A meeting originally scheduled between the Asheville Downtown Association, city of Asheville staff and Council members is now a “downtown summit” in Pack Library at 3:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 21, with the public invited to attend and weigh in on the issues affecting the area.
Originally, the meeting was planned for a conference room on the sixth floor of City Hall, as Xpress reported Monday. There, representatives of the ADA were planning to bring the concerns of their members to staff and Council members. What they see as problems downtown include trash, crime, panhandling, and topless women.
However, on Tuesday the city announced a change of venue and format, and Business Services Manager Jaime Matthews tells Xpress that the shift is intended to give the public more chance to weigh in. As city staff did at a recent forum on the state of the Asheville Police Department, instead of taking comments in a town hall-style forum, they will break the attendees into small groups, write their concerns and suggestions down, and then compile those.
