Asheville council approves $275.8 million budget with property tax hike
Asheville City Council approved a $275.8 million budget on a 4-3 vote, lifting property taxes as residents face higher bills and sharper fights over pay and services.
Asheville City Council approved a $275.8 million budget on a 4-3 vote, locking in a property tax increase and exposing sharp divisions over how the city should fund itself in the year ahead. Vice Mayor Antanette Mosley and council members Sage Turner and Kim Roney voted no, showing that the debate reached well beyond routine bookkeeping and into the city’s core priorities.
The budget was adopted June 9 and covers the fiscal year that runs from July 1, 2026, through June 30, 2027. City staff said council restored an additional 1% employer contribution to 401(k) retirement accounts and set the FY27 General Fund tax rate at 37.69 cents per $100 of assessed valuation. Those changes will affect both city workers and property owners as Asheville tries to keep services operating under tighter financial pressure.
Officials said the spending plan reflects continued commitment to Helene recovery, service delivery and long-term financial stability. Bo Hess said the budget gap was driven more by inflation and slower growth than by missing money, a framing that points to a city still absorbing higher costs across payroll, supplies and operations.
The split vote also highlighted a deeper disagreement over what Asheville should protect first. Some critics said city staff pay still lagged and objected to cuts to community center hours, while supporters of the plan argued that the higher tax rate was needed to preserve essential services and pay down debt. For residents, the consequences will show up most directly in household tax bills, but the effects will also ripple through staffing levels, public safety, infrastructure work and recovery-related spending over the next year.
The vote came after more than an hour of public discussion and 20 minutes of closed-door meetings, underscoring how little consensus existed even as council moved to finish the budget on time. It also followed last year’s budget fight, when council adopted about $256 million on June 10, 2025, and raised the tax rate to 44.19 cents per $100 of assessed value. One estimate said that increase would have added roughly $114 a year to a home valued at $350,000.
Taken together, the back-to-back tax hikes show a city still wrestling with the cost of recovery and the limits of what residents can absorb. The 4-3 vote made clear that Asheville’s budget battles are now a proxy for broader disagreements over taxes, staffing and the future of city government.
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