PART 2: None of Your BIDness | Critics of a Proposed Downtown Business Improvement District

Talks of establishing a business improvement district in downtown Asheville stretch back to the 1980s. But over the past year, those talks have gained a lot of momentum, and some civic leaders are lobbying city council to approve it before the start of the next fiscal year.

A chorus of critics are also reaching a crescendo with their opposition, pushing back against what they see as vague details, a lack of accountability and oversight and a process they say has been anything but thorough and inclusive.

Today is the second half of a two-part conversation. My guests are Rebecca Hecht, owner of Shining Rock Goods; Susan Griffin, a 20-year downtown resident who co-chaired a previous effort to pass a BID; Karen Ramshaw of Public Interest Projects and Patrick Conant, founder of Sunshine Labs, a relatively new Asheville organization pushing for greater accountability and transparency in local government.

Over the course of this conversation, we dissect some of the details, or lack thereof, of the proposed BID, including the subjective discretion of people hired to patrol the streets on behalf of the BID. We also talk about the potential economic impacts for residential renters and small business, the proposed power structure of the BID’s governing board and criticisms of a process led by the Chamber of Commerce and Asheville Downtown Association.