When 20 acres of farmland became available near the Swannanoa River's western bank in 2007, Jeanne Sommer jumped at the opportunity.
The then-Warren Wilson College religious studies professor spent all of her savings and secured loans to buy the property, turning it into a wedding venue and flower farm. By 2024, Hidden River Events was earning about $2.6 million in gross revenue and hosting about 85 weddings a year.
Then Hurricane Helene hit. The Swannanoa River swelled from 1.44 feet to a peak of 27.33 feet, according to U.S. Geological Survey data, spilling out of its banks and inundating much of the low-lying Swannanoa Valley.
Like many local businesses in and around the unincorporated community of Swannanoa, about 10 miles east of Asheville, Sommer's farm was devastated.
A pair of vacation homes on the property were destroyed, as was a shop where Sommer sold fresh flowers grown on-site. The gardens where she grew those flowers were also destroyed. Due to Helene, Sommer had to cancel 64 previously scheduled weddings.
"Most of the infrastructure for the event business was scattered all over the valley, and we spent a couple of months collecting that. I'm still cleaning as much as I can to try to recuperate that," Sommer said.
Sommer was one of about 10 Swannanoa residents who visited the General Assembly this week to remind lawmakers that residents of western North Carolina are continuing to grapple with the challenges of recovering from Helene. They brought a message that they need additional relief, and they need it quickly.
"We need all of it as soon as possible. We just have needs in every direction," Matt Barker, the board chair of community advocacy group Friends of Swannanoa, said Tuesday.
Barker pointed specifically to support for small businesses, which could support local restaurants that are either scrambling to reopen after sustaining storm damage or have opened in a limited capacity.
"It's an encouragement to our community to know that these people are working on these things and to see these businesses reopening, but if they then can't sustain and have to close, that's going to be a real punch in the gut to our community," Barker said.
The N.C. House of Representatives passed a $465 million Helene relief package in May, an effort that includes long-awaited disaster grants for small businesses worth $75,000.
But the effort has stalled in the Senate, with Senate Pro Tem Phil Berger and other Republicans pushing for the next Helene relief package to be part of the state budget.
The Senate's initial budget proposal would have dedicated an additional $700 million in state funds to Helene relief, with another $633 million in transportation funds allocated to the Helene rebuilding effort.
The General Assembly has previously dedicated about $1.4 billion to Helene recovery efforts, money that was shifted over four separate bills.
"I just think it's an appropriation of dollars. We've already appropriated separate measures," Berger told reporters after Tuesday's session, adding that a significant portion of funds from previous relief packages remain unspent.
Some lawmakers are worried that tying additional Helene relief to the budget could mean a lengthy delay in additional funds reaching western North Carolina, as the House and Senate appear to have significant differences that could slow the budget process.
Rep. Lindsey Prather, a Democrat from Buncombe County, said Tuesday that she believes the recovery package should be split from the budget.
"We don't know how long the budget negotiations are going to take, and western North Carolina needs help now," Prather said during a press conference.
Relief funds: in budget or separate?
Tying additional Helene spending to the budget has at least some support from the Senate's western North Carolina delegation.
Sen. Ralph Hise, a Spruce Pine Republican, said he believes the budget is the most appropriate place for additional funds to be shifted to the recovery.
"There's some things that we think there are universal agreement on that we need to spend, but we really need to make sure that we look at the entire finances of the state when we make those decisions," Hise told the NC Newsroom.
Senate Minority Leader Sydney Batch criticized that approach, telling reporters she's heard relief funds are being used as a negotiating chip in ongoing negotiations with the House.
"Why would we take something that is absolutely essential for North Carolinians and western North Carolina to recover and use that as a bargaining tool so that we can potentially get a budget? I just think that that is exceptionally cruel," said Batch, a Wake County Democrat.
Batch was speaking just a few minutes after Sen. Brent Jackson, a Sampson County Republican and one of the body's chief budget writers, described some of difference in the Senate and House's budget proposals as "as far as the east is from the west." Jackson was urging the Senate to vote down the House's version of the budget, which would allow select members of both bodies to negotiate a final version behind closed doors.
If those negotiations stall, Hise said, there is a chance his stance could shift to handle an additional relief package separately from the budget.
"We may have to make decisions later if the budget process falls apart, but right now we need to account for the funds as the entire state," Hise said.
'Lots to be done' but need visitors
Back in Swannanoa, Sommer anticipates that her gross revenue this year will be about $89,000.
Without the wedding business or flower shop, all of that will come renting five remaining vacation homes on her property.
The people renting those homes are disaster relief workers, who are removing debris in the surrounding area.
Sommer has been dipping into her retirement money to try to help with the recovery effort, while also seeking grant money whenever it is available.
More grants for small businesses would provide a boost, Sommer said during a press conference Tuesday, while pointing out that small businesses like hers largely depend on visitors coming to the region from elsewhere, providing necessary customers for the region's lodging and restaurants.
Sommer said it is important that people thinking about how to help western North Carolina recognize that recovery efforts are still ongoing, but also that there are parts of the region's tourism-driven economy that are flickering back into activity and need visitors to thrive.
"Even though it's very disheartening still to see the damage, there are people that are open for business and that want tourism to come back to Asheville, to Black Mountain, Swannanoa," Sommer said. "So we need to tell the story simultaneously, that there's lots to be done, but we also need people to come back."
Sommer is targeting an October reopening. If that isn't possible, she said, Hidden River will hopefully open in April 2026.
