Grassroots efforts pay off for Democrats in Henrico’s local elections

Democrats won big in this year’s Virginia General Assembly elections, but they also triumphed in Henrico’s local board of supervisors and school board races.

Democratic candidates Misty Whitehead and Jody Rogish flipped two seats on the Henrico Board of Supervisors in Three Chopt and Tuckahoe respectively, giving Democrats a 4-1 majority on the board. The Fairfield and Varina seats will be represented by newcomer Roscoe Cooper III and incumbent Tyrone Nelson – both Democrats – while Republican incumbent Dan Schmitt won the Brookland seat.

The Henrico School Board also will have a Democratic majority following the election, with two Democratic newcomers, Madison Irving and Ryan Young, winning in Three Chopt and Fairfield and Democratic incumbent Alicia Atkins winning the Varina seat. Incumbents Kristi Kinsella and Marcie Shea, who won the Brookland and Tuckahoe seats, do not have public affiliations with either party, although Shea did receive funding from the Henrico Republicans in 2019.

While school board candidates are required to run as independents, they are allowed to receive funding and public backing from political parties.

Going against election norms, several candidates who were significantly outspent by their opponents still triumphed in local races. While Tommy Branin, the two-term Republican incumbent in Three Chopt’s Board of Supervisors race, spent a whopping $180,593 this calendar year, he still lost to Whitehead, who only spent $18,337.

Republican Greg Baka, who was endorsed by the outgoing seven-term Republican Tuckahoe supervisor Pat O’Bannon, spent $152,906 this year in the Tuckahoe race – double that of Rodish’s $75,030 – but still lost to his Democratic opponent.

Other races showed that big bucks still win elections. Schmitt spent $97,040 this year in the Brookland race, defeating Democratic challenger Stephen Rast, who only spent $11,344. Cooper spent $24,743 – significantly more than his independent opponents Delta Bowers, who spent $4,877, and Bo Middleton, who spent only $1,123.

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In the Three Chopt school board race, Irving also outspent Republican Eleina Espigh and independent Kristen Vithoulkas. He received $16,589 from 501c4 We the People for Education and $4,267 from the Democratic Party of Virginia and spent $32,881 this year. Espigh received $7,686 from the conservative Middle Resolution PAC and $500 from the Henrico Republican Party, contributing to her total expenditure of $22,636. Vithoulkas mostly funded her campaign with her own money, saying she rejected almost all donations, and spent only $3,047.

But in Fairfield’s school board race, the well-funded Terrell Pollard, who spent the most out of any candidate in the race ($28,202), still narrowly lost to Young, who spent only $8,673. Both candidates funded their campaign with donations and their own funding. All candidates in the Fairfield race were publicly backed by the Henrico Democrats.

Young also received only one endorsement, from House of Delegates candidate Destiny Levere Bolling, while Pollard received endorsements from several local leaders, including Henrico Commonwealth’s Attorney Shannon Taylor, Henrico County Sheriff Alisa Gregory, and Fairfield supervisor Frank Thornton.

But being a well-known community figure, as a youth basketball coach and a youth basketball league director in Fairfield, clearly helped Young in the election, who said that his campaign had “a real grassroots effort.”

(A similar bump likely also assisted Rogish in his Tuckahoe District supervisor's win; he has been a prominent administrative volunteer with Tuckahoe Little League for several years.)

Early voting also wasn’t the best predictor in Fairfield’s school board race. Among the 6,323 early votes cast, Pollard won 31.17% – the highest percentage of any candidate – while Young only won 17.72%, putting him in third out of the five candidates.

Irving won 47.95% of 7,654 early votes, while Espigh won 30.83% and Vithoulkas won 21.11%. About 2,000 more people voted early in Henrico this year than last year, with 38,845 early votes cast this year and 36,926 early votes cast last year.

Once Election Day came, however, Young garnered 26.3% of the vote, narrowly defeating Pollard who won 25.8% of the vote. The other Fairfield candidates received the following: Tommie Jefferson with 19.9% of the vote, Crystal Varner Parker with 17.5% of the vote, and Keith Hicks with 9.6% of the vote.

Irving ended Election Day with 45.5% of the vote, while Espigh ended with 33.6% and Vithoulkas with 20.5%.

Young won nine of Fairfield’s 22 precincts, including the areas around Wilder Middle School and Henrico High School – schools he had previously attended. Pollard won five precincts and Parker won four, while Jefferson and Hicks both won two precincts. Young did the best in Maplewood, Wilder, and Azalea, where he gathered 50% of the vote in each despite being faced with four other opponents.

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In the Three Chopt school board race, Irving won 13 out of 15 precincts, doing the best in Ridge where he won 50% of the vote. Espigh narrowly won in Shady Grove and Nuckols Farm by 10 votes and eight votes respectively.

In Three Chopt’s board of supervisors' race, which Whitehead won by less than 300 votes, Branin won eight precincts and Whitehead won seven. Whitehead received 68% of the vote at the Tucker High School precinct.

In the Tuckahoe board of supervisors' race, Baka won six precincts (most in the southern part of the district), while Rogish won 13 precincts (most in the northern part). Rogish did his best in Crestview, where he won 60% of the vote.

Both Cooper (Fairfield supervisors' race) and Atkins (Varina school board race) won all of the precincts in their districts. Cooper won 69.3% of the vote in the three-way Fairfield supervisor race, while Atkins defeated challenger Domonique Pervall with 72.8% of the vote.

Now that the school board has a majority of Democrats, constituents will be eager to see how the board votes on issues such as school staff collective bargaining, the Virginia Department of Education’s new policies on transgender students, and on book removal policies in school libraries.

All three Democratic-backed candidates said they would stand against implementing the VDOE’s 2023 model policies and against changing book removal policies during their campaigns. Both Irving and Young have stated that they would support a school board resolution to allow collective bargaining from Henrico Schools’ employees, while Atkins said she may be open to the idea and is “committed to exploring opportunities that uplift teacher and staff compensation while working to create better working conditions for them.”

On the board of supervisors, each of the three new Democratic members made environmental issues focal points of their campaigns and pledged to seek ways to enhance the county's ongoing efforts there. Each also championed plans to make the county more walkable and bikeable.

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Liana Hardy is the Citizen’s Report for America Corps member and education reporter. Her position is dependent upon reader support; make a tax-deductible contribution to the Citizen through RFA here.