Tod Leaven | Asheville City Council Candidate

Tod Leaven doesn’t dwell on the details when he speaks of his twin sister, who he says was battling addiction and chronic homelessness in the early 2000s when she was killed. But it isn’t a reach to see the connection with his sister, in part, fueling Leaven’s career as an attorney, his community service and his current run for a seat on Asheville’s City Council.

My conversation with Tod Leaven continues our series of episodes devoted to every candidate for City Council. Today, Tod Leaven talks about his path from the active duty military to a career in law to his current campaign. We dive deep into his takes on affordable housing, stewardship of public money and prioritizing what he believes are core city services.

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Transcript

Matt Peiken: How do you see the connection between your sister's death and your run for city council?

Tod Leaven: Okay, so there's definitely not the only reason why I am running, but a major reason why I decided to go ahead and throw my hat in the ring now, and of course, there are always exceptions, but it seems like the two major arguments when dealing with this current unhoused crisis is either A, you ship them all off or you arrest them, Or B, you throw them in some abandoned hotel without any wraparound type of services.

Both of which seem incredibly inhumane to me. Every time I see someone who's unhoused on the streets. I see my best friend for my whole life who was my twin sister. I see the biological mother of my daughter and they're people. They're [00:03:00] not problems. And you hear folks talking about, Oh, the unhoused problem.

And I'm like, damn it. They're not problems. They are people. They deserve dignity. They deserve respect. This whole out of sight, out of mind, which is politically popular. No one wants to waste money on people who aren't going to give back to the community, as they are often viewed, And I just think it's bullshit.

So I think If we take care of them, we absolutely have to take care of them. I don't think the unhoused is a drug problem. I don't think it's a mental health issue. I don't think it's an alcohol abuse issue. I think if you suffered those types of setbacks, you're more likely to become unhoused.

But I think really the unhoused is a housing problem because we do not have anywhere near as much affordable housing. We don't have any affordable housing in Asheville at all, which I have to say back in '05, So I got out of the army in 04, I waited tables full time at the Grove Park Inn, and I was a full time student at UNCA.

So I was a full time student at [00:04:00] UNCA, waiting tables. On that salary, I bought a house in North Asheville in 05. Cause you could do that back then. You can't do that shit now. 

Matt Peiken: Yeah. So what were the takeaways from your sister's situation and what led to her death? 

Tod Leaven: When we bought our house in '05, she was already on the streets and already had a, at that time it would have been a six year old daughter.

My wife and I, my wife, I swear to God, is the most patient woman that's ever walked the face of this earth. She let me bring them into the house. And we let them stay with us, my sister used drugs, she drank. We absolutely enabled her, but our thought was, you know what? At least she has a roof over her head.

It's okay! She can drink, she can drug, she really had no rules at all, but at least she wasn't on the streets. And, I did that because I loved her. This was my absolute best friend. And it enabled her to spiral down so quick. And in retrospect, had we not have done [00:05:00] that, could she have possibly lived more and gotten the help?

There's a chance, yes. Do I view myself as an enabler? Yes, but it was with the best of intentions and it was absolutely done out of love. So when I see folks either say, oh, all the unhoused are vagrants. Let's throw them in jail. That's just cruel, but I also see a lot of Folks with big hearts and enlightened people who say, listen, all we need to do is just get a roof over their head.

It's not up to us to police if they get mental health help. Or if they get addiction help. Or if they drink. That's not up to us. Let's just throw them in a shelter and then we're good. We're great. And I don't like that. So I have run for about the past 11, 12 years, I've run a free legal clinic for homeless veterans at ABCCM.

And I think that model works. I think it works incredibly well. I'm not saying that the housing first model is inappropriate for everyone. It's not one size fits all. And I'm sure there is a small percentage of people that could be used as a [00:06:00] first step, but only as a first step. If we're going to house the unhoused, we need to give them wraparound services. But even more important, we should focus on affordable housing because that's the pipeline into becoming unhoused. 

Matt Peiken: Let me ask you, so the city, at least from what I can tell over the past couple of years has approached this from a somewhat progressive vantage point.

They have affordable housing people in staff who are working on housing specifically. So what do you think the city isn't doing even now or what do you think is flawed about the city's approach? Great question that you want to help steer differently as a city council person.

Tod Leaven: I really view my role in dealing with the unhoused is Not undoing anything that the city has Done.

I can't point out and saying, oh my gosh, this decision on this date, this is terrible. No, it's not that. I think we're at a turning point and I can see people who, if they spend millions of [00:07:00] dollars and just some remote housing and some hotel out in East Asheville. And then saying, Oh, look at all the money we've spent. We've done a good job and that's it. And then they go on to the next shiny thing. 

I see that as being a real possibility in the future. And I really want to be able to lend my voice. Again, city council does not execute upon what the city does. They're like the board of directors. It's Deborah and her staff.

They're in charge of the day to day work. I think they're doing a really good job. I just want to make sure that in our pursuit to help the unhoused and our heartfelt love going forward, that we don't err on the side that I think some other cities, especially in the Pacific Northwest or Northern California, have, I think, gone too far.

And it's exacerbated the problem and it's left more enabling and less problem oriented. I really want to keep the topic of the unhoused really focused on building affordable [00:08:00] housing, which I have to say the resistance to development in Asheville is significantly. I was warned about it, but it's significantly stronger than I thought it would have been.

And I think it's easy for a city to say, Ooh, let's not focus on development because we can't get reelected because of the NIMBYs. Let's focus on this housing first type of model Which I want to Domo down again and say I'm not opposed to it, But we have to make sure that we actually keep our eye not really on just the blame but On the solutions, what can we do to actually solve this?

Matt Peiken: You're talking about wraparound services. I think a lot of people are advocates of that and at the same time that costs money 

Tod Leaven: Yes. 

Matt Peiken: This city is very strapped for money. Yes. There's only there are only so many vehicles we have, Mechanisms we have to raise money and property taxes is really the chief one because the state doesn't allow The city to enact other taxes.

So how do you how and I want to expand this beyond [00:09:00] just Services around affordable housing and wraparound services to your general policy positions on other issues. How can we pay for some of the things that are your priorities or how where do you--

Tod Leaven: that is a wonderful question? Okay, so first and foremost Since property taxes are our mainstream of income, it generates a ton of property taxes.

Multifamily housing. I have a single family house. I'm not against single family housing. But, dollar per acre, tall multifamily housing is a cash cow for the city. And it should also further incentivize why we need to significantly refine the UDO to allow The missing middle. Not just the missing middle, but apartments and condos and duplexes and triplexes. That in itself will generate Significantly more revenue than we have now, but also if we are to prioritize what I like to call prioritize core city services.

So there's a reason why people pay taxes in Asheville not go [00:10:00] out and live In the county. It's because they expect your roads, your sidewalks, your infrastructures, your parks and rec. This is the main job of a city. We need to not rely upon a 20 year bond cycle to pay for the necessities. If the city were to prioritize core city services, which includes paying all city employees a full living wage, those priorities, if we were to fund those first before spending one penny on what I like to call pet projects, and I have pet projects as well. And I'll totally go into great detail, but those can't be funded at the expense of the actual core city services. I think with a little bit more due diligence and fiscal responsibility, which I think I would help bring, not only because of my legal training, but because of my experiences on the board of directors that I've served on, that's always been my role. I think we would be amazed at how better financially we are. 

Matt Peiken: Are you suggesting that we are I guess the city at [00:11:00] large, city leadership, isn't as scrutinous about where money is going? 

Tod Leaven: Absolutely. And I think a concept I've heard a lot, especially when it comes to grants, is the concept of free money. Like I when the city decided to do the damn 400, 000 toilet. And I was like, Oh, you could have spent a fraction of that on the actual existing bathroom across the street. No. That doesn't count. That's free money. What do you mean free money? No, it's from a federal grant.

I'm like, what, you don't fucking pay your federal taxes? That that those concepts of, no, it's free money, yeah, just spend it. I think it's irresponsible, and I think it's not, and it's not ill intent. It's not ill hearted. No one is trying to engage in fraud, waste, and abuse. It's not that. It's just the pumping the brakes. 

Oh, a great example. And I think this is a safe one to bring up because I don't think anyone is currently on city council when the electric buses were purchased. But had anyone spent, I don't know, [00:12:00] like 15 minutes, sat down with a laptop and said What about maintenance?

Oh, these buses have a proprietary maintenance agreement. So if the company goes out of business, they're screwed and they're very large paperweights. That's not an excessive amount of due diligence that the city could have done,, But out of the excitement of getting an electric bus, it wasn't done.

And it's, I'm pro electric buses. I'm very pro EV. I think it's really smart. And I think it'll help incentivize us to further expand upon our solar and wind infrastructure. We just need to do due diligence. And like with that 400, 000 toilet. There are cities that have invested money in that and are ripping them out right now.

And that's a kind of a little bit of extra due diligence that we could do and when that's raised up, The retort shouldn't be, Oh, that doesn't count, it's free money. 

Matt Peiken: Do you think that's happening in general, that the city is pursuing shiny bulbs, in a way and going [00:13:00] after things like that rather than addressing core issues from the root up?

Tod Leaven: Oh God, of course. When you have sitting members of city council complaining about what they call deferred maintenance, that proves that's going on, and I personally like every single person who's currently on city council. I think they have the city's best interest in mind.

They are good people. I'm so happy I'm running for city council and not state or national office. Every single person who's running. So they're really good people. They have really big hearts, but I think you would be a fool to say that the city does not do a proper amount of due diligence and a proper amount of focus upon core city services, when the sitting city council themselves talk about oh, we have to raise taxes because deferred maintenance. 

Matt Peiken: Do you think some of this is hindsight? That you know on the front end of issues, that with all evidence or at least all data that's available to city council, and About the time that they have [00:14:00] to study this or lack of time they might have to study things in depth to the degree that you're talking about that is in hindsight you can see. Oh, this became an issue or this. 

Tod Leaven: I get it. And I think that's very kind of you to say that. I don't think you have to be a member of Mensa to realize that if you build a pool, you have to maintain it. And it's something that I want to throw some good credit to CJ. He talks a lot about, you know how cheap it would have been to maintain the Malvern Hills pool if we actually maintained it? And now it costs, 80 fold because, oh yeah, we're supposed to maintain that, oops. Or, oh, we should have been maintaining the parking decks.

That, with the electric buses, maybe, but if you don't have the foresight to think, How are they going to be maintained? How are they going to be stored? What happens about the cold weather? These are normal discussions that an adult, a fiscally responsible adult who has to take care of other folks and has, any kind of a normal life, these are life skills that they should practice.

Matt Peiken: And at the same time, unlike [00:15:00] Adults who might get cost of living raises every year, two years, whatever, The city isn't necessarily getting raises We're trying to raise property taxes to account for the costs of things that have gone up so much.

I'm wondering, and this is just a question. I'm not saying this is a right or wrong approach. But if to take a maintenance first vantage point and Anticipating that certain things are going to cost, it means we're going to be spending more every year than we're spending now to maintain certain things, rather than the cost of 

Tod Leaven: something cheaper in the long run. Yeah. 

Matt Peiken: And I'm not saying it isn't. I'm just saying, okay, so my point is, okay, let's say to take a maintenance first approach. And again let's say I advocate that. Okay. Let's say doing so means we have to tack on 10 percent more than we are spending right now, It's going to cost us 10 percent more for the operations for every department whether it's roads, water, You name it.

That's a lot of money. I'm just suggesting Without [00:16:00] more money coming in, without passing another bond referendum, which you said, we can't just keep looking to referendums, it means reprioritizing, right? Taking money away from column B to put into column A. Yeah, yes. So what would say 

Tod Leaven: That column B is all of the things that are not core city services. 

Matt Peiken: Give me some examples of things you don't see as core city. 

Tod Leaven: So first and foremost, I want to say that If I were on city council right now, I would have voted in favor of the bond referendum because we're so stuck in that part right now. The only way we can afford to make up for the years and years of deferred maintenance is to raise taxes and to do the GO bond. I think is unfortunate .

The same way I would have voted in favor of the BID because the city has not been servicing the downtown anywhere near enough to where the property owners have actually decided, We'll pay for it ourselves. We just need these services. I think that's terrible and I think that shows that the city is not prioritizing what it should be, [00:17:00] but I would have voted in favor for it because again, I don't care about blame, solution going forward. Someone's got to do it. Okay.

A great example. And I don't want to harp on our current city council's pet projects because I think that's not fair. So I'm going to focus upon my own. I am an actor, I'm on the board of directors of multiple performing arts non profits in town. My god, we need a real valid performing arts center in Asheville.

We do. I would love to see the city have a building with multiple stages so the different arts collectives and non profits have free rehearsal space and performance space. That would be wonderful. That is not a core city service of the town. And if the town cannot afford to actually pay its own bills and maintain what it has and promote the arts, the arts are going to have to go with funding.

And I think that's sad. And that is a huge pet project. I want to, I think the arts thrive in Asheville despite the city not because of the city. So that's a pet project. 

Matt Peiken: Let me pause you then so two two Costly elements which relate to what you're talking about would be the refurbishing of Thomas Wolfe [00:18:00] Auditorium to get it in current contemporary shape and the second is McCormick Field and What the cost is to the city to renovate that and keep the Tourists in town. Both of those you could argue by your the way you frame the issue that they are Not core city services. So would you vote? So would you have voted against renovating McCormick field? 

Tod Leaven: I think that is Yes right now, I would have spent the money instead of going into Sorry, if the city had enough extra money after the proper funding of core city Services, I would have put that money in other venues of performing arts. But since that's not, and what happened was at the end of the budget cycle, Literally looking at city staff and at the fire departments Oh, we can't pay a living wage because we've run out of money. The city staff was discussed after the budget had already been finally. People voted to pay millions to mccormick [00:19:00] field Oh, we have to pay our staff. Oh, sorry. I

Matt Peiken: don't know that that's a fair characterization. You know because they did fund the city firefighters were raised I think eight and a half percent, somewhere around that point And in the police were it was like four and a half to five percent, six percent something like that. 

Tod Leaven: I would have prioritized funding them more and funding them earlier Before mccormick field, and if there was anything left after that after the discussion Of all city employee pay after that discussion, if there were some leftover, then yes, I think that's the time to talk about McCormick field. I think it's not fair to say would I vote against Thomas Wolfe or McCormick.

What I would have done is I would have said, hey, let's have this conversation after we talk about the Malvern Hills pool or after the parking deck.

Matt Peiken: Yeah, but you can't affect timing sometimes, right? Some things come up before other things. Let's say the city contractor, you know that there's a contract with police [00:20:00] and or fire that lasts until x 2026. Meanwhile the malvern hills Pool, they may not have known in 2021 that this would be an issue in 2023, I'm just saying sometimes you don't know.

Tod Leaven: Get the hypothetical that you're saying. I think they probably did not know about the Malvern Hills pool in 2021. And I think that's all on them. I think people knew about the Malvern Hills pool in 2018 and 2019. Especially certain stuff like your staff payment. If for some reason you're on city council You don't realize you have to pay your staff every single year, then you don't belong on city council I don't think you don't realize you have to pay them Yeah, but they know it's going to come up and I think they can prioritize that above other Projects.

And like when I say i'm big into the performing arts, I love the performing arts, but even I realize Some things are going to have to get funded. Am I saying that I don't [00:21:00] fund the performing arts at all? Absolutely not. But I just say that the city has to prioritize core city services first. 

Matt Peiken: Do you think Thomas Wolfe and what the city has committed to Thomas Wolfe is wrong?

Tod Leaven: Thomas, I think Thomas Wolfe is just a, I don't say it's a lost cause. It's really sad. I think it's a terrible space. I think as a performer, I think the acoustics there are terrible. I think money was probably going to be spent better. And I think we'll get significant more bang out of her buck looking at Other places for the performing arts venue instead of continuing to funnel it into Thomas wolfe. 

I know there was talk about the spot next to City hall, I think, you know that would probably be money better spent. To be completely honest and transparent though, because i'm not on city council, I don't have access to every single discussion that city council makes and this is really important. And I really hope that everyone else who's running also admits this: I am not an answer man.

The reason why I'm running for city council is not because you can ask me, do I know what's best for folks in Shiloh? Hell no. Why? Because I don't live [00:22:00] in Shiloh. Do I know what's best for people in Biltmore Park? No, because I don't live there. I don't know what's best for everybody.

But I'm a process man and I definitely am willing to listen. So even though I just said all this stuff about say, Thomas Wolfe, if it comes up and I realized, Oh Christ, that's actually a really good idea, I am flexible enough to adjust to say, okay, let's continue to look at that, if that makes sense.

Matt Peiken: Yeah. You mentioned, so you're a person who really wants to stress and emphasize core city services.

Tod Leaven: Which includes affordable housing or making it easier to promote and build affordable housing and city pay, but yes core city services, Public safety your water. Yes. Streets, parking deck. 

Matt Peiken: So getting to that, I would venture to say that every city council person probably would say they agree that we should be emphasizing core city services first. Maybe you might see otherwise, and tell me if you do, [00:23:00] but even within that, are there core city services that have not been emphasized enough? Are there some that should be getting more focus, more funding, which would mean taking away funding from other areas that are now being funded?

Tod Leaven: No, and Matt, no one wants to be that interviewee that argues with his interviewer. Argue with me. Yeah. I'm fine with that. I think it's a false narrative that you're spinning. And it's because even, yes I bet if you were to ask every single person who's been on city council for the past 20 years at us, Oh, of course, city of services, that's the number one reason why I'm running for, and then why the fuck are we stuck here with deferred maintenance?

I think there's a difference between what you actually do and what you say, So I think that's just a non argument. And I saw this with the police pay and the fire pay, oh, if we pay the police more, that means we're stealing money from the pockets of the fire department.

And I think that's just crap. I think The city has enough money to fully fund all core city services going [00:24:00] forward. I think we need the GO bond and in stuff to make up for decades. So I'm not just blaming the current city council at all. In fact, there's very little I can blame them for because they're really good folk, but I think for decades of deferred maintenance means that no maintenance.

Okay. I think we need to get the bonds to catch up. But going forward, unless we actually pull our heads out of our rear and start funding, start prioritizing what is the main job of city council and fund that first, we're not going to get out of the cycle. 

One of the first things that I did in law after when I moved back to Asheville, is I practice homeowner's association law. And my specialty, not because I was really good at it, because no other attorney wanted to do this shit, I felt I represented the HOAs, and I brought defective and deficient boards back online. And they're wonderful boards. We probably represented 50 some, and they're great boards that wanted to feed the poor.

They wanted to have a pool, or they wanted to paint this, or they wanted to do this. I'm like, listen no. What's the core, what's the [00:25:00] one job if this HOA could actually do one job, what is it? The road maintenance agreement. Then let's get rid of all the other shit. Let's focus on that, find a common goal, go forward.

And then once we get back in line and we're productive, then we start to expand out and do those good things. And going forward, we're financially responsible and profitable. 

Matt Peiken: You just touched on the kind of law that you've done, or at least partially, what was your area of focus as a lawyer?

Tod Leaven: Okay I still am. So it started off, my first job for the first, few years was I did medical malpractice on behalf of inmates, which was because even though they may be rapists and felons and stuff, they have constitutional rights, and when a judge sentenced them to jail, it's not to have the wrong leg cut off.

So it was fascinating work, crazy work. When I moved back to Asheville My focus was land use and homeowners association for a number of few years. Then I became a partner Grimes, Teich and Anderson, which is a great firm I was there for about 10 years and I switched primarily to veterans law. [00:26:00] And now that I have my own law practice with my wife who's also a lawyer. In fact, she's the one who convinced me to go to law school. I do almost solely veterans law, So it's veterans disability appeals, but it's because i'm a disabled Multiple combat bet myself. 

Matt Peiken: Oh, so tell me in the time since you announced your candidacy, what have you learned about the city or how residents view the city and what they view city council can and can't do? What have you learned in these months that has affected where you're coming to the issues now, then let's say even back in April and may? 

Tod Leaven: Okay. So I decided to run about a year ago and I think most people don't, and I'm going to over generalize there, most people think that city council actually run the city, the day to day operations of the city.

And I think they expect city council to, and if they don't agree with what the city manager is doing, they expect the city council to jump in and micromanage. And think that's [00:27:00] very evident stuff. Like. The reparations commission where people are like damn it. They've taken too long. City council, do something You know 

Matt Peiken: I was going to ask you and not to interrupt your flow on the answer of this question But I was going to ask you about reparations in a sense and it's been delayed, deferred. The reparations commission has asked more time. Meanwhile, the racial justice coalition is looking for a new executive director. Just curious from an outside looking in do you think Is it, as a white man, I'm a white man, is it our role to just step back and not have a voice in this?

Tod Leaven: When Asheville decided to be the first city to have a reparations commission, and they consciously, and I think it was a good choice, they consciously decided, let's make it a really big board, so everyone has a voice, the second we voted for that, then we needed to get our asses out of the kitchen And actually let them come up with their recommendation.

If we wanted it to be efficient, which I, I have lots of experience on board of directors, if we [00:28:00] wanted it to be efficient and timely, we said, okay, appoint five people. But they didn't. Twenty five people. Yeah, come on, twenty five, you get twenty five people. Hey, I've never had an HOA with twenty five people on it. And if there was, I'd say, you guys are stupid.

No, I'm not, the reparations commission is not stupid for being that large. But for an HOA, if you want it to be efficient and timely, You make it streamlined and more of a representational type of basis. The fact that Asheville wanted it to be so large, the second they voted, it needs to be large them as they need to shut the hell up, stop trying to micromanage the timeline and actually let the people do their job. 

Because if Asheville really wants to know what the community thinks we should do for reparations, we need to shut up and let the community, and if the community comes back and says, we need another year, you know what Asheville needs to say? Yes. Why? Because it was our decision to make it such a large board. Yeah. So that's, that's what I strongly believe. 

Matt Peiken: So getting back to the question I asked [00:29:00] before you brought up reparations about what you've learned in your campaign that has affected your views on different issues. 

Tod Leaven: Okay. So the big thing is housing. So I live in Montford, which I think is a model for the missing middle. Right next door is a family home. It's an old home that's turned into five apartments. Two doors down on the left, there's an old home that's turned into 12 apartments and there's like a 20 unit apartment down here a little bit. Then like a couple of blocks down the road or Klondike. So it's, it has everything from incredibly multi, multi million dollar homes to government homes.

We're on the neighborhood. It's beautiful, amazing tree canopy, a greenway walking. It's just, it's great. And it works. I'm like, Who would be opposed to this in Asheville? And I'm not gonna call anyone out because again I think you need to be solution minded instead of blame centric And I think you need to always have a very forgiving and open heart. Otherwise, you won't be able to turn people to the right path a quality I learned in the military.

But Talking to people who seem really no you [00:30:00] can't build in my backyard. No, you can't do this. No, you can't know this is the terrible and when you get down to it You Okay, Tod, listen, I get what you're saying. Yes, poor people, they deserve to live in my neighborhood too. But can we pick out who actually moves here?

Matt Peiken: People are saying, people are in a sense saying that? 

Tod Leaven: No, it doesn't sound like, no. And it turns out, that it's, I think there's a lot of subtle racism that goes on in Asheville that I had no clue. And I don't want to, and I know this is probably political suicide saying it, but it's, I'm a Democrat and a bunch of Democrats get around there.

Oh, it's the Republicans. Oh, it's the people in the County. Oh, the Republicans, they're evil, blah, blah, blah. I think there is more subtle racism With, say, the North Asheville Karens than with the Leicester Jethro's. Yeah. 

Matt Peiken: Wow. And so knowing that's come up among your potential constituency, how have you reacted and responded? What do you say to that?

Tod Leaven: You gotta lead with love. You can't point your finger and you can't say, you are the second you say you are wrong. [00:31:00] What is wrong with you? That's terrible. A, you're cutting them off from growing themselves, and B, they're gonna build a defensive wall and then C, nothing's going to come.

You have to say, Hey, I understand you may think that. I disagree but you have a valid point. It's even stuff that I don't, I might not think is valid. You have to approach it with love and with understanding the way you do that wayward cousin at Thanksgiving and you sit down and you're like, okay, let's talk about, let's really talk.

Hey, why don't you come to my neighborhood? Check this out. And then with love, leading with love, non judgmental love, I think is the way that gets addressed. And I have found, I've never run for political office in my life, being a veterans law attorney, most, 75 percent of my clients are predisposed to be significantly on the further right.

And sitting down with them and talking to them about the importance of reparations. I've had so many say, God, Tod, I never thought about that. Oh yeah, that's cool. But had I [00:32:00] said, listen, you're a jerk and blah, blah, blah, and started off with that, I would have never been able to have cracked through.

So I think the way you deal with it is you put down your ego. You stop trying to be so judgmental and you lead with love. 

Matt Peiken: Is there anything we haven't talked about issue wise? And you have some core elements on your website, your platform. We've talked a lot about affordable housing. Public safety. We didn't talk about public transportation.

Tod Leaven: Okay housing. Housing. And I hate to sound like a one trick pony. And a lot of times, I do. But I especially bow to like the Asheville For All folks. At every venue I have, I'm going to talk about the importance of housing. If we were to develop, Significantly develop a lot more multifamily housing downtown and along corridors, we wouldn't have to, the conversation is, do we expand the bus route out to Canton? Cause that's the only place that workers can afford to live. We don't have to have that conversation because people can actually afford to live downtown. 

So I think public transportation is a core city service. It's incredibly [00:33:00] important. If we were to build significant more housing right in the middle of downtown, We would have to depend less upon cars. Because you could have more walkability, more bikeability, and we would have to depend less upon long, extensive routes of public transportation. And I also think the tree canopy, you destroy significantly less tree canopy and significantly less environment if you build up, as opposed to sprawl. And the way things are going right now, the only development in Asheville is this suburban sprawl. 

Matt Peiken: You mentioned if we build more, there's only so much we meaning city can do. Right? I mean, it takes, It takes developers, private developers. So what can we do to better incentivize developers to develop?

Tod Leaven: The UDO. And I don't think. 

Matt Peiken: When you say UDO, you mean the unified development ordinance? 

Tod Leaven: Yes. Yeah. Yes. And I think like off the top of my head, easy, low hanging fruit, get rid of the parking requirement. I think if we make it easier to build, I've heard this floated and I think it sounds like a great [00:34:00] idea, if city were to just set out This is what we want downtown. If you can do it, You don't even have to go in front of the PNC. You can just can almost like build by right.

I think if we made building easier, more people would want to build. I think it was right around the 4th of July, I was in a bar in Savannah just chit chatting with a couple next to me. Turns out they were developers and when they heard I was from Asheville, they had some four letter words and said, I'm never going back to try to develop in that town. You guys are crazy. That's a lot of the developers, the general consensus is dealing with Asheville is a nightmare. So I think it's not even that we have to go above and court them. I think if we just stop scaring them away. 

I think rich people Will always be able to find housing because if there isn't housing stock out there for really wealthy people, They'll just pay to have a house built. So I think when I keep talking about Developing affordable housing, I really want to stress what I mean affordable housing. I'm not talking about A 900, [00:35:00] 000 condo. Well, It's cheaper than a 2 million condo. Yeah. Yeah, that's great by Asheville standards. That's not what i'm talking. I'm literally talking about Someone who works down. The people who serve the city deserve to live in the city.