This Tuesday’s (August 24) Asheville City Council meeting will be a remote meeting.
You can (1) email your public comments, (2) leave your comments as a voicemail message, or (3) signup to deliver your remarks during the meeting. Here is a link to the agenda, which includes another link to the procedures for making remarks. Disregard the typo on the agenda with the wrong date – I spoke to the clerk, and she acknowledged that the meeting is on Tuesday, August 24, and said that she would correct the typo on Monday when she gets back to the office.
We hope some anti-masking voices will make some comments. We heard an awful lot from pro-maskers at the July 27 meeting.
We also heard from many who demand that the city defund the police. It would be terrific to convince many people to call or email and go on record requiring that the City Council demonstrate support for the police and silence those who seem to believe that the City Council is inclined to defund them instead.
The agenda doesn’t include public comment on ARPA plan spending, but the staff report requests comment. We plan to signup to make remarks for that item under new business. The landlords and other small business owners should consider speaking up on this topic and to submit proposals BEFORE September 14 to address some of your losses. Haven’t the City Council and County Commissioners spent enough of our tax dollars on homelessness issues? $850,000 here. A couple million dollars there, another hotel purchase….. What about our small business owners?
Sadly, it is also necessary for us to demand that the City Council demonstrate some support for our police force that not every citizen believes that we live in a systemically racist society.
Make a phone call to express YOUR views by 9:00 AM on Tuesday. Yes, it’s a little scary.
