It was a typical Asheville City Council meeting. It opened with a long public hearing with members of city council trying to get a developer to commit to LEED certifying his building and rent controlling certain units. Councilman Bryan Freeborn was interested in requiring a fence and a retaining wall not visible from the main road to be buffered and made aesthetically appealing. He was shocked to find out that the developer did not have to spell out each tree species in each location until the technical review. The developer sent agents who were not delegated with the authority to make the level of decisions council was asking, provoking Mayor Terry Bellamy to proclaim that henceforth projects are not to be heard by council without those with the power to make decisions present.

Then, it was time to talk about homelessness. The Ten-Year Plan to End Homelessness was great. Chronic homelessness was down 38%. Dr. Carl Mumpower asked if police and EMT calls for service were down, along with arrests and emergency room use. He didn’t see how anybody could spend time downtown and believe the number of homeless people was decreasing. Holly Jones accused Mumpower of launching grenades and asked that he commit to believe any statistics before staff goes and fetches them. Mumpower said he wanted homeless people who come to Asheville to be given the options of contributing to the community, getting help, going to jail, or going away. Robin Cape was incensed that Mumpower would suggest something so fascist as legislating respect; especially after calling her and her peers socialists all the time. She left the room without voting. Mumpower followed after her. Bellamy called a recess.

When council came back, the night was still young. Nonetheless, the mayor lumped four agenda items together, and whizzed through the final six items with nary a word spoken by way of deliberations.