THE TOP 10 NEWSSTORIES OF 2017: 3, 2, 1.

Henderson County News

THE TOP 10 NEWSSTORIES OF 2017: 7, 6, 5, 4 ...

No. 7. Good news at Seven Falls Although no one’s pulling any building permits yet with a Seven Falls address, the development based on the fraud that sent Keith Vinson to prison had its best year since the dizzying days when country musicians choppered in for exclusive sales extravaganzas. Thanks to the patient guidance of County Attorney Russ Burrell and a star-studded lineup of attorneys who knew how to reach a compromise, lot owners agreed to a distribution of $5.5 million in bond money Henderson County received after the development failed. “My argument in court about why Judge Powell should accept this is I didn’t go through life seeing very many miracles but this is as close to one I’ve seen in a long time,” Burrell said. “I did not expect them to agree to anything.” The horizon brightened, too, when Carolina Mountain Land Conservancy bought 146 acres of old Seven Falls property along the French Broad River, pledging to preserve the land for passive recreational use and water quality protection. No. 6. Water wars For generations, water — where it comes from, where it goes and who decides— has created conflict in the Henderson-Buncombe region. This year was no different, except now Henderson County commissioners have trained their sights on Hendersonville, not Asheville. In March, commissioners called on the state Legislature to force the city to cede its water system to the county. If it refused, commissioners wanted the Legislature to place the city system under state control. Commissioners contend that the city ought to charge customers outside the city the same rate — or close to the same rate — as ratepayers inside. Before the March 15 meeting, the city issued a pre-emptive strike to counter arguments Commissioner Bill Lapsley has made for the takeover. “The City of Hendersonville contends that Commissioner Lapsley’s facts are misconstrued, taken out of context or simply wrong,” City Manager John Connet said in a news release. State Rep. Chuck McGrady filed a bill to put the city system under control and later softened that to a study of regional water system. At year’s end, the conflict remained unresolved. No. 5. Store wars The commercial sizzle in Hendersonville’s south gateway is going to get even hotter when Publix opens next year. Ingles and Dollar Tree opened in 2017 at ground zero of the grocery and drugstore war. Harris Teeter scrambled to add Starbucks coffee and ready-to-eat items to keep pace with Ingles, Fresh Market and Publix. The NCDOT’s plans for traffic are already drawing opposition. An NCDOT plan for the city’s south side envisions three roundabouts, including one where King, Main and Church streets merge. A White Street extension would take two commercial buildings and reduce parking for Walgreens and Wendy’s. Property owners and city council members are skeptical at best. Look for a scrum in 2018.   Read Story »

Henderson County News

THE TOP 10 NEWSSTORIES OF 2017: 10, 9, 8 ...

  No. 10. Seventh Avenue rising The Hendersonville City Council saw drawings of brick paver crosswalks, leafy medians and handsome gateways on Seventh Avenue East. They talked about façade grants and heard a consultant describe an aggressive redevelopment strategy that would use eminent domain to bulldoze dilapidated houses and buildings. But in the end it was the market — the craft beer boom and an improving economy — that sparked progress on Seventh Avenue in 2017. The changing fortunes of the once-bustling Historic Seventh Avenue District was most striking in the upper end. In the 300 block, Triskelion Brewing Co.’s two-story taproom rose from the ground. Underground Bakery owner Matthew Hickman added Independent Beans espresso bar, dine-in and delivery chain Marco’s Pizza prepared to open and a fitness center moved in. As the year closed, increased traffic had sparked friction between the Hendersonville Rescue Mission and neighboring businesses. And suddenly a parking shortage —  a good problem to have — was becoming a topic. On the last day of the year, Triskelion will open its preview space to customers — in the brewhouse behind the taproom — and start pouring craft beer. No. 9. Mail at the mall Besides the talk of Publix — will they or won’t they break ground? — the most watched decision was where our our new post office would end up. Ever since the Postal Service announced it was looking for new digs, box holders and regular counter customers had chattered about where they’d next have to go. Now they know: Blue Ridge Mall. “The Postal Service is excited to have secured a new location for the Hendersonville Post Office,” said Postal Service spokesman Phillip J. Bogenberger. The post office will be in the 7,000-square-foot space currently occupied by Sears, which plans to move a few doors down. “I just don’t associate the post office with a mall,” said Charlene Varnes, who also had concerns about accessing her P.O. box at night. “It should be a stand-alone building.” Hendersonville mayor pro tem Ron Stephens agrees with that. At the Dec. 7 council meeting, Stephens raised safety concerns and urged the council to register its dissatisfaction with the Postal Service’s decision. Others looked on the bright side. “Anything is better than this,” Mary Stroman said of the deteriorating brick building on Fifth Avenue. “The mall needs a shot in the arm.” No. 8: A star departs County Manager Steve Wyatt recalled his reaction when a delegation from the Henderson County Partnership for Economic Development stepped into his office in September. “When they came to see me to deliver the bad news they looked like their dog had been run over,” Wyatt said. “I knew before they opened their mouth what they were going to tell me. I said, ‘That’s Elected officials and company manager celebrate the GF Linamar, one of Tate's last industrial catches.not bad news. Bad news would be, “We’re having to run this guy off because we’re not getting anything done.”’” The news that made their faces droop was that Partnership President Andrew Tate had resigned to take a job with the North Carolina Railroad in Raleigh. “I’ve been doing this for 35 years,” Wyatt said. “In his role, he is as effective as anyone I’ve ever worked with. The results speak for themselves.” What were those results? Demmel, Empire Distributors, Legacy Paddlesports, UPM Raflatac Specials, Norafin, the Dirty Dancing film production, Sierra Nevada Brewing Co., Microtech Knives, Raumedic, PMA Tools, Bold Rock Hard Cider, Smart Products, Wingate University, Country Malt Group, GF Linamar. Those businesses made a taxable investment of $796,458,000 and created 2,070 jobs. “That’s going to change hundreds of lives,” Wyatt said.   Read Story »

Hendersonville News

BUSINESS BRIEFS: Penny certified, nurses honored

Will Penny certified through Wharton School   Will Penny, president of Penny Insurance Agency in Hendersonville, North Carolina, has been awarded the Certified Advisor of Personal Insurance designation from the Aresty Institute of Executive Education at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and Chubb Insurance. Will PennyPenny is among a group of only 38 agents this year to receive the certification after completing a one-year intensive educational program on understanding the lifestyle and risk management and insurance needs of successful individuals and families. Created by Wharton and Chubb in 2014, the CAPI program is the first of its kind to focus on a specific client segment in the personal insurance marketplace. A Henderson County native, Penny is the third generation president of Penny Insurance Agency. He is a graduate of Wofford College, and has been with Penny Insurance since 1994. Courses are taught by Wharton faculty, Chubb subject matter experts and other professionals. Agents received instruction on the Wharton campus at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and through virtual classes, webcasts, reading assignments and other online activities throughout 2017. Founded in 1881 as the first collegiate business school, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania is recognized globally for intellectual leadership and ongoing innovation across every major discipline of business education. Chubb is the world’s largest publicly traded property and casualty insurance company, and the largest commercial insurer in the United States.   Austin named PeriAnesthesia Nurse of the Year Pardee UNC Health Care nurse Debbie Austin has been named PeriAnesthesia Nurse of the Year by the North Carolina Association of PeriAnesthesia Nurses. The award recognizes a nurse who demonstrates excellence in the practice, management and teaching of PeriAnesthesia nursing, and promotes high standards in the profession. Austin, an RN, is a charge nurse in the hospital’s post-anesthesia care unit, where she treats patients recovering from anesthesia. She also serves as a faculty instructor for advanced cardiovascular life support, pediatric advanced life support and basic cardiac life support certification training.             For more than a year, Austin has spearheaded a pilot program for the safe disposal of narcotic medications given to patients for post-operative pain. The program uses education regarding safe storage and disposal, as well as Deterra bags, which allow patients to safely dispose of unused narcotics at home after a surgical procedure. Not only did Austin obtain funding from the Pardee Hospital Foundation for the first 200 packs of Deterra, she also educated the Day Surgery nursing staff on the need for these bags and worked closely with Pardee administration, Hope Rx and the Henderson County Sheriff’s Office to make the pilot program successful.             “Debbie has always had a heart for serving others and our community, whether she is feeding and clothing the homeless, sponsoring a food drive, or volunteering at church,” said nurse Jennifer White a colleague of Austin’s who nominated her for the award. “By confronting the drug epidemic head on and gaining hospital support, Debbie is making a lasting impact on the prescription narcotics problem in our community. She is most deserving of this award.”   Darlyne Jarrett honored as DAISY award winner Darlyne Jarrett has received the DAISY Award at Park Ridge Health. A part of the Home Health team, Jarrett, 82, was recognized for her outstanding character and work ethic. Darlyne Jarrett“She is always willing and works every day that we have visits for her to do. She will go to any area, and is always smiling and cheerful,” a nominating letter said. “Patients ask for her specifically. She consistently goes above and beyond for her patients and for her team. She takes call even though she is not obligated to do so as a PRN nurse, and is often helping others by switching out call so they can be with family or meet other personal obligations.” Jarrett also serves as a Spiritual Ambassador for the department, and is currently going to a particular patient’s home on Sunday afternoons for Bible study because the patient said she wished someone would talk with her about the Bible. She takes meals to patients in need and provides them with community resources on her own time. The DAISY Award was created by the family of J. Patrick Barnes to thank the nurses who cared for Patrick and for them as he battled an autoimmune disease. Patrick lost his battle, but his family realized the impact his nurses had on the final days of his life and wanted to create a lasting opportunity for all families who experience the benefits of the extraordinary care of nurses to show their appreciation.     Park Ridge Imaging Center is accredited Park Ridge Health’s Diagnostic Imaging Center, located at the main campus, has earned the American College of Radiology Accreditation for a new 128-slice CT Scanner, the hospital announced. Park Ridge Health installed the GE 128-slice imager earlier this year. At that point, Wendy Miller, one of Park Ridge Health’s Diagnostic Imaging Radiology Technologists, took the lead to begin the process of attaining the ACR accreditation.  “Wendy ensures patient safety and clinical quality are top priorities in our Computerized Tomography (CT) Suite,” said Todd Guffey, Park Ridge Health Director of Diagnostic Imaging. “Wendy not only made sure the Diagnostic Imaging team met all the ACR requirements, but she did so without interrupting the exceptional care each of our CT patients received. Achieving this accreditation shows this team’s passion for exceeding the expectations of providing high-quality care to our patients.” To learn more about the Park Ridge Health Imaging Center or to make an appointment, call 855.PRH.LIFE (855.774.5433) to speak with a member of the Park Ridge Health Patient Resource Team.   Read Story »

Hendersonville News

Second Seventh Avenue brewery opening on New Year's Eve

With seven gleaming tanks behind him, Jonathan Ayers passionately describes the lineup of craft beer he plans to pour in 12 days from now. “As soon as I get all seven of my tanks filled I’m going to be making my announcement,” he said in mid-December. They’re filled now, and Ayers announced this week that he is opening his Triskelion Brewing Co. with a New Year’s Eve party on Dec. 31. He and his wife and co-brewer Becky plan to serve food, wine, mead (wine made of fermented honey) and of course beer. “We’re walking through the door with seven of our own beers,” he says. They also plan to have food on New Year’s Eve. Triskelion will open in the brewhouse, which is behind the 5,000-square-foot taproom in the 300 block of Seventh Avenue East. “We’re shooting to try to get that one open around April or May,” he says. It’s all-concrete both for fire code and esthetic reasons. “The décor we’re doing, it’s not like what goes on around here,” he says. “Everybody does like mountain rustic. We’re not doing that. This is going to be like Norwegian modern, clean …” “IKEA style,” Becky adds. “It’s going to be something different,” Jonathan adds. He says patrons can get food with their beverages in a variety of ways. “Marco’s has an app,” he says. “You can be sitting in here and place the order for your subs and pizza and tell them you’re at the brewery and they’ll hand walk it over to you. You don’t even have to leave.” They’re also talking to Sol y Luna. “They deliver. They want to keep a menu here so if you want something different than pizza you can call Sol y Luna and have them bring the food down to us.” And they’d like to work something out with Daddy D’s, the Southern food restaurant across the street. Triskelion becomes the second microbrewery in the Historic Seventh Avenue District, joining the pioneering Southern Appalachian Brewing Co., the first one in Hendersonville. Among the craft beers the couple will debut on New Year’s Eve are the Punkadelic porter, the Order of the Kensmen, a wheat heavy Scottish ale; and two IPAs. Regular hours will be 4 p.m.-midnight Thursday and Friday and noon-midnight Saturday.   Read Story »

Hendersonville News

McGrady 'very disappointed' with Buncombe over MSD vote

Defying the wishes of Henderson County commissioners and state Rep. Chuck McGrady, the governing board of an Asheville-based sewer system on Wednesday shot down a proposal to merge with a Henderson County-owned system and add three Henderson County representatives to the MSD board. The Metropolitan Sewer District voted 10-1 against the new makeup after board members from Buncombe, Asheville and other Buncombe towns served by the utility questioned the motives of McGrady and Henderson County officials. “I couldn’t believe it,” said Henderson County Commissioner Bill Lapsley, who attended the meeting and spoke in favor of the change. The lopsided vote was a stunning setback to the efforts of Henderson County to promote a cooperative, regional approach to providing water and service through a governing body with representation from a broad customer base. Given the decisive no vote, Lapsley said he did not see how the issue would be revived. “It’s off the table. They voted 10-1 not to do it,” he said. A state law McGrady sponsored last spring would have required the Metropolitan Sewer District to add the Henderson County representatives had it voted to merge with the Cane Creek Sewer District, as McGrady and the Henderson County commissioners wanted. The Cane Creek Sewer District, a county-owned utility, serves 3,700 customers in northern Henderson County. McGrady, a former Henderson County commissioner, and the current Board of Commissioners, with Lapsley in the lead, have argued for what they paint as regional cooperation. The attempt to think beyond city and county lines — and put more Henderson County officials on governing boards — is viewed with suspicion by Asheville city officials. McGrady also attended to advocate for the merger and new board makeup. “Sewer ought to be handled on a regional basis and these political boundaries we have I don't think are the way we ought to handle sewer — or water for that matter, but we're just here about sewer,” McGrady said, according to a report in the Asheville Citizen-Times. The Cane Creek Sewer District is a collection system, not a treatment system. It owns the sewer lines that carry sewage to the MSD plant in Woodfin, which treats the effluent for a fee. Henderson County officials have long complained that Cane Creek customers pay higher sewer rates than MSD customers. ‘Oh, this is a conspiracy’ Adding three members from Henderson County, MSD members said, would give Henderson County a disproportionate share of the overall membership board. The county would have 20 percent of the appointees on the 15-member board, on behalf of a Cane Creek customer base that amounts to just 7 percent of the total. Lapsley scoffed at the notion that adding Cane Creek to the MSD and adding Henderson County representatives was anything more than a straightforward effort at regional cooperation. “There would be one from Mills River, one from Fletcher and one of the county commissioners to represent the unincorporated area so that all the customers in the Cane Creek district are represented,” he said. “We weren’t going to have county people to vote together to take over MSD. That’s absurd. That was said. ‘Oh, this is a conspiracy.’ Several people said that. ‘There’s a sinister thing going on here. Henderson County — they've been pretty belligerent about this.’” Asheville Mayor Esther Manheimer and other MSD board members suggested last month that the MSD ought to withhold support for the change until it becomes clear what if anything the Legislature will do about city- and county-owned utilities. McGrady pushed through another bill this year that calls for a study of local utilities, their rates and governance. Manheimer and other Asheville officials fear that study will be used to justify putting municipal and county water and sewer systems under state control. “I really think that all that goodwill was torpedoed when Chuck got his new study committee, which is clearly starting that fight all over again,” said Barry Summers, an activist on Asheville area water issues who opposed a bill McGrady sponsored that would have turned over Asheville’s water system to the MSD. (The state Supreme Court invalidated the law in 2016.) “Over the past year he’s been talking about how he’s got another way to get it done,” Summer said. “It was exactly a year ago that he said ‘there’s more than one way to skin the cat.’” Summers thinks Henderson County lost support from the Buncombe officials when word got out about the new legislative study committee. On Nov. 15, a week after the committee’s formation and scope of work was announced, the MSD took up the proposed Cane Creek merger and voted to postpone a decision. “They brought it up at that board meeting,” Summers said. The tenor of the discussion was, “That’s looking at regional of water and sewer and we all know what that means,” he said. “They figured he was very likely taking another swing at not just Asheville but he’s talking about taking control of Hendersonville’s system, too. So everybody’s realizing he’s really going for this.”   McGrady ‘very disappointed’ McGrady, who called Summers “venomous,” acknowledges he continues to look for ways to guide Buncombe and Henderson counties and the cities of Asheville and Hendersonville to more regional solutions in water and sewer. Asheville and Buncombe officials ginned up opposition in a mistaken interpretation of his motives, he said. “Basically no one had a problem with Henderson County joining MSD,” he said. The city (of Asheville) had said that for a long time. Buncombe County has said that for a long time.” Then Asheville officials began spreading the word that the change in the makeup would cause Asheville to lose a seat on the MSD board. “I didn’t realize there was any problem until a month ago,” McGrady said. “I get a call from Mayor Manheimer and she’s saying there were problems here, Henderson County was going to be overrepresented.” Manheimer also expressed concern about the legislative study committee. “That was very problematic because I had done exactly what I told people I would do,” he said. McGrady said his goal last spring was to try to create “a mechanism reflecting agreements with respect to water.” “I was really surprised that Mayor Manheimer now was expressing this concern that was part of the stuff being put forward by the activist known as Barry Summers,” he said. “She made the motion” to delay action on the Cane Creek merger. “I’m very disappointed,” he added. “I feel like Asheville reneged on its agreement. I’m very disappointed with Buncombe County.” McGrady expressed frustration with the parochialism that characterizes water and sewer issues, in the form in this case of one representative asking, “What’s in it for Asheville?” “I said it’s good policy. We ought to deal with these things on a regional basis. Henderson County is giving up control of sewer to work in a regional manner. It makes sense. We have to work on water and sewer and transportation and other things on a regional basis.” For now, that looks like a remote possibility. A legislative tweak to make the agreement more palatable to the MSD members is unlikely, at least in the near term.“It would take unanimity among the affected parties, which would mean all the Buncombe County and all the Henderson legislators would have to be for it,” McGrady said. “And then getting it through in the short session would be hard and moreover I’m not even sure I’ve got the stomach for it.” From Henderson County’s point of view, status quo sustains rate inequity. “Let’s keep the rates up in Henderson County while giving us no representation,” he said. “And then they wonder why they can’t get cooperation on issues they care about.” The MSD vote comes three years after Henderson County Commission Chair Michael Edney and Manheimer worked out an agreement to resolve a 20-year-old dispute over a water plant the city of Asheville built on the Mills River. In exchange, Asheville gave a 137-acres site in Bent Creek to Henderson County. When the Asheville City Council and Henderson County Board of Commissioners settled the dispute, it appeared that the two bodies could be ready to work more cooperatively on regional utility issues. Manheimer even made a symbolic gesture after the council vote, fastening a pin depicting the Henderson County Historic Courthouse on her lapel above a city of Asheville pin. Wednesday’s stunning smackdown of the sewer system merger could reignite the mistrust that has long bedeviled any chance of regional cooperation. The 10-1 vote, Lapsley said, suggests that Asheville “has no interest in joint venturing with Henderson County on any utilities.”     Read Story »

News Archive

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