In the sixth year of the Inspirational Women in Local Government series, we’re continuing to highlight women who are leading transformative, innovative work within local government. 

Melissa Moore is one of those leaders.

After beginning her career in corporate finance, Melissa made a deliberate shift into public service. Her “why” was clear: apply financial discipline and strategic thinking in service of taxpayers, rather than shareholders. That calling took her through public finance leadership roles in Texas, and eventually to Buncombe County, North Carolina, where she moved with her husband a little over two years ago.

Then Hurricane Helene hit.

Here’s a snippet of how Melissa’s nominator described her leadership:

“In late September of 2024, Buncombe County, North Carolina was devastated by Hurricane Helene. While sixteen months have passed by since then, North Carolina is still dealing with the aftermath. Melissa Moore, CFO of Buncombe County, balances being a citizen and leader dedicated to staying focused on restoring normalcy to her county’s residents, employees, and small businesses.”

In our conversation with Melissa, she reflects on what she’s learned moving from private sector finance to local government and what fearless career growth looks like.

This is the first of the 2026 Inspirational Women in Local Government series. The next three honorees will be profiled each Thursday this month.

Q. Is there a book that you've read in the past that was particularly meaningful to you?

Probably the Bible. I’m a preacher’s kid and The Bible has shaped a lot of my worldview.

But in terms of professional development - particularly as a woman navigating environments that can be male-dominated - there are a couple of other books that stand out. One is “It’s Not What You Say, It’s How You Say It” by Joan Detz. Another is “Surrounded by Idiots” by Thomas Erikson. While it’s an attention-grabbing title, the book is really about communication styles and tailoring them to different personality types. It’s about understanding that people communicate differently - and if you want to be effective, you need to communicate in the way they best receive information. 

Q. Tell us a little about your community and your role?

I’m fairly new to North Carolina. I was born and raised in Texas and had never lived outside the state until moving here a little over two years ago. But once my children had graduated from school, my husband and I saw it as an opportunity to explore somewhere new.

So, it’s been a big transition: new state requirements, a new community, and a new organization and team.

I serve in a finance leadership role at the county, which is in the Asheville area. Hurricane Helene really was a “baptism by fire.” If you didn’t know your co-workers and peers at that time, you certainly did after that, because you were in the trenches together day in and day out, responding to the community on what for many people was the worst day of their lives.

Emergency management focused on the operational response, and my job behind the scenes was to ensure we were documenting properly and following all the FEMA guidance and our own county policies so we could maximize reimbursement. If we didn't do that work correctly, the costs would end up being passed on locally. I felt very strongly about protecting our residents from additional financial burden.

Q. What was the path that led you to public service?

My career started in corporate finance. I then moved into management consulting, including a short stint with KPMG. I didn’t grow up around local government careers, so public service wasn’t an obvious path at first. When you get a finance degree, the expectation is usually that you go to work for a company. So that’s what I did.

My first real exposure to how government works came through a consulting project with a city-owned utility in San Antonio. Even though it had its own board, the city ultimately owned it, and council approval was required for things like increasing utility rates. Seeing that process - the need to explain, persuade, and make the case in a public setting - was truly eye-opening.

Over time, I felt a growing passion for using my financial background to advocate for taxpayers. 

In the private sector, the value you create often benefits investors or executives. I wanted to apply that same strategic thinking and efficiency mindset to protect public dollars. I wanted to push for accountability from vendors, to insist on measurable results, and to make sure taxpayer funding was treated with the seriousness it deserves.

That “servant heart” was also shaped by volunteering and nonprofit work. I helped to start a nonprofit in San Antonio focused on wellness and belonging for people experiencing homelessness. That sense of giving back and finding purpose in the community carried over into public service and ultimately led me into local government finance roles.

Q. What are you most proud of professionally?

I would say I’m most proud of our response in the early days of Hurricane Helene.

The storm had a significant impact - the sheer number of people affected, the infrastructure damage, the scale of disruption. As a finance officer, I knew immediately that my role was to do everything I could to protect our community from additional financial burden. I may have been new to Buncombe County at the time, but in that moment, it was my community.

Once there’s a federal disaster declaration, FEMA funds are set aside. We have a right to that money, but only if we follow the rules. It’s an incredibly detailed and tedious process. And in the middle of a disaster, no one responding on the ground is thinking about documentation or policy compliance. Nor should they be. That’s my job. I felt very strongly that Helene could not become a second disaster by forcing us to pass costs back to residents through a tax increase to reimburse ourselves. Protecting the community from that was incredibly important to me.

I had been through prior emergency operations center activations in Texas, so I understood the fundamentals. But the breadth of this disaster triggered programs I had never encountered before, like private property debris removal. There were layers of complexity and different rules attached to each program.

Those early days were also emotional in the emergency operations center. Waiting to hear from employees to make sure everyone was safe was emotional, and some members of our team experienced damage to their own homes There were a lot of feelings layered into the work.

We’re still in the reimbursement process, but so far what we’ve submitted has been going through. I’d love to take credit, but it’s really my incredible team who are deep in the details every day making it happen.

What I’m most proud of is that our disaster response has been focused not just on recovery, but on stewardship. 

Q. What advice would you give to other women in local government looking to grow their careers?

The first thing I would say is: understand how change happens in local government.

When I first came into the public sector, I had this vision that I was going to come in with my finance skills and directly make a huge impact on my community. And while you absolutely can make an impact, the reality is this: nothing changes unless your elected officials change it.

If they’re not on board with your ideas and your vision - or even if they agree in principle but don’t take steps to implement it, approve it, and appropriate funding - it doesn’t matter how brilliant you are. That was a big realization for me. It’s not just about how hard you work or how strong your ideas are. There’s a process. There’s governance. There’s an agenda.

That doesn’t mean you stop dreaming big. It means you learn how to work within that structure. You focus on helping elected officials understand trade-offs, timing, and the steps required to move something from idea to action. That’s where influence really happens.

And beyond understanding governance, I’d tell women to be fearless.

I recently attended the GFOA Leadership Academy and sat next to a young woman who was in an assistant finance director role. She got emotional asking me, “How do I get to the next level?” I told her: Apply. Go for it. All they can do is tell you no.”

Sometimes we underestimate ourselves. We think we need one more credential, one more year, one more perfect moment. Meanwhile, we’re already doing the work. I encouraged her to revise her resume from a leadership perspective and show exactly how brilliant and capable she was. I remember thinking: “Why does she believe she doesn’t have what it takes to be a director?”

If you have a career path in mind, you’re the only one who can steer it. Set your vision and go for it. 

Q. Where do you go when you want support, education, or mentorship?

I’ve been incredibly impressed with the University of North Carolina School of Government since moving here. You’re learning from professionals who have dedicated their entire careers to becoming subject-matter experts. The classes are multi-day, rigorous, and substantive. It’s a tremendous resource for professional development and certification, and I think it raises the overall bar for local government talent in North Carolina.

On the informal side, I’ve been very fortunate to have strong mentorship within my organization. Our county manager, Avril Pinder, has been an incredible resource. When you’re pursuing big goals there are moments of uncertainty. She’s someone I can sit down with one-on-one and talk through my questions.

Having a leader who invests in you, who models confidence, and who can walk into a room and truly own it - that’s powerful. Watching Avril lead with confidence has been a mentorship experience in itself.

Q: Who else has been an inspirational leader who has had an impact on you?

My parents.

Avril is absolutely an inspirational leader, but my parents are my core. They raised me with high expectations and steady love and support. Even now, I can call them anytime. Half the time they don’t really understand the details of what I do, but they’ll always say: “You go, girl. We’ve got you.”

I saw them persevere through hard times with integrity - especially watching my mom as a preacher’s wife navigate difficult seasons with grace, kindness, and integrity. As a kid, I didn’t understand how hard it could be. But I watched how they handled it, and it shaped me.

No matter the industry, my parents’ integrity is a driving force. I’ve always wanted to make them proud.

Q: What do you hope your legacy will be?

Something that has really resonated with me as I’ve grown in my career is the power of taxation.

I’m currently working on my doctorate in public administration, and as I narrow down topics for my dissertation, I keep coming back to issues around fraud and corruption. But I look at them through the lens of taxation. Government holds this extraordinary power to tax - a revenue source embedded in law that goes back to biblical times. Our services and our society function through federal, state, and local taxes.

When fraud and corruption enter that system, we layer on more rules, more bureaucracy, more oversight. And while that’s done with good intent it can also create incredible complexity and inefficiency. You can’t drive enough human behavior to stop every bad actor. So the question becomes: how do we design systems that make fraud far more difficult in the first place?

I would love my legacy to be making a meaningful difference in that space. Whether that’s through leveraging technology - creating smarter systems where government and banking platforms can communicate in real time so misuse is caught immediately - or influencing policy in a way that simplifies processes while still protecting taxpayer dollars, I want to have an impact. I want to get to a point in my career where I can say: we’ve reduced opportunities for fraud, we’ve strengthened stewardship, and we’ve protected the public’s trust.

Q: Are there women who you know in public service who deserve a shout-out? Celebrate them here.

I met some amazing women at the GFOA Leadership Academy in Charleston, including: Betsy Tucker and Charlene Bunch.  The women who first hired me in public sector, Heather Hurlburt, as well as Karen Proctor.  They have both supported me through my public sector career.

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