Xpress joins thousands of publications across the country in making a special push to promote official transparency. A year ago, we marked this nationwide celebration of freedom of […]
There’s trouble at URTV. Who—and what—is responsible for that trouble? The answers depend on who you ask. Before the crowd: URTV Executive Director Pat Garlinghouse addressing a 2007 meeting of URTV producers. Photo by Jonathan Welch Launched in 2005, Asheville’s public-access channel is “a televised forum for legal, noncommercial speech; a place where you can […]
URTV Executive Director Pat Garlinghouse has not answered calls from county staff trying to contact her about ongoing transparency controversies at the public-access channel, and Buncombe County may delay funding for the station, County Manager Wanda Greene said at the Board of Commissioners meeting tonight.
