Every city has illusions about its culture. Here’s a list of Asheville’s, because it’s time we started facing our myths Above: Hieronymus Bosch’s “The Conjuror,” with a crowd getting their pockets picked while they watch an illusionist perform. Asheville’s got its own magic, a spell it casts that brings people

Pay is terrible in Asheville because there’s often no real protection for workers’ rights. To fix that, this city needs unions. Above: The rights assured to all workers under federal law, a key part of what unions help to enforce. Asheville has a wage problem, and a bad one. We’re making

For over a decade my family tried to make our lives in Asheville. But by this year, we simply couldn’t make it here anymore. Above: Downtown Asheville at night. Photo by Bill Rhodes. A few weeks ago, we ran a column by Noor Al-Sibai, a young journalist and writer who’d

Racist government programs shaped Asheville’s ‘urban renewal,’ demolishing homes and pushing out thousands. The results still haunt the city today. Above: Priscilla Ndiaye, with her map of the homes demolished in the Southside neighborhood during urban renewal. She’s standing on the site of the house her family lived in, condemned

The rising use of credit checks, just to allow one to rent housing in Asheville, excludes much of its working class and increasingly pushes them out of the city they make possible There was an important point raised in the Asheville Citizen-Times‘ June 30 forum on family homelessness, and one that hasn’t gotten

Concerned about low pay, a lack of benefits and many other problems, a group of local service workers are organizing Above: Image for Asheville Sustainable Restaurant Workforce, used with permission of Jessi Steelman. There are over 20,000 food service workers in the Asheville area, according to the Bureau of Labor

The city’s current tack amounts to exploiting artists’ work while ignoring them and pushing societal homogeneity. There’s a better way. Photo by Zen Sutherland. “It’s a waste of time debating the merits of illegal graffiti,” says Gus Cutty, a local muralist and street artist, but that has not stopped the argument from

Asheville’s current approach to diversity is like putting a bandage on a dirty wound. A better way will require a more politically and economically powerful black community — and the city truly addressing some hard history. Above: African-American owned businesses in downtown, before the East End neighborhood was devastated by

Above: locals protesting Gov. Pat McCrory’s appearance at Moogfest on April 24 . Photo by Scott Owen. Our latest opinion column is from leftist activist and former mayoral candidate Martin Ramsey, who attacks what he sees as an attitude of “stay-in-your-placeism” from political decision-makers in Asheville and elsewhere. By Martin

By David Forbes The city of Asheville is on course to spend $147 million. That’s the amount of its annual budget, covering everything from parks to public art to smartphones for cops. Except for us urban policy masochists, the words “city budget” don’t usually make people run to pour over