About a week ago, the Buncombe County Commissioners decided to buy time for a request from Frontier Syndicate for some help building workforce housing for households earning between $44,300 and $77,560 annually. All the developers want is tax breaks worth $1.8 million from both the city and county.
Commissioner Holly Jones represented the position of mainline mathematicians.
“It’s not lining the pockets of developers, which I’ve heard, and that’s just outrageous,” she declared, pointing out that the incentive payments would come out of the additional property-tax revenues a project would generate. “We’re not out any money at the end of the day. … I think we can do ourselves a world of good, and people who need affordable housing a world of good too.”
Got that? Jones’ argument is a little better than the same line used by city council. After all, the development will be in the Asheville city limits. Any financial burdens from increased demand on public safety and infrastructure by 100 new households will be shifted to the backs of city taxpayers, and the county can come off smelling like a rose.
