Jim Icenhour and the U-shaped cost of government curve

It's July 27. We talk with James City Supervisor Jim Icenhour about the costs of growth. County supervisors will look at extending senior tax break on real estate taxes. Nordstrom Rack opens Oct. 22.

Left to Right: Jim Icenhour in 1968 as a fighter pilot, flying with the airlines, and with his wife Linda. (photos from Jim Icenhour)

Talk to Jamestown Supervisor Jim Icenhour about his skepticism of new housing developments in James City County, and he will bring up his study of Virginia counties and draw a U-shaped curve relating the cost of local government to population size.

A small community lacks a large enough tax base to provide essential services, Icenhour says. They tend to rely on volunteer fire departments and emergency services.

“When you get between about 25,000 to 75,000 people, now you’ve got a critical mass,” he told us. “You are collecting enough in revenues from taxes that you can provide better services, and the cost is reasonable.

But counties in the 75,000 to 100,000 population range see the cost per resident creep back up, “because that kind of community demands better services.”

James City County is already there.

During a recent interview over lunch, Icenhour, told Williamsburg Watch he is often a skeptic of planned residential developments because he is concerned about their impact on schools and transportation and the eventual cost to existing taxpayers.

He said the tax revenue the developments generate often doesn’t pay for the capital infrastructure required to sustain them.

“I’m representing my constituents,” Icenhour said. “And you come to me with a development that I think is going to cost them, in the long run, more tax money. Why should they subsidize?“

Icenhour has the second-longest tenure on the county board of supervisors after Chairman John J. McGlennon.

A Ford’s Colony resident, he was first elected in 2005 from what was then the Powhatan District, comprising the entire community. He ran unopposed in 2009.

But he was re-districted out of his seat in 2011 after the prior year’s census. Ford’s Colony was split down the middle between Powhatan and Jamestown districts. McGlennon, a fellow Democrat, was redistricted out of his Jamestown seat into the Roberts district.

Redistricting occurred under what was then a Republican majority in the supervisors, on the recommendation of a committee chaired by a Republican party operative, Jeff Ryer, who is now the state Republican party chairman.

McGlennon won re-election by 28 votes. A temporary supervisor was appointed to the new Jamestown seat until a special election was called for a one year term in 2012, which Icenhour won. But he lost re-election in 2013, also by 28 votes, to Republican Kevin Onizuk. Onizuk decided not to run again in 2018, and Icenhour was returned to the board.

Icenhour says he has seen James City County become increasingly Democratic because “growth has brought in a lot of people, from areas where they tend to be” majority Democrats.

Icenhour, a North Carolina native, is himself a transplant. He and his wife Linda moved to the county with their two daughters from Newport News because of what he says was increasing crime and over development.

His oldest daughter is an military veteran like Icenhour and lives in Brussels, where she works for NATO. The youngest daughter is a James City County teacher and lives in the county.

Icenhour says he ran for the board because “I was concerned about the fact that (James City) was going to be turned into another Newport News, or another Northern Virginia.”

He retired from the U.S. Air Force after 20 years as a fighter jet pilot, then went to work as an airline pilot with Pan American World Airways, later absorbed into Delta Airlines.

“I like it, Icenhour says of his role as supervisor. “It keeps me involved in the community.”

Icenhour says he will continue to stand for election “as long as I think I have something to offer. And as long as I’m physically able to do it.”