Police searches in Asheville to face new restrictions, including written consent

ASHEVILLE - City police wanting to search people will face new restrictions, including in how they obtain permission from drivers or pedestrians before going through their property.

The changes mandated Tuesday night by City Council were part of a dramatic 5-2 vote that went against the wishes of Police Chief Tammy Hooper.

The biggest change is that police will have to get written permission before conducting a search unless they have reasonable grounds or "probable cause" to believe a crime has been committed.

Activists hailed the surprise vote as a concrete move to limit what they have called over policing of minority residents as evidenced by years of traffic stop data. They also said the vote would help repair damage from the August beating of a black pedestrian that has led to criminal charges against an officer.

"It provides a safeguard," said Ian Mance attorney with the Southern Coalition for Social Justice in Durham, who has advocated for the change for more than a year.

"If you do have officers out there who are targeting people because of their race this is a guard against that. It reduces searches of innocent drivers."

Hooper and law enforcement advocates, meanwhile, said the changes would make it harder for officers to protect the public and would hamper them in combating a historic drug epidemic and the crimes that come with it.

"Why would we take away any of the tools that we have when we are dealing with the highest opioid epidemic we've every seen?" said the chief.

Along with a requirement for written consent, the council also voted for two other new limitations along the same 5-2 lines.

The first reduces the reasons for which officers should attempt consent searches, eliminating a past criminal record or behavior deemed suspicious as valid reasons.

The second is to de-prioritize "low-level" regulatory stops of drivers for such things as expired registration stickers.

Police now can get verbal consent from drivers or others before conducting such a search.

Council members voting yes were Mayor Esther Manheimer, Brian Haynes, Julie Mayfield, Sheneika Smith and Keith Young. Voting no were Vice Mayor Gwen Wisler and Vijay Kapoor.

The council can't make the changes itself because of the structure of city government; the elected body instructed Interim City Manager Cathy Ball to have police enact the new search procedures.

The vote came after attention from activists to data on police traffic stops and searches that showed a disparity between the racial makeup of Asheville and who is stopped and searched. African-Americans were subjected to the procedures at a higher rate, according to the data.

It also came in the wake of an infamous August police beating of a black pedestrian which some council members said has caused a crisis in relations between local law enforcement and African-American residents.

This story will be updated.