Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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MAY 16-22, 2018 UCW 23 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM Housing choices reflect political divide by JOHN HOOD POLITICS JOHN HOOD, Chairman of the John Locke Foundation. COMMENTS? Editor@upandcomingweekly.com. 910-484-6200. D.G. MARTIN, Host of UNC's Book Watch. COM- MENTS? Editor@upandcomin- gweekly.com. 910-484-6200. LITERATURE Who's got the biggest house? by D.G. MARTIN ere is a familiar kind of political argument that goes something like this: "I know we are politically divided. I think that partisanship has its place – but surely there is no need to make (fill in the blank) a partisan issue." Politicos routinely claim that education shouldn't be a partisan issue or health care shouldn't be a partisan issue or whatever because of course we all care about good schools, good medical care and other good things. What comes next, all too often, is a passionate argument for a particular policy, one disproportionately favored by either Democrats or Republicans. I don't think such rhetoric is dishonest, for the most part. Human nature takes over. We all tend to see our own views as reasonable applications of broadly accepted principles while describing alternative views as informed by nar- row special interests or partisan gamesmanship. Most of these partisan divides aren't artificial. ey accurately reflect deep, persistent differences in val- ues, assumptions and even definitions of terms. Few policy issues are immune from the effects. Take the very pragmatic, seemingly non-ideological question of how to structure and deliver public ser- vices to local communities. Progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans tend to disagree about issues such as housing regulation, mass transit, street design, and growth controls not because of external pressure by special-interest groups but because their preferences are fundamentally different. A recent poll question from the Pew Research Center ties this up well. Asked whether they would rather live in communities where "the houses are larger and far- ther apart, but schools, stores and restaurants are sev- eral miles away" or in communities where "the houses are smaller and closer to each other, but schools, stores, and restaurants are within walking distance," voters as a whole were evenly divided – 49 percent favoring the former, 48 percent favoring the latter. But ideology was a strong predic- tor of who preferred which option. Among the respondents who were most consistently left-wing on other issues (from fiscal policy to foreign affairs), 77 percent said they'd prefer the option often described as "smart growth," the more-walkable communities with higher densities. Correspondingly, among the most conser- vative respondents on other issues, 75 percent said they'd prefer the less-compact suburban option, a model my John Locke Foundation colleagues have long described as "flex growth." e present task is not to explore all the growth- policy arguments and counterarguments that lie beneath this philosophical disagreement. My sympa- thies lie with my fellow flex-growthers, to be sure, but that's a topic for another day. Rather, I will point out that in North Carolina, as in most other states, voters are acting on their personal preferences and policy priorities not just with their votes but also with their feet. People who like both ur- ban living and progressive politics are moving into or near the downtowns of Charlotte, Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro, Winston-Salem, Asheville, Wilmington and other cities. ey're living in denser, mixed-use neighborhoods. ey're disproportionately voting for Democrats, up and down the ballot. People who mix a preference for suburban or exurban lifestyles with conservative politics prefer to live in other parts of urban counties – places such as Wake's Cary, Apex and Holly Springs, or Mecklen- burg's Huntersville, Mint Hill, Matthews and Pineville – or in next-door counties such as Union, Cabarrus, Johnston, Franklin and Alamance. e effects on local politics are clearly evident. Big cities that used to have at least some spirited partisan contests are increasingly Democratic, so that most races are settled by primaries or with "left vs. further left" races that are officially nonpartisan. And some populous, fast-growing counties that were once Democratic, and then went through a period of robust partisan competition, are now reliably Republican. If this troubles you, I understand. But waving your hands at millions of your fellow North Carolinians and insisting that they "take a nonpartisan approach" won't change anything. Each will say the other side's policies on growth are costly and counterproductive. Each will define those terms differently. Here is a newspaper headline from last week: "A 'pal- ace' in NC: One of the state's largest homes is for sale." Must be the Biltmore House in Asheville, I thought. en I kept reading. No, the 16,000-square-foot home in the headlines is in Rougemont, a high-end Dur- ham suburb. You can buy it for $6.95 million. But if you owned it, you would not come close to having one of the largest houses. Just for comparison's sake, the White House has 50,000 square feet. Presi- dent Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago has 62,500. White- hall, the Palm Beach house Henry Flagler built for his North Carolina bride, Mary Lily Kenan, is 60,000. Another large North Carolina-connected house, Duke Farms, built in New Jersey by James B. Duke, had 58,000, until it was taken down in 2016. But if you are still thinking Asheville's Biltmore House, you have the right idea. With a reported area of 175,000 square feet, it is by far the largest privately owned house in the United States. It is also one of the country's most visited attrac- tions. e mansion with 250 rooms is packed full of art, antiques, architecture, books, collections of vintage clothing and other accessories representa- tive of the Gilded Age. e house is part of an 8,000- acre compound containing expansive gardens and landscapes, the first managed forest in the country, a deer park, miles of level paths and walking trails, a section of the French Broad River and a winery that enjoys a growing reputation. On a typical day, thousands of visitors pay up to $75 for a one-time visit to the attractions. If it sounds expensive, it is really a bargain compared to a trip to France to see something comparable. How did this world-class attraction come to be in North Carolina? In her latest book, "e Last Castle: e Epic Story of Love, Loss and American Royalty in the Nation's Largest Home," Denise Kiernan tells the story of how and why the Biltmore House was built and how its gradual transformation to a high-class tourist attrac- tion made its survival possible. In 1888, George Washington Vanderbilt, a young wealthy bachelor, and his mother came to Asheville to take advantage of the healthy mountain air. On horseback rides around the surrounding mountains and forest, George was enthralled. rough agents, he began the secret and systematic purchase of thou- sands and the tens of thousands of forest and farm- lands. Ultimately, more than 100,000 of these acres became the nucleus of the Pisgah National Forrest. George also decided to build a home for himself and his mom. e idea began modestly, but after a trip to the Loire Valley in France with the famed architect Richard Morris Hunt, plans expanded. e designer of Central Park, Frederick Law Olmsted, was brought on to design the landscape, and Gifford Pinchot agreed to plan for the massive forests. e house opened in 1895. Kiernan told me recently that it might have been simply a 275-room "man-cave" for the then aging George. In 1898 he married Edith Stuyvesant Dresser, and in 1900 their daughter, Cornelia, was born at Biltmore. In Kiernan's opinion, Edith is the great hero of the Biltmore story. When George died in 1914, financial challenges had surrounded the Biltmore operation. Edith took the lead. She secured and followed expert advice that required painful cutbacks and sales of beloved projects. Later, she arranged for the sale of most of the forest properties. In 1924, Cornelia married British diplomat John Cecil. Although their marriage did not last, their sons, William and George, and their families took charge of the aging castle. ey developed a sustain- able and profitable business model that assures our state will have our country's largest privately owned house for many years to come. Most partisan divides aren't artificial. Asheville's Biltmore House has a reported area of 175,000 square feet. Photo via www.biltmore.com.