The race for the Chickahominy Board of Supervisors seat will be at least a two man race this November.
Independent James M. Ellis Jr. announced last Friday that he will oppose incumbent Robert R. Setliff in the fall election.
Ellis, 46, said he had been urged to run by friends and neighbors.
“I couldn’t get the idea out of my head,” said Ellis, a senior research associate at VCU’s Survey and Evaluation Research Laboratory, where he has worked for the last 18 years.
“The county needs to create an ongoing relationship with the citizens,” said Ellis, who said he thought the Comprehensive Plan Update process exposed some weak points in the way Hanover communicates with its populace.
“I can’t believe that 900 people show up at Hanover High School and they don’t get the message,” said Ellis, referring to the board’s public hearing on the update.
Ellis, who lives in Craney Island Farms with his wife Lisa and their four children, said he never understood the urgency behind the update process.
“I didn’t see anything that showed we needed this update process right now,” he said.
Ellis said if no land had been added to the Suburban Service Area, he still didn’t think Hanover would be one giant bedroom community 20 years from now.
Ellis said that citizen groups should have the same relationship with county planners as developers and home builders do, and be included in the planning process from the very start, rather than be presented with a plan near the end of the process.
“Opening the process will be messier at times,’ Ellis said. But with his professional experience he believes he is the one to do it.
“Someone has to bring these issues out; that someone is me.
Ellis said he has spent his career listening to what people have on their minds, and thinks these kinds of attitude and skills are needed on the board.
In the Chickahominy District, Ellis warned that every piece of land will probably be developed in the next 20 years
“We could end up with no open spaces, no walking areas,” he said. “Will citizens get to provide meaningful input before the designs are already locked in and only then presented at public hearings?” he asked.
Ellis said that the network of neighborhood and civic associations, faith communities and other groups could be used by the county to draw citizens into the planning process earlier.
“All I would like to do is make sure that citizens have a meaningful place at the table,” he said.
The new candidate has a website at www.jimellisbos.com