I’m Dan Ferrell, and I’m running for Asheville City Council to truly make Asheville a safe and livable town for all of us. We live in a different world than we did a few years ago, and I want our town’s policies to reflect our community’s real needs.

We learned during the Hurricane who we are: we are people who take care of our neighbors because we know there is enough for everyone. We don’t have to live in a world of scarcity; we just have to live in one where we get the right things to the people at the right time.

When all of our usual systems were down, we worked together to build something deeply human. We shared information, fed each other, and helped our neighbors find housing and community. We took care of each other, and in that we grew stronger.

But we’re facing another crisis, a longer crisis. One that will require us to act now if we want to be prepared. I saw so many of you out in the streets in 2025 demanding that we fight back against the federal government. I want to be a voice for our community that is clear that we need to prepare for a future that looks radically different from our past. Preparing is our first step to resisting.

We can prepare for long-term oppression by ICE, and we can prepare for the end of federal democracy - the advent of a so-called 'King'. We see the federal government trying to criminalize, imprison, or starve our neighbors by eliminating the SNAP benefits. They disappear fathers, mothers, children, based on where they were born or simply on their perceived ethnicity. They criminalize LGBTQ+ people and take away their access to healthcare and identity. They imprison, attack, and kill Black and Brown people with increasingly unmasked hatred. But we also see each other in the streets, in city hall, and in the food banks, demanding that the humanity of each and every one of our neighbors is honored.

We as a community know that we can and must protect ourselves and our neighbors, because we all deserve the safety to live our lives free from the chaos of state-funded terror.

Whether our future holds attacks from our own government, intentionally depriving neighbors of basic needs, or new climate-related catastrophes, there are ways we can increase our resilience and security as a town for the benefit of everyone. As a city councilor, I will act in a way that reflects the real danger that exists in front of us, emphasizing food and water security, as well as the housing needs of the majority.

I plan to explore ways to deepen neighborhood organizing, because as we saw after the hurricane, there are times when our neighbors are all we have. And on the political level, when neighbors come together to identify their own greatest needs, we can deepen our democracy by listening to every neighborhood, not just the loudest or wealthiest ones.

This town is not just for business owners, tourists, and the wealthiest of our neighbors. It is a home for every single one of us. And none of us can truly thrive while our neighbors struggle to meet their basic needs. As a city councilperson, I hope to move the needle to more deeply reflect that you matter here, too.