The Facts: The Tourism Development Authority (TDA) Annual Report will be presented to the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners on January 6, 2026. The presentation provides key performance indicators for Post-Helene tourism and lodging trends, including occupancy and economic indicators, marketing results, major upcoming events and conferences, and updates on tourism product development investments. The report also highlights the “Always Asheville Fund,” which has raised and awarded over $2.2 million to support small businesses following Helene, as well as other community partnership initiatives.

Review the TDA Annual Report presentation here.

Our Assessment: We are glad to see the TDA report on community-oriented investments, such as the Always Asheville Fund, which supports local small businesses that may have been disproportionately affected by Helene—businesses that often employ low-wage workers and serve historically-marginalized populations. The inclusion of nonprofit partnerships and support for local business recovery aligns with equity-focused disaster response principles.

However, the presentation emphasizes tourism performance metrics (e.g., occupancy rates, visitor spending), without accompanying analysis of how tourism growth affects Buncombe County residents—especially workers in the service industry, low-income households, and renters facing affordability pressures. There is no explicit reporting on whether tourism recovery contributes to wage growth for service workers, which sectors benefit most, or how tourism revenue supports community services for local residents.

Furthermore, while the TDA invests in marketing and large events, it does not provide transparent data on who benefits from those investments. We know that tourism contributes to housing cost escalation and service worker shortages. The absence of equity-focused indicators means that decisions may be driven by economic performance without adequately considering outcomes – positive and negative – as they are distributed across our region’s local residents.

We know that the Buncombe County Commission has limited leverage over the TDA, but these annual reports are a good opportunity to raise these kinds of points and demand greater accountability to our community. We’d like to see the Commissioners take that opportunity with this report, and push for even more transparency in future reports.

Our Proposal: We proposed a series of actions for the Buncombe County Commissioners for their meeting on 1/6/2026; they chose not to take them. In our revised template below, we’re suggesting that they push for this kind of data in future reports. Here were the actions we proposed.

• At the presentation on January 6th, they can ask TDA President and CEO Vic Isley important questions, such as:
  • How does tourism investment affect housing affordability for low-wage workers?
  • Are tourism revenues being reinvested in communities most impacted by tourism pressures?
• Moving forward, they can request that future TDA reports include equity indicators, such as tourism-sector wage data broken down by race, gender, and income, and measures of housing cost changes correlated with tourism activity.
• They can ask for impact assessments regarding how tourism investments affect low-wage workers and small, locally owned businesses.
• They can encourage alignment between tourism strategy and broader community objectives such as housing affordability, workforce stability, and disaster resilience.

Things to do: Join us in calling on Buncombe County leaders to address equity issues with tourism, as well as two other issues on the January 6th agenda highlighted on this page. We have drafted a template for one email that advocates for equity in all three of these issues. If you want more information on the other two issues before you send your letter, read on above and below this item on this page.

You can send an email to Buncombe County leaders by filling out the form below. Our email tool will send an individually addressed email to the recipients, and enable us to track how many emails were sent overall in the campaign. If you prefer to write your own email, you can copy and paste (and adapt) our template text – please cc: or bcc: info@gapavl.org on your individualized email, so we can better track how many emails were sent.

To: Avril.Pinder@buncombecounty.org, alfred.whitesides@buncombecounty.org, amanda.edwards@buncombecounty.org, drew.ball@buncombecounty.org, jennifer.horton@buncombecounty.org, martin.moore@buncombecounty.org, parker.sloan@buncombecounty.org, terri.wells@buncombecounty.org

CC: or BCC: info@gapavl.org

Subject: Equity Follow-Up on TDA Presentation, Rogers Rezoning, and School Funding Agreement

Dear Buncombe County Manager and Commission,

Thank you for your ongoing service to Buncombe County. I’m writing regarding three items from the January 6, 2026 agenda.

• For the TDA Annual Report, I encourage you to follow up with Vic Isley and ask her to offer data on the impact of tourism on housing affordability for low-wage workers, and how tourism revenues are being reinvested in communities most impacted by tourism pressures. I also encourage you to request that future presentations include equity indicators such as workforce wage data, housing cost impacts, and distributional effects of tourism strategies.
• I am disappointed that in approving the Rogers rezoning, you didn’t include a monitoring amendment that tracks housing affordability and displacement outcomes post-approval, missing an important opportunity for the County to demonstrate its commitments to equity and affordability for its residents. Would you be in favor of tracking this kind of data moving forward?
• I am disappointed that in approving the School Funding Agreement, you didn’t ask for an annual, disaggregated equity impact summary to accompany the agreement. Would you be in favor of including that summary in the future?

These steps are consistent with Buncombe County’s equity commitments and will help ensure policy outcomes benefit all residents. The team at GAPavl has a summary of these recommendations at gapavl.org that I encourage you to consider.

Thanks for your leadership,

(Your Name)

Report Back

At the 1/6/2026 Commission meeting, Commissioner Drew Ball asked TDA CEO Vic Isley to comment on the “intersection between tourism and affordable housing.” Ms. Isley’s response was that if tourism increases that will be better for workers and will help people stay housed, but she did not provide any evidence of this relationship. None of the data that we suggested was requested or provided.

Total GAP Supporter Actions Taken: 21

Recipients and Responses:

Buncombe County Commission

• County Manager Avril Pinder: No response
• County Commission Chair Amanda Edwards: No response
• County Commissioner Al Whitesides: No response
• County Commissioner Drew Ball: See above
• County Commissioner Jennifer Horton: No response
• County Commissioner Martin Moore: No response
• County Commissioner Parker Sloane: No response
• County Commissioner Terri Wells: No response