This page records each request by Asheville residents for police oversight since 1991, what was delivered, and the state-law limits on what a city board may do. As of Sept 8, 2026, no civilian police oversight body in Asheville is meeting.
The record, crisis by crisis
1991 to 2020: the Citizens Police Advisory Committee. Asheville’s Citizens Police Advisory Committee was created in 1991 as a “liaison”: no investigative power, no records access, no discipline role, members removable by council “with or without cause.” In 2018 the city considered dissolving it; it last met in March 2020. Never abolished, never convened; the city’s own page says “not currently meeting.” A CPAC member told council in 2020: “I don’t think CPAC needs to exist anymore.” (City page · WLOS)
2017–2019: the 2017 beating of a pedestrian by an APD officer. An APD officer beat, choked, and tased a Black man walking home from a 13-hour shift. The public learned of it only because someone illegally leaked the bodycam video: NC’s bodycam law (G.S. 132-1.4A) had kept it sealed through six months of internal handling in which the officer was allowed to resign before the video became public. The reforms that followed: a Human Relations Commission given no investigative power; a written-consent-to-search policy that council ordered in May 2018 and APD implemented in October 2019, seventeen months later, after the chief refused, and the Police Benevolent Association threatened legal action against the five council members who voted for it. The officer’s felony guilty plea ended in probation, dismissal, and expungement. (ACLU · Mountain Xpress on the PBA threat · city announcement, Oct 2019)
2020. After the tear gas and the medic station, Chief Zack was “truly sorry”; Mayor Manheimer called it “senseless… wrong.” City Attorney Brad Branham promised a new kind of board with “much deeper access to records… a much more formal role in the process of reviewing disciplinary situations”, pending state authorization. What was delivered: a ~3% budget reallocation (animal control and noise moved out of APD); an internal after-action review, ten months later, that found the tear gas “within agency policy”; no publicly confirmed discipline for any officer (not for the gas, not for the medic station), with 500+ tear-gas complaints filed and every outcome sealed by state personnel law. And the promised board? That was HB 399, sponsored by the entire Buncombe legislative delegation, pre-negotiated to be modest (no subpoena power, no public findings, use-of-force cases only). It died in Raleigh without a hearing. Meanwhile the city spent six figures on a California PR firm billed as “transparency engagement advisers.” (Mountain Xpress on the after-action · WLOS on the promised board · Camera network misuse, documented cases)
2026: the Public Safety Committee. The council committee assigned RTIC oversight, chaired by Bo Hess, had requested no audit and received no post-approval briefing through its July 29, 2026 meeting (meeting-by-meeting record). On Nov 20, 2025 eight callers asked it to cancel the Flock and Fusus contracts; staff answered that no data goes to federal agencies, and no motion followed. It next meets Thursday, Sept 24, 1:00 PM: Asheville City Council Public Safety Committee, Remote meeting (virtual, per NC Gen. Stat. 166A-19.24(f)); livestream on Engagement Hub or the City's YouTube Channel, call-in (855) 925-2801 code 11543. Live call-in comments during the public comment period: (855) 925-2801, code 11543, then press * and select option 3. Pre-recorded voicemail comments accepted at the same number/code until 5:00 p.m. the day before the meeting. Written comments to publicsafetycommittee@PublicInput.com, also closing 5:00 p.m. the day before.; the audit reports required by G.S. 20-183.31(a)(7) are the record to ask for.
2026: the RTIC. Council approved a citywide surveillance apparatus with a resolution stating it would be used “solely for lawful purposes.” The resolution designates no oversight body, creates no reporting duty, and contains no enforcement mechanism, and it was passed in a city where, at that moment, no civilian oversight body was meeting: CPAC dormant six years, the Human Relations Commission conducting no business since Helene, the Reparations Commission formally dissolved in October 2025 with its criminal-justice recommendations punted to a future budget. None of the four recovery boards created in 2025 has a policing role. A resident, a contract negotiator by profession, said it at the podium: “We aren’t protected by civil liberties statements.” (BPR · BPR on the boards · Urban News on the commission’s dissolution)
What state law allows a city board to do
The statutes:
- G.S. 160A-168 makes personnel files confidential. A city official who showed a review board an officer’s disciplinary file without a court order would be committing a misdemeanor. Boards cannot see the records they’d need to review anything.
- No NC city may grant its board subpoena power. Only the General Assembly can, and bills to allow it (2015, 2017, Asheville’s own 2021 local bill) have all died without hearings.
- The boards that exist under these limits have these records: Charlotte’s review board heard 102 appeals in ~25 years and sided with complainants twice, and both times the chief rejected the finding. Winston-Salem’s considered 11 cases in 9 years and sided with police every time. Durham’s has granted 2 hearings since 2011. Dawn Blagrove of Emancipate NC, on the record: “These boards are doing exactly what they are designed to do by system actors, which is create the facade of accountability without creating actual accountability.” (WFAE · Winston-Salem Journal · ABC11)
What this record means for the RTIC
Put the three records together:
- Camera network misuse, documented cases records the misuse cases elsewhere; the safeguards did not catch them before an audit or a records request did.
- This page shows Asheville cannot build real oversight even when it wants to: state law withholds the powers a review board would need, and bills to grant them have not been heard.
- The Promise Tracker records the city refusing to release its Flock audit logs in September 2025; the Axon plate-reader portal now publishes retention and device counts, and no audit result has been published.
Our concern is accountability and oversight, not cameras as such; the position is stated in full on the homepage. The specific asks are on Getting Flock Out and Speak at Council.
A note on labels: quotes and dates above are from public records and named reporting; where an assessment comes from advocacy or opinion journalism rather than documents, we’ve linked the source so you can weigh it yourself.
Related: Camera network misuse, documented cases · Promise Tracker · The pre-meeting check-in sessions · Timeline