'Where the rubber meets the road:' Montreat to vote on new comprehensive plan in August

After more than 18 months of work, Montreat’s new comprehensive plan is ready for a vote.

The plan, titled Montreat Tomorrow, was put together by a steering committee consisting of Mayor Tim Helms as well as other community members and leaders, including Montreat College President Paul Maurer and Montreat Conference Center President Richard DuBose. Montreat’s Zoning Administrator Kayla DiCristina and Interim Town Manager Ben Blackburn also worked on the plan with MS Consultants.

Montreat Tomorrow is an update of the 2008 comprehensive plan. At the July Board of Commissioners meeting, Blackburn said the cost of the new plan was “exceeding $40,000.”

Helms said writing the comprehensive plan involved community input, including neighborhood meetings. He said the people working on the plan are “great” and worked hard to put the plan together.

“We were meeting every couple of weeks wordsmithing paragraphs and sentences as we went through and finished it up,” Helms said. “It was quite intense, but it was quite fun.”

In addition to in-person meetings, a survey was also sent out to Montreat residents. According to the plan, of the 402 responses, 57% live in Montreat between one and three months out of the year, while 20%, or 82 of the respondents, live in the town full-time. The plan said 902 people lived in Montreat full-time in 2020, but also notes "the population in Montreat is likely higher than the U.S. Census estimates at most times of the year" because the town has such a fluctuating population between college students, conference-goers and those with second homes in the town.

“The seasonal population changes put a strain on services during peak visitation in the summer months,” the plan said. “The need for part-time and full-time residents are different and that conflict can present challenge for town governance.”

A public hearing was held for residents to comment on the new plan. Of these comments, several residents cited concerns that there was no section addressing new ways of adding revenue for the town, something that was included in the 2008 plan.

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Helms told Black Mountain News that this is because it is difficult for residents to be able to come up with revenue sources in the town. He said this is instead the job of town staff and commissioners. For this fiscal year, the town has a budget of $2,430,436.

“The majority of the people do not want any commercialization inside of Montreat so it’s difficult for them,” Helms said. “As we went through it, most of those tasks really fall to the commissioners and the town staff to discover those possible means of revenue in addition to taxes and fees.”

Helms said he thinks Montreat Tomorrow is “probably the best plan" he has seen for a town of Montreat’s size.

“I think it’s very aggressive in some respects and it’s very general in that it will allow the commissioners to look at the goals but be able to work out means of achieving those goals,” Helms said. “That’s where the rubber meets the road.”

After discussions with residents and among the steering committee, three main topics were identified as a focus for the town: Natural preservation and stormwater, community character and development, and traffic and transportation.

The plan says the goal of identifying these topics is to “value and protect” the town’s environment while being “a community that respects buildings with history value, encourages new development to consider the surrounding architecture and strives for resilience in the face of a changing climate.” Montreat Tomorrow also mentions the goal of being accessible for people of any age.

Another public hearing is set for the comprehensive plan Aug. 10 at the next Montreat Board of Commissioners meeting. After the public hearing, the board will vote to either approve, approve with revisions or deny the plan.

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