Danny Hein's Conservative Views and What They Would Mean if He Becomes Brevard Mayor
Hein, a health care administrator, said he would carefully watch city spending if elected. But, like his more liberal opponents, he backs affordable and workforce housing and community preservation.
BREVARD — Danny Hein’s campaign Facebook page calls him the “only conservative” in the four-way race for Brevard Mayor.
While that might not quite be true, considering the platform of right-wing, unaffiliated candidate Chuck Chapman, Hein is the only registered Republican in a race featuring two high-profile, well-financed Democrats, business owner Dee Dee Perkins and City Council member Maureen Copelof.
The nonpartisan race that opened up earlier this year when longtime Mayor Jimmy Harris announced plans to step down, is the most competitive in more than two decades. And it is Hein’s conservative credentials that give him a distinction and — in a city where Democrats hold a significant but not overwhelming advantage in numbers of registered voters — an opportunity.
“Absolutely,” he said, in a Monday interview at downtown’s Quotations Coffee Cafe. “If we get a decent turnout, I think this thing is going to be interesting.”
But how much difference does partisan affiliation mean when it comes to addressing local issues? In Hein’s case, maybe not that much.
Hein, 52, a former U.S. Army major and an administrator at Pardee Hospital in Hendersonville, sees out-of-sight housing prices as one of the biggest issues facing the city. So do Perkins and Copelof.
Like them, he also sees the economic benefits of the planned multi-use Ecusta Trail.
Hein, who has a master’s degree in business administration from the University of South Carolina, says he wants to “pick the city budget apart line by line” and guard against “budget creep.”
But he’s not calling for dramatic, wholesale cuts, and unlike Chapman, Hein didn’t blast city decisions to spend money building Depot Railroad Avenue Park and Clemson Plaza. He merely says that if he had been mayor at the time, he might have had different priorities.
“I would have really wanted to say, what are we not doing because we are doing this,” he said, referring to the park projects. “Were there streets that could have been repaired with this money? Were there infrastructure needs that could have been addressed? Were there things related to attracting businesses?”
And one project that he would have definitely put near the top of his list is the one that might be considered the most conventionally liberal — building the Mary C. Jenkins Community Center in the traditionally African-American Rosenwald Community.
“Mary C. Jenkins would have been a priority,” he said, “because that is a neighborhood where investment is warranted and needed and has been for some time.”
How would he try to address another priority, improving the city’s infrastructure? As he would in taking on many of the city’s biggest issues, by evaluating needs and possible solutions, he said.
He knows, for example, that Brevard has spent millions of dollars upgrading its sewer system over the past decade, but he’s also aware that some of its water and sewer lines “have been in place for many, many decades,” he said.
So, he’d like to study the details of the work that has been done and the work that remains and figure out if it needs to be accelerated.
He’d take a similar approach when it comes to affordable and workforce housing. He’s not ready to back “inclusionary zoning,” which would set aside neighborhoods for dense development that require a set portion of affordable and workforce units.
But the crushing demand for housing and its soaring costs — a recent report from Blue Zones Project-Brevard, for example, noted that the median price for a single-family home had soared to $389,000 in the first quarter of 2021 — warrant a thorough review of city land-use laws, he said.
Hein, whose latest campaign-finance reports shows he has raised $3,010 from individual donors, sounds more conservative when he talks about offering property tax incentives for businesses that provide high-paying jobs. The county already has such a program; the city should also have one to better allow the governments to work together on job creation.
“Why aren’t the city and county looking collectively at incentives that could be more powerful?” said Hein, who previously mounted an unsuccessful run for Transylvania County Commission. With such cooperation, he added, “both boats float higher.”
Likewise, he said, city regulations should be re-examined to make sure they are not impeding investment. But, once again, he’s not advocating dramatic changes, and certainly not without careful consideration.
“I don’t say blow them up,” he said. “Let’s put in the mental effort of doing the work of evaluating them. But we need regulations; there’s a reason there’s a speed limit.”
He especially doesn’t want growth to destroy the charm of Brevard, another point on which Hein and his more liberal opponents agree.
Hein’s connection to the city is deep, he said, because he grew up here, in a neighborhood near King Creek north of downtown. He and his friends explored the woods that border Pisgah National Forest and rode their bikes to town.
He played football at Brevard High School, and now calls the team’s games for WSQL Radio. During Army postings in Central America and while working in health care in Tennessee and Texas, he was always thinking about moving back, which he was finally able to do in 2015.
“The memories of (Brevard) helped me endure some times when I was really far away doing work in the corporate setting or the military,” he said. “I know some people may think this is a little funky, but (the city) is part of who I am.”
The Candidate:
Danny Hein, 52
Facebook: Danny Hein for Mayor
Education: bachelor’s degree from The Citadel military academy; master’s degree in business administration, University of South Carolina
Career: U.S. Army, left after 12 years at the rank of major; various positions in health care administration, including current job as Administrative Director of Orthopedics and Sports Medicine, Pardee Hospital
Public Service: Transylvania County Parks and Recreation Commission, the Mountain Area Workforce Development Board, Blue Ridge Literacy Council
Personal: Single, two adult daughters
Brevard Connection: Native who left after graduating from Brevard high school and returned in 2015.
The Job:
The City of Brevard mayor serves a four-year terms and receives an annual salary of $10,500. Early voting begins Oct. 14.