By Marty Gordon
The Montgomery County Board of Supervisors is guaranteed to have one new face on the governing group after next month’s election as two newcomers are seeking the seat formerly held by Chris Tuck. Sherry Blevins and Brian Lawson are seeking the District B seat while incumbent Darrell Sheppard faces opposition from Robbie Jones in District E.
Also, Sue Kass and Sofia Zhang Midkiff are running for the District F seat on the Montgomery County School Board. Connie L. Froggatt had held the seat since 2016 and decided not to run this year.
Interim Treasurer Helen St. Clair is also facing opposition from retired businessman Tay Taylor.
Thursday, the candidates had a chance to introduce themselves to the public during an election forum sponsored by the Montgomery County League of Women Voters in the county’s Board of Supervisors meeting room. The event was co-sponsored by the Montgomery County Chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
Midkiff serves on the Montgomery County Public Schools Gifted Advisory Committee, the Blacksburg Chinese School Board and the Haymarket Square HOA Board. Kass taught at Blacksburg Middle School from 2006-2017 and now works in Student Services at Virginia Tech Graduate School.
St. Clair has 35 years of experience in the treasurer’s office including 15 as the chief deputy treasurer and currently serves as Interim Treasurer after Richard Shelton stepped own earlier this year. Taylor has been a small business owner and is a former insurance agent.
Sheppard is a lifelong resident of District E and has served the district for the past four years. Jones is a past Vice President and President of the Montgomery County Education Association, and currently serves on Virginia Education Association’s Board of Directors. Lawson owns a food truck and a Radford restaurant called Thai This.
Blevins is a small business owner of the New River Valley Driving School and was an advocate to move the Falling Branch Park and Ride Lot away from a nearby elementary school.
School funding took center stage for both the school board and the supervisor candidates. The key thing, according to all the candidates, is balancing funding for county schools without raising taxes.
Sheppard feels the county has done a good job of doing that over the past few years. “I believe we have to work with what we have, and I think we have done that,” he said.
Jones called it a delicate situation and the so-called increase has not covered the loss of several teaching positions from that past.
Lawson alluded to the discussion of funding for new schools in Christiansburg. He hopes supervisors can work to fund that plan and others as many of the current schools like Blacksburg High School are already at capacity.
Blevins is optimistic that economic growth can ease some of the problem, and grants can help generate new revenue that would keep the county from having to increase taxes.
When looking at future plans for new schools, the two school-board candidates pushed for a much larger comprehensive plan that would look at all schools across the county. “We need one (plan) to look at all our older schools and then look at the funding needed across the board,” Midkiff said.
Kass said that as a former teacher she knows about the need for more funding for better security in all county schools. “It is important that students and teachers feel they are safe,” she said.
Midkiff pointed out that what opens the doors on many of the school buildings is not up-to-date when it comes to security. She called for parents and students to be more vigilant of things around them.
Lawson, a supervisor candidate, also mentioned the problem with broadband service here in Montgomery County. “So many of our students are given Chrome Books (laptops) to do their homework at home, but many do not have WiFi in their home to do that.” He is calling for that to change.
All of the other supervisor candidates agreed this is a problem in the county that has to be corrected.
Sheppard mentioned a recent study that is looking at the differences in the broadband service in different parts of the county. He hopes the area can receive future state and federal funding to relieve the problem. Blevins agreed and suggestedthat the county consider more public-private partnerships including reaching out to the current area’s Internet providers.
Voter guides for the candidates running for county treasurer, board of supervisors and school board are posted at www.VOTE411. Paper copies of the voter guides are available in the county’s area libraries.Both Taylor and St. Clair cited their business experience as a way to improve the treasurer’s office.
