From Staff Reports

Asheville elected three women to the three open seats on Nov. 3, giving the city known as “the Paris of the South” its first all-female City Council in its history.

Three of the seven women also are black — another first in city history for Asheville’s council.

 The three winning candidates were locked in a tight race, with each within a percentage point of the other.

With 100 percent of precincts reporting, Sandra Kilgore led the way with 25,747 votes votes (20 percent), followed by Sage Turner with 24, 684 votes (19 percent) and Kim Roney with 22,800 votes (18 percent).

Meanwhile, the only incumbent on the ballot, Keith Young, failed to win enough votes to retain his seat. Young won 21,774 votes (17 percent), just getting nipped by Roney for the final available council seat.

Roney, who was he only unaffiliated candidate on a race that otherwise was all-Democratic, placed fourth in the 2017 general election.

Other losing candidates included Rich Lee, who netted 19,286 votes (15 percent), and Nicole Townsend with 12,984 votes (10 percent).

Mayor Esther Manheimer was quoted by Asheville television station WLOS (News 13) after the election as saying, “I think that it’s exciting. I love that it’s newsworthy in a way, but I also hate that it is because you know, in the history of America and all the city councils that have ever existed there have been plenty of all-male city councils and of course it wasn’t newsworthy.

“So, the fact that this is means we still have a long way to go in terms of women in leadership positions,” she told News 13.

Kilgore told News 13 after her win, “First of all, I think it’s important that we develop a certain synergy within the council; that’s what my campaign was about the whole time. I felt that we were not united as a city, and also as far as the council.

“We need to work on uniting and communicating with each other; that, to me, is going to be paramount because I think that’s going to determine how successfully we’re able to work together and solve some of these issues that Asheville has on the agenda,” News 13 quoted Kilgore as saying.