Stop the Open Space Amendment!

February 11, 2022

A message from Perrin de Jong, an 11-year Asheville resident, is a staff attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity and a commissioner on the city of Asheville’s Urban Forestry Commission

Dear Neighbors,

The Open Space Amendment will dramatically slash, and in some cases, eliminate, the open space that developers are now required to provide with larger construction projects

In addition, the proposal contains many loopholes that allow developers to avoid even those meager requirements. For example, it would:
• Relieve some developers from providing up to 80% of their required open space due to the use of stormwater mitigation measures that are legally required anyway.
• Relieve developers that provide a percentage of temporary “affordable” housing units from having to provide up to 80% of the open space that would otherwise be mandated.
• And relieve developers from providing an extra 10% of the open space that would otherwise be required in exchange for providing a flat, rectangular spot with pedestrian-accessible seating, resulting in a total potential discount of 90% of the open space required.

The proposal contains provisions to allow developers to meet their open-space requirements without producing any added benefits to city residents. For example, 100% of a developer’s open-space requirements could be met using mandatory property line buffers that are separately required under law. Also, separately required building setbacks could be used to satisfy up to 50% of a developer’s open-space requirements.

For more information read Perrin de Jong’s letter in the Mountain Xpress.

Call to action!

 1)  Please contact City Council and tell them why they should vote “No” on the Open Space Amendment at the March 8 City Council work session You can contact all City Council members with one email at AshevilleNCCouncil@ashevillenc.gov.

Also, please consider taking the following steps:

2)       Pass this call to action on to your friends, family & associates in Asheville who might be persuaded to contact Council or write a letter to the editor.

3)       Keep the letters to the editor rolling in to the Mountain Xpress and Asheville Citizen Times! We need to keep this issue in the public eye. Please submit your letters of 300 words or less to the Mountain Xpress at letters@mountainx.com (plain-text e-mail only; no attachments or HTML). You can submit letters of up to 250 words to the editor of the Asheville Citizen-Times at https://static.citizen-times.com/submit-letter-editor/.