Next Tuesday, the Buncombe County Commissioners will decide on whether or not the citizens will have an opportunity to vote for district elections. District elections have long been advocated by conservatives in the rural portions of the county. Republicans and yellow-dog Democrats reason that wealthy city-dwellers traditionally have been elected. They feel it is impossible for a little farmer to campaign like a city lawyer can. Furthermore, if five or so rural districts get a representative, and wacked-out hippie Asheville gets splintered, mountain values will rule.
My opinion is that if the demographics were reversed, conservatives would be arguing against district elections. Further, I used to live in the country, and now I live on a city street with drug dealers. I don’t think that means I used to understand farmers and am now incapable of doing so; and now I relate wholly to drug dealers. I am not interested in voting for somebody so unwise as to use his power to favor a constituency of special interests over fairness.