ASHEVILLE, N.C. (828newsNOW) — A protracted legal battle over removal of the Vance Monument in downtown Asheville added $99,401.42 to the deconstruction cost, prompting a costly change order the City Council will consider next week.
When the council meets at 4 p.m. Tuesday, April 23, at the banquet hall of Harrah’s Cherokee Center, 87 Haywood St., its lengthy consent agenda includes a proposed resolution ratifying a $109,402 change order and increase in what contractor Chonzie, Inc., is being paid to complete removal of the monument.
It includes a $10,000 contingency on top of the $99,401.42 additional estimated cost associated with a court-mandated stop work order, a staff report states.
The old monument, an obelisk honoring the late Gov. Zebulon Vance, was deemed for deconstruction following the Black Lives Movement in the summer of 2020 amid questions about Vance’s slave-holding past. The work was nearly completed when it was halted by legal action, as a group dedicated to preserving the history of the 26th North Carolina Infantry Regiment.
In March, the North Carolina Supreme Court finally dismissed the claim, allowing work to continue. But according to the staff report from Assistant City Attorney Eric Edgerton, “The contractor will have to remobilize their equipment and crews a second time, and procure sufficient traffic control measures, resulting in a need to increase the total value of their contract.”
Work on the project is expected to be completed by the end of July. As Edgerton pointed out in the report, it’s the contractor’s responsibility to dispose of the material, which is to be altered in some way that will make it impossible for the monument to be reassembled from the original material.