Mountain Xpress sold to nonprofit, aims to keep Asheville local

Jeff Fobes is handing Mountain Xpress to FIRE, a journalism nonprofit, in a deal aimed at keeping Asheville’s weekly newspaper locally owned and active rather than folded into a larger chain. For Buncombe County readers, the shift matters because Mountain Xpress has long been one of the region’s most distinctly local outlets, covering arts, food, neighborhood life, politics and the community issues that often shape daily life in Asheville.

The paper said the nonprofit buyer, FIRE, is being revitalized to operate Xpress and that the new structure could improve its chances of winning grants and donations. That matters in a local-news market where the economics have grown harsher for independent papers. By moving ownership into a nonprofit model, Fobes is betting that Mountain Xpress can keep publishing as a community institution while building a more stable funding base for the newsroom.

Fobes had been looking for a succession plan for years and decided about a month before the sale announcement to move forward with the nonprofit deal. He has been tied to Mountain Xpress for decades and had considered nonprofit ownership at different points during the paper’s more than 25 years in business. That long transition underscores how much of Asheville’s media landscape has rested on a single local operation and one owner’s commitment to keeping it independent.

The stakes are bigger than a corporate transaction. The Library of Congress records Mountain Xpress as beginning publication on August 10, 1994, and the paper has served Asheville and Western North Carolina for more than 30 years. Its own history page says it covers investigative reporting and city and county government news, the kind of reporting that helps residents track what happens at City Hall, in Buncombe County government and in the neighborhoods where decisions land first.

Mountain Xpress was still publishing during the transition, with its issue archive showing Volume 32, Issue 41 dated May 6, 2026, and the sale story published May 20, 2026. The central question now is whether FIRE can preserve that local identity while using nonprofit ownership to expand the paper’s financial footing, or whether the change will mainly protect the existing model without adding much new capacity. For Asheville readers, the answer will shape how much hyperlocal news, watchdog reporting and community coverage survives in the years ahead.