Facts about ASU's Reich College of Education

• UNC system president Erskine Bowles directs ASU to help address the state of North Carolina’s teacher shortage. 
  
  
• ASU receives $1.8 million from North Carolina to start the search for a new site for the Reich College of Education which has outgrown its present building, Edwin Duncan Hall.
  
  
• The state of North Carolina earmarks $34 million in the budget for ASU’s new college of education building.
  
  
• An area near First Baptist Church, located outside the central business and municipal districts is identified as the best suited location for building.
  
  
• Ken Peacock promises to replace Edwin Duncan Hall with “green space”.
  
  
• ASU submits plans to Boone development services for review, wherein the town applies commercial building regulations intended for businesses to a university building. ASU therefore withdrawals its plans.
  
  
• Mayor Loretta Clawson along with council members Bunk Spann and Lynne Mason travel to Raleigh in an attempt to lobby against the building.
  
  
• Feb. 23rd, the Boone Town Council decides to consider conditional zoning, which would allow for flexibility in dealing with the university.
  
  
• March 15th, In a 4-1 vote town council reversed their position and and decided not to adopt the conditional zoning amendment.
  
  
• Sept 4th, the Boone Town Council finally meets with ASU to discuss the college of education project. In the end, the town agrees to form a group to study the issue.

During the September 4th meeting, council member Lynne Mason raised the issue of Boone's eroding tax base as ASU continues to grow into the town of Boone. Her comments are hypocritical as she has been instrumental in preventing growth in Boone, thereby restricting not only the property tax revenue but the much greater sales tax revenue that would benefit the town. Her comments illustrate an unwillingness to allow to Boone to grow along with the university.