Report from Asheville’s State of
the Community meeting
By Finn Finneran
Asheville, North Carolina, Jun. 2 (AGR) — The
city of Asheville does a fine job of continuously holding “community”
meetings. Unfortunately, on May 27 when Asheville held its third annual
State of Our Community meeting it also maintained its tradition of leaving
little to no time for community input or dialogue, leaving the air heavy
with numerous statistics, and leaving grand or scary (depending on who
you ask) plans for the future. Speakers included representatives from
The Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce and Asheville-Buncombe VISION,
an organization which self describes itself as a “neutral, citizen-driven
agency” located in Asheville’s City Planning Building, whose
mission is to “lead and inspire our diverse community to discover
and achieve common goals.” The evening’s highlighted speakers
were Asheville’s mayor, Charles Worley, and the Chair of the Board
of Commissioners of Buncombe County, Nathan Ramsey. The meeting was
held on the campus of AB Tech.
The first speaker was Rick Lutovsky, President and CEO of the Chamber
of Commerce which will be moving into a new building on the corner of
Monford Ave. and Hill St. within the next year. Lutovsky introduced
“Advantage Asheville,” a 5 year campaign to increase economic
development, jobs, better transportation, and quality of life. The Chamber
of Commerce outlined several priorities for economic development in
their 2004 Legislative Agenda. Included were recommendations to reduce
corporate income tax and the highest marginal personal income tax, a
fund balance of $15 million to always be available for industry “recruitment
and retention,” and to increase funding for North Carolina’s
Brown Field Program, a program designed to assist in the redevelopment
of “blighted” properties. Also included was a plan to redevelop
the Civic Center and the river district with a link from the controversial
I-26 connector. The plan to expedite the planning and construction of
the I-26 Connector Project through West Asheville was made lovingly
clear when Lutovsky said “We’ve made a commitment to [former
Asheville Mayor] Lou [Bissette] that we will drive him to the nursing
home on I-26.”
Different speakers throughout the meeting made mention of a push for
creating and drawing more “creative” or “innovative”
positions in to Asheville’s workforce, reflecting a national trend
of cities’ attempts to fix faltering economies by attracting people
of the “creative class.”
Another topic of interest at this year’s State of Our Community
meeting was the hope of developing more affordable housing. Asheville
currently has the least affordable housing in the state. The 2004 Legislative
Agenda recommended allocating more funding for the State and City Housing
Trust Fund for “attractive, affordable rental housing for elderly
and disabled people and families with small children.” No mention
was made of what constitutes as “affordable,” but Mayor Worley
reassured that he envisions Asheville to be “livable for all economic
backgrounds.”
Asheville has a 3.4 percent unemployment rate, based on the number of
people who file for unemployment. This is the lowest unemployment rate
among the metro areas in NC, but Ramsey says that Buncombe County’s
wages are still lagging. Ramsey also brought to light the effects of
free trade on our area. “We cannot have a national trade policy
that moves jobs to other countries where people earn a few dollars an
hour.” North Carolina has lost 190,700 manufacturing jobs in the
last five years, which represents a loss of 24percent of its total manufacturing
jobs.
For the most part the meeting included many more plans and hopes for
the future of Asheville and Buncombe County than a report of “the
state” of the city and county. But when the current state of Asheville
was put into focus such positive statements were made such as “Asheville’s
low unemployment rate is due to a healthy balance of manufacturing,
tourist, and medical industries,” as Lutovsky put it. Mayor Worley
said “[Asheville] takes the past heritage and tastefully blends
it with development for a bright future for our economy.”
As the meeting came to an end, despite the lack of public input, a muffled,
sarcastic voice could be heard from the back of the crowd: “Man,
you’d think we were living in paradise here.”
Memorial Day Ceremony features
commander of homeland defense
By Liz Allen
Asheville, North Carolina, Jun. 2 (AGR) —
General Ralph “Ed” Eberhart, commander of North American Aerospace
Defense Command (NORAD) and United States Northern Command (NORTHCOM)
military agencies, was the featured speaker at the Memorial Day Ceremony
held at City County Plaza in downtown Asheville. The May 31 event was
attended by approximately 250 people, included patriotic/religious music
by the Asheville Christian Academy Chorus and Band, an unveiling of
a US commemorative WWII stamp, and was emceed by WLOS television personality
Bob Caldwell. Approximately 30 uniformed police patrolled the area.
A few acts of protest where visible. A picture from the New York Times
of a hooded statute of liberty was held up by a person in the crowd
and a person wearing all black and a veil kneeled in front of the crowd
of the stage. At the end of the ceremony the individual removed her
veil and addressed the crowd, “Don’t do this in my name! Don’t
torture people in my name! Thank you for letting me do this!”
NORTHCOM and NORCOM are located at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado
Springs, CO. NORTHCOM, includes all military branches within the United
States. NORTHCOM’s mission, according to www.northcom.mil, is to
“deter, prevent, and defeat threats and aggression aimed at the
United States, its territories, and interests within the assigned area
of responsibility;… As directed by the President or Secretary of
Defense, provide military assistance to civil authorities including
consequence management operations.” NORAD, according to www.norad.mil,
consists of US and Canadian military officials working together to “Deter,
Detect, and Defend” threats in domestic aerospace.
Eberhart devoted the majority of his speech to World War II veterans
and the memorial that was unveiled in Washington DC in May 29. He also
repeatedly referred to “the global war on terrorism” which
he stated began because the attacks on Sept. 11 2001 “attacked
our women and children and our citizens out there living normal lives
as they should expect to be able to live.” However, the general
did not mention military personnel who have died in the war on Iraq
and Afghanistan. Eberhart called NC “the most military friendly
state in the America” as he reported NC Governor Easley to also
have said. The General was introduced by North Carolina Congressperson
Charles Taylor who thanked the VA hospital and called it one of the
best in America.
Caldwell read a poem entitled “It is the Veteran” which repeats
“it is the veteran” not “the preacher,” “reporter,”
“campus organizer,” or “politician” “who has
given us” rights and freedoms.
Members of city council were present at the event and could be seen
signing along to the song “God Bless America.” After the event,
Asheville Mayor Charles Worley commented that he supports the reinstatement
of a draft, commenting, “I think there is something about military
service. I think it’s good for our country.” He also said
he believed the war on Iraq is being fought “extensively over terrorism.”
When further questioned if he felt Iraq is now or ever has been a threat
to the US despite lack of any evidence demonstrating WMD or links with
al-Qaida, Worley responded, “I am not privy to the intelligence
that others have, so I’ll have to defer on that one.” Worley
did say that he disagreed with Sinclair Broadcasting censoring the names
of soldiers who died in Iraq on the WLOS version of Nightline news on
Apr. 30 and Bush ordering media not to show images of soldiers returning
in coffins.
Wearing red, white, and blue and holding a US flag, Alice Keller, who
attended the rally and has a son in active duty in the air force, said
she believed the war was being fought over freedom. Keller said she
felt the actions Bush took to censor images of body bags or not count
Iraqi dead are “appropriate.” She also said she felt the high
rate of suicide of soldiers in Iraq compared to other wars, and incidents
of torture and rape of Iraqi prisoners are an indication “that
there are many troubled young people in this generation.”
Also in attendance of the event was Cynthia Croll, who was helping her
friend take donations for homeless veterans, who said she believed that
incidents at Abu Ghraib were the results of commands from higher-ups
and that war is “a shame; you kill each other and there’re
ain’t nobody here no more... I’m for peace.”
