County appoints 11 people to short-term rental committee

They may not be the Avengers, but the team is assembled. After three hours of interviews on Aug. 20, the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners appointed an 11-member volunteer committee to review and recommend regulations for short-term rentals (STRs).

Commissioners selected nine community members from a pool of 113 candidates to continue the process that began in December as part of the Buncombe County Comprehensive Plan 2043. They will join two members of the Buncombe County Planning Board, Chairman Nancy Waldrop AND Ken Kahn. Chairman of the Commission Brownie Newman and the Commissioner Parker Sloan will be members without the right to vote.

“A lot of (people) in our community have been thinking a lot about this really important topic. And there are a lot of different perspectives, and I think a lot of people realize that this is not a simple issue, but one that is important to the future of our community,” Newman said before announcing the nomination.

The commission is made up of community members, Newman said, including real estate professionals, STR owners, other business owners and affordable housing advocates.

These are:

• Matt Allen
• I am grey
• Matt Lutz
• Jay Gerlach
• Kit Molina-Nauert
• Angelica Cote
• Chris Joyell
• Andrea Golden
• Candice Matelski-Brady

The county’s nine-member planning board released proposed changes to the STR regulations in December, which drew both praise and criticism, prompting months of debate, as previously reported PrintThe legislation would ban construction of new whole-home STRs in unincorporated parts of Buncombe County unless they are in the county’s five commercial zones or open-use residential zone, among other changes. Existing STRs would not be covered by the new rules but would require a county permit.

During a public hearing April 22, the Planning Board voted to adjourn the matter for 100 days, responding to complaints that the process was moving too quickly.

According to Waldrop, several of the board’s proposed changes gained broad support, including banning STRs from being built in mobile home parks, on steep slopes and on Blue Ridge Parkway overlays, and grandfathering existing STRs.

However, community members opposed restrictions on where STRs could operate and on the number of new STRs property owners could build.

The committee is scheduled to meet in September and October, then make recommendations to the Planning Board in November. The Board will make its recommendations to the commissioners in December.

ABCCM to add transitional housing

Asheville Buncombe Community Christian Ministries is expanding its temporary housing on Brevard Road in South Asheville.

The Recovery Housing Program of the North Carolina Department of Commerce awarded Buncombe County a $1 million grant to help ABCCM expand its Transformation Village, which provides transitional housing for homeless women, mothers and veterans.

Commissioners approved the funding at their Aug. 20 meeting, according to a staff presentation. The funds will be used to build a four-story building with 64 units, 32 of which will be for women and mothers with children recovering from drug addiction.

Print contacted the director of ABCCM, a priest. Scott Rogersfor comment on the expansion but did not respond by deadline.

A composting plant will be built at the district landfill

Buncombe County gets in on the compost game.

Commissioners on Aug. 20 approved construction of a composting facility at the Buncombe County landfill using funds earmarked for a stormwater ditch project that could instead be implemented through repairs and maintenance, saving about $147,000 for the pilot composting program, according to a budget amendment.

The project will collect food scraps from eight food scrap collection points across the county, which produce around three tonnes of the material per week, he said. Casi Lohmeyer, county solid waste sustainability coordinator. The facility can hold up to 25 tons of material before the county must obtain a permit from the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality.

“Once we are confident in our operations and ability to navigate and produce a successful product, we will consider the possibility of expansion and (consider) submitting a permit application to increase production capacity,” Lohmeyer said in an email to Print.

The finished compost will not be offered to the public but will instead be spread on the landfill slopes to encourage vegetation growth and reduce the county’s reliance on fertilizers and grass seed.

Construction of the new composting plant will begin in the fall and is scheduled to be completed by June, she added.