Sizing up the field for Asheville City Council

Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

1

Filing for this year’s Asheville City Council race doesn’t start until summer, but the candidates are already lining up. That means it’s time to take a look at the field so far. 

On Friday, Asheville political blogger Gordon Smith moved out from behind the computer screen to toss his hat into the ring one of three seats that are open: the seats of Robin Cape, Carl Mumpower and Kelly Miller. Voters will cast ballots and the top three highest vote getters win, so people running for council seats all get lumped together, and we have a non-partisan system, so there’s no distinction.

The mayor’s seat, now held in lock-down mode by Terry Bellamy, is also up. Bellamy has stated she’s running for re-election.

Why is Smith getting out of the gate so early? First, he’s got a lot of work to do to increase his name recognition about town. Second, he may be trying to smoke out other candidates who thought they might stay off stage a few more months. By announcing his run now, Smith is going hard after volunteers, voters and their money. 

Now back to the incumbents. I’m assuming Cape, Mumpower and Miller will all seek re-election. The wild card here is Mumpower, who might decide to challenge Bellamy, or might even give up the ship all together. I have no idea. 

Former Mountain Xpress reporter Cecil Bothwell has declared his candidacy for council, as well. Bothwell fell just a few hundreds votes short of winning a seat on the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners last November in his first run for political office. So he’s got some momentum. And he’s got name recognition. Bothwell and Smith will both be vying for the votes of the city’s “progressive” Democrats. Will they cancel each other out? It’s going to be tough to crack three.

And who else might run? We need only to look back at the list of 40-plus candidates who sent in their applications for City Council last year. The sitting council asked for the applications for anyone interested in filling the seat of Holly Jones, a council member who won a seat on the county Board of Commissioners. 

Asheville activist Charlie Hume and Asheville attorney Esther Manheimer both applied, and each got votes from the sitting council before the group ended up choosing Kelly Miller, who’s connected with the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce. They might run.

A couple of former council members applied last year. Bryan Freeborn and Ed Hay filled out the paperwork, and might be up for another run. 

Who else might run? You tell me. It’s going to be an interesting year, as always. The city is facing unprecedented financial pressures to deal with, on top of everything else. Who wants to wade into that? Not sure. There’s risk if the new council screws up, but also high reward if they get it right.