Politics

Hendersonville gets all-female council amid countywide gains for women

By Bill Moss, Published: November 14, 2024

Although the 2024 elections delivered no surprises along party lines— Republicans continued their dominance in local and regional contests in a decisive way — voters did deliver a significant shift in the makeup of local boards. Call it the Women Rising Election. Henderson County may never have seen a broader run of success by female candidates.

The Hendersonville City Council led the way, becoming all-female for the first time when newcomer Gina Baxter joined incumbents Jennifer Hensley and Lyndsey Simpson in election victories last week. Those three join Mayor Barbara Volk and Melinda Lowrance to put women in charge of the city.

That’s not all. Elsewhere in the county:

• The School Board went from a 4-3 female majority to 5-2 after an election in which three out of four Democratic and Republican nominees were women.
• Vice Mayor Anne Coletta became the first female mayor of the Village of Flat Rock, succeeding Nick Weedman, who has served as mayor since 2019 and on the council for 21 years. The Village Council would go from 4-3 to 5-2 female if Emily Whitmire was successful, as expected, in her write-in campaign for District 2 seat.
• With the election of Sheila Franklin in the District 2 seat, the Board of Commissioners doubles the number of women, from one to two. She joins Chair Rebecca McCall on the board, which can either re-elect McCall as chair or elect one of the other four during its organizational meeting on Dec. 2.
• With Franklin’s move up to the county board, the Fletcher Town Council loses its only female. The four men remaining on the board could neutralize the loss by appointing a woman to Franklin’s seat.

‘Logical, common-sense decisions’

Hensley, 45, and Simpson, 37, are both business owners, entrepreneurs and moms who have been active and engaged members of the council. From their comments, votes and priorities, it's generally impossible to tell that Hensley is a Republican and Simpson a Democrat.

“I was hoping that people would see that I am just trying to serve on the council in most nonpartisan way and not be an activist,” said Hensley, who won 40 percent of the vote to Simpson’s 34 percent. “I think it showed in the election because I want people to know that I’m working for everybody. I’m just try to be logical and make common sense decisions and I hoped people would see that and appreciate it.”

Baxter, 35, finished ahead of Colby Coren and Lynne Williams to win a seat and an unexpired term that ends in 2026. Coordinator of the adolescent parenting program at Children and Family Resource Center, she chairs the city Environmental Sustainability Board.

Women surge across region

Michele Woodhouse, who is Republican chair of the 11^th Congressional District, agreed that Nov. 5 was a good day for female candidates — though she painted their wins through a more partisan lens.

“I think if we look across the entire 11^th Congressional District we had strong conservative women running and winning — in Transylvania County, in Jackson County,” she said. “That’s great to see. Even in a race where they had two women to pick from (for a District Court seat), Monica Gillett had a resounding success.”

Beyond Henderson County and the 11^th Congressional District, Woodhouse sees less progress.

“We had one Democratic woman and one Republican woman in the (10) Council of State races and in the (14) congressional races we had three Democratic women who all won and two Republican women — one won and one lost,” she said. “Are we getting better? One-hundred percent,” she added, though women have yet to reach parity. “When you look at primaries, women tend to lose to men.”

Staff balances elected council

As recently as 2019, the Hendersonville City Council was made up of four men and one woman, the mayor. Hensley looks forward to serving on the new, and likely unprecedented, all-women edition.

“I love female leadership,” Hensley said. “I think we can do really do awesome things. I also really like balance so it’ll be interesting to see how it all shakes out.”

If gender balance has vanished from the council, no one need fret that no male perspective survives in the city’s day-to-day leadership. The city manager, assistant city manager, fire chief, police chief, public works, utilities and planning directors are all male — as well as other major city department heads except for the city attorney, personnel director, communications director and city clerk.

“I hope the male city staff can deal with all this estrogen because there’s going to be a lot,” Hensley said.