Rent is Too Damn High!

Morgan Murray for Town Council

Why is the rent too damn high?Why are students paying over $300/month more than they should be?
Why can no one who works for a living afford to live in Boone?
Why are our streets clogged with traffic?There are three, mostly distinct, populations that want to live in Boone.There are 18,124 Appalachian students attending classes at the Boone campus.
There are 5,684 beds on campus, leaving 12,440 beds needed off campus.There are approximately 14,000 people who work in Boone. Of those, only approximately 1,650 actually live in Boone, a significant number of them students.The rest are retirees, wealthy people and the like.Each of these populations have their own natural preference. Students want to live in high density housing with as many students as possible nearby and within the shortest walking distance to campus as possible.
Working people want to live in neighborhoods close to their jobs, with other working families as neighbors. Those with children want to be within walking distance of their schools.
Second home and retirees want to live in secluded resorts. Hopefully in Florida, or some other far-away place.Why is there so much traffic in Boone?The simple answer is because everyone has to drive to get to where they need to be. We have 12,440 students who either need to drive or take the Appalcart to campus each day.
We have at least 13,000 workers driving from as far away as Tennessee to work here, because that is as close as they can afford to live.
Add tourists and retired people meandering aimlessly about and our roads are clogged.How do we reduce the traffic?We have two easy solutions to reduce the traffic.Get students living within walking distance of campus, and separated from their cars. Human nature is to take the easiest path. If it is easier to drive than to walk, or to bus, then they will drive.
Build housing in Boone that people who work here can afford. Then their 30 minute commute each way becomes a five minute commute each way. Instead of their cars being on the road for an hour a day, they are on the road for ten minutes. Zero minutes if they can walk or Appalcart to their job.At local salaries and wages, workers in Boone will never be able to outbid students for housing.Students have to be here to go to classes. Students are facing the worst economic situation for people their age since the Great Depression. There are few, if any decent jobs available, prices for houses, and a middle class life, are far out of reach. For one third of the students, neither of their parents went to college. They, and their parents, know that a college education is the surest path towards navigating this economy to a better life. Students, and hopefully their parents, will do what they have to do to get them a college degree. That includes, as has been amply demonstrated, paying exorbitant rents so that they can be as close to campus as possible.Students don't mind, most even enjoy, living with lots of other students. They can devote all of their housing funds to one bedroom in a multi-bedroom apartment. A three bedroom apartment is worth over three times to them collectively, as it is worth to a one income, or even two income family.A one bedroom apartment is worth more to a student than to a working person. If that is all that is available, they will bid up the price to live close to campus more than a working person can afford.That is the demonstrable fact. Do any deny it?It is simple economics.There will never be affordable housing for working people in Boone until the demand for student housing is met. As long as there are more students than student housing in Boone, students will continue to bid up the available affordable housing beyond what working people can afford.Given the same price, students would rather live with other students within walking distance of campus, and working people would rather live in neighborhoods close to their schools and jobs.A necessary step in solving Boone’s housing crisis is to promote the building of student housing within walking distance of campus to the point that there are more beds available than beds needed.
It is only when working people do not have to compete with students for their housing, that they will be able to afford to live in Boone.*Where should students live?From Appalachian Street east, and from the Courthouse west along King Street, there are acres of underutilized and unused land that would be absolutely perfect for both student housing and commercial.
It is downtown, but outside the historic district.
It is easily walkable to campus, people living there would shop downtown, especially if getting to their cars involved more effort than walking, creating opportunities for local people to start businesses that cater to people living downtown.
Ideally, every student would live within that area, walking to campus.
By restricting new student housing to that small area, it frees up the rest of the town for housing for working people.Why aren’t people building student housing in the downtown area outside the historic district?It is a telling fact that despite sky high rents, it is not economically feasible to build in that area, with the existing building ordinances. The simple math is that the maximum allowable density is way too low to justify building anything on lots that small.There are ordinances that the Town passed over a decade ago to prevent apartments from being built within walking distance of campus.Buildings are only allowed a maximum of two stories. Since the bottom one has to be commercial, built to commercial code, and the maximum height is 30 feet, that allows for only one floor of housing above one floor of commercial.
Each bedroom of each apartment requires on-site parking, but without an exit onto King Street. Most of those lots cannot be physically configured to meet the parking ordinances, and even if they could, the parking lot would take up more of the lot than the building itself.
No more than two unrelated people living in the same apartment. This is a rule directed against students, to prevent them from living in three or more bedroom apartments. Or even two bedroom apartments for couples.If there is no parking at the apartments, where will students park their cars?One of the goals is to get students away from their cars, within walking distance of where they need to be, so that they will walk and bus, and instead of driving.But most students have cars that need to be parked somewhere.
Students can park their cars at State Farm through the university. If the university is not going to provide a sufficient long term parking solution, then what the Town can do is create a parking lot near downtown, which can be used by long term residents, and by visitors, with an Appalcart service that runs every 15 minutes 24-7. Their cars will always be available for them all times of the day and night. They will just need to make a minimum effort to get to it.So should we just change the rules to increase the height limit, remove parking requirements and the non-related housing rule in that area ?Absolutely not.Since the current rules essentially allow nothing to be built where most students would love to live, the Town has leverage.
As conditions for removing those restrictions for each project in that area, the Town should require:German/Austrian level building codes. By law, buildings in Austria and Germany are built solidly. Insulation, both for energy efficiency and sound, is required not only on the outside walls, floors and ceilings, but between apartments, and between rooms within apartments. It not only greatly decreases energy bills, but it also reduces noise to almost nothing. People are not disturbed by noises in the next apartment, let alone by noises from outside.
Green building codes that reduce utility bills.
5% of total project costs for an affordable workforce housing investment fund. More details below.How much is housing that working people can afford?First, let’s define what is affordable for people who work in Boone. The vast majority of people working in Boone can afford a home in the $161,000 to $225,000 range, if they make between $20/hour and $30/hour.For comparison, the median sales price of a home in 2025 in Boone is $545,000, which would require an income of $150,000/ year to finance.Appalachian State has a total of 70 employees making more than $150,000, some of which are even professors.A person making $20/hour should be paying a maximum of $960/month.How many homes in Boone are priced at less than $300,000?If you see one, let me know.How many homes in Boone are priced at $960/month or less for an entire apartment/house?If you see one, let me know. Chances are that a desperate student saw it first and signed a lease for it 8 months before it came open.Why are there no homes a working person can afford in Boone?Two reasons.
There aren’t enough beds for students who need to attend Appalachian State. They are desperately pouncing on anything that comes available, filling all available rentals and driving the rental prices higher.
The ordinances in place to ‘protect our neighborhoods’ are designed for a resort community, like Blowing Rock. They are meant to ensure that only high end housing can be built and only wealthy people can afford to buy.If there are enough beds for students, will people build housing that is affordable for working people?Relieving the pressure of student’s desperate need for housing is necessary, but not sufficient. The Town needs to change existing ordinances to allow people to build housing that is affordable.The problem with ‘Protecting our Neighborhoods’.The question is ‘protecting our neighborhoods’ from who? And ‘protecting our neighborhoods’ for who?From the standpoint of both people that work for a living and for students, it makes no difference to either who lives in $750,000 houses on the hill. If we are ‘protecting our neighborhoods’ from both working people and students, and zoning most of the available area in our small town just for them, is it any wonder that neither working people nor students can find nook or cranny to live in town?Besides having to compete with students desperate for housing, working people have to compete with retirees and second home buyers. Any affordable homes that appeal to wealthy people are not going to be affordable for very long.
The target sweet spot is to build housing that working people want to live in, but wealthy people don’t.Which ordinances cause only high end housing to be built?Large minimum lot sizes;
Square footage requirements;
Setback requirements;
Limited density;
Single-use zoning;
Impact fees;
Extensive review and permitting.So what can the Town do to allow people to build affordable housing?There are at least four strategies that the Town can, and should, implement simultaneously to allow the creation of housing working people can afford.High density zoning, especially near schools, for townhomes, apartments, duplexes, multi-family structures, and houses on very small lots.
Accessory Dwelling Units;
Public Private Partnerships
Build Housing ourselves through grants, low interest municipal bonds and a Workforce Affordable Housing Fund.How can high density zoning help?Change zoning, especially near schools, and other appropriate places, to allow high density housing such as townhomes, apartments, duplexes, multi-family structures, and houses on very small lots.What is an Accessory Dwelling Unit?An Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) is a secondary housing unit built on a lot with an already existing primary house. This could be a garage apartment, attic, basement, cottage, extension, ‘granny flat’ etc.How can Accessory Dwelling Units help?Allow Accessory Dwelling Units on all single-family lots. This is an easy, quick and equitable fix. Asheville recently allowed ADU’s on all residential lots in the city limits to address their housing shortage. Charlotte is offering $80,000 interest-free loans to anyone who builds an ADU on their property.
Anyone who owns a house in Boone should be allowed to build an ADU on their property to rent to a working family.
It has the potential to double the amount of housing in our already existing neighborhoods with minimal impact.
It allows families to build a place on their property for their grown children, or for their parents.
It allows other families to profit from providing much needed housing, instead of just developers.What is Private Public Partnership?A collaboration between government and private sector entities to develop housing, often focusing on affordable or mixed-income projects. These partnerships combine public resources like land and funding with private sector expertise, capital, and efficiency to create projects that might otherwise be financially unfeasible for either party to undertake alone.What is building it ourselves?Utilizing money from a Workforce Housing Fund, bought into by a 5% fee on new housing projects, and from grants and bonds, the Town can build affordable housing for workers and either sell them to working people, or rent them to working people, and recoup the cost.All four of these strategies, and any others we can come up with, should all be pursued, until every working person who wants to live in town, can afford to do so.

Ballotopedia:I first came to Boone in 1993, as an App student living in East Dorm Subfloor. I worked a number of minimum wage jobs, and started a couple of small businesses. Like everyone else who lives here, I've been forced to move away multiple times, to Asheville and Raleigh, in order to make a living. I was living in the Jailhouse on 9-11. I was living on King Street when my son, Blue, was born.I currently own Blue's Brews on King Street, and work, mostly remotely, for the Biltmore Estate. Despite having a good job, and a business, I can't afford to live in Boone. And neither can anyone else who works here. Students are being systematically robbed and stigmatized by a Town government that treats them like second class citizens. Because of Byzantine ordinances and punitive 'impact fees', it is impossible for a local person to open a business. The businesses that do open are tourist-priced country-club establishments that neither students nor working people can afford.The people running the Town of Boone have worked diligently at turning Boone into a country-club boutique retirement community. It is time for us to take it back.

Please list below 3 key messages of your campaign. What are the main points you want voters to remember about your goals for your time in office?

The rent is too damn high. The rent in Boone is at least the second highest in North Carolina. Every person who rents in Boone is paying, on average, more than $300 more per month than they should be. That is an additional $300/month over the already sky-high effects of the national economy. That additional $300/month is because of the deliberate policy of the Town of Boone to artificially strangle the supply of housing, specifically and especially, for students. For students, over four years, that means they either are $15,000 more in student debt than they should be, or they, or their parents, have $15,000 less to start them out in life than they should have. For people who work for a living, it means they can’t afford to live in Boone.
Boone is a working class college town. We need a Town government that advocates for students and the people who work here, rather than exclusively for the rich people living on the hill.
Boone must become a democracy. In a town of people almost all unhappy with the local government, running elections unopposed and with 5% turnout is unacceptable. Democracy is our national tradition, and freedom, our birthright. Democracy is the process by which free people decide the issues on which they disagree. Town elections should be moved to even number years, along with every other election in the country, instead of hidden on the odd years. Within a month of each election, there must be no restrictions on campaign speech, signs or public displays. That is how almost every other town and city in the United States has done it over the past two and a half centuries.

What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about?

All politics are local. If we want to make a better world for our children, the best place to start is here and now. Boone is a working class college town. Or, it was, and needs to be again.
Instead of silencing our citizens, and working in the shadows, our issues must be debated and decided by the residents of Boone in the open.

What characteristics or principles are most important for an elected official?

Empathy. The most important characteristic of any person in a democratic government must be empathy for others.“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”
37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[
38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

What was your very first job? How long did you have it?

Two weeks after my 18nth birthday, and four days after I graduated High School, I was in Fort Leonard Wood Missouri, going to basic training as a combat engineer.

My Ballotpedia

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