All Six Midlothian and Clover Hill Board of Supervisors Candidates Meet MBA Members at the Election Lunch at Salisbury Country Club

The Midlothian Business Alliance hosted a Board of Supervisors Election Lunch on Tuesday, September 12, 2023 at Salisbury Country Club, 13620 W Salisbury Road, Midlothian, VA 23113, bringing together all six candidates from the Midlothian and Clover Hill districts. The MBA described it as likely one of — if not the — only events featuring all six candidates from the two districts. The program ran from 11:15 AM to 1:00 PM and paired networking with the candidates with a moderated Q&A.

Dr. Mark Miller — D, incumbent, Midlothian District. Miller had lived in Midlothian for twenty-five years with his wife, Jennifer, and their two adult daughters, Sage and Eliana. He held an undergraduate degree in secondary education from the University of Pittsburgh, a master's in psychology from Shippensburg University and a doctorate in clinical psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies, and was licensed in Virginia as a professional counselor and certified substance abuse counselor. He had spent the previous nine years as a professional counselor at Brightpoint Community College, after thirteen years as a services supervisor for Chesterfield Mental Health, where he was named employee of the year in 2007.

Erin Phelan — I, Midlothian District. Phelan grew up in Williamsburg, majored in Spanish at Virginia Tech and later earned a B.S. in environmental science from Oregon State University while working. Her early career ranged from operating heavy equipment to estimating, procurement and job-site logistics on environmental remediation projects; from 2006 she worked in facilities and transportation infrastructure operations and maintenance in Richmond and Washington, D.C., and for a period in Colorado. She held a Project Management Professional certification from PMI and served on the Better Housing Coalition's Young Professionals Board and the League of Women Voters Affordable Housing Committee. She worked for Fluor Enterprises Inc. in Richmond and lived in Moseley with her husband, Ray, and their twin daughters.

Jim Williams — R, Midlothian District. Williams was a Midlothian attorney and business owner who grew up in a military family. After studying public administration he began his career on Capitol Hill with a congressional watchdog agency, then clerked for a U.S. District Judge before practicing commercial litigation, insurance defense and plaintiff personal injury law. He had served as a principal at Burnett & Williams in Midlothian since 2006. His community roles included director of the Hopewell/Prince George Chamber of Commerce, the Hopewell Downtown Partnership and the Evergreen Athletic Association, and he was serving on the Richmond Airport Commission. He lived in Midlothian with his wife, Kristina, and had five children and two grandsons.

Chris Winslow — R, incumbent, Clover Hill District. Winslow graduated from the University of Mary Washington in political science, managed Rob Bell's 2001 House campaign and served as Bell's legislative assistant in the 2002 and 2003 General Assembly sessions. He entered the U.S. Navy as an intelligence specialist petty officer after September 11, 2001 and served at Camp Lemonier, Djibouti, during Operation Enduring Freedom. He owned and operated Winslow, McCurry & MacCormac, PLLC, a 19-employee Midlothian law firm, and Sycamore Title. Elected to the Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors for Clover Hill in 2015 and vice chairman in 2021, he served as chairman in 2022, when the county pushed to lead the region in teacher pay, landed more than $2 billion in capital investment and 2,000 jobs including the LEGO Group's first U.S. manufacturing facility, dedicated the future Enon Library in honor of Dr. Wyatt Tee Walker, and cut the real estate tax rate to $0.91 per $100.

Greg Allen — I, Clover Hill District. Allen grew up in Roanoke, joined the Marine Corps Reserves in 1975 as a combat engineer and graduated from Virginia Tech in 1983 in landscape architecture. He spent ten years in Charlotte, North Carolina preparing site and construction plans — including for the 60-story Bank of America building — and led a grassroots campaign that tightened the city's billboard ordinance. Hired by the Chesterfield Planning Department in 1993 to implement the 1994 zoning ordinance, he managed commercial construction plan review, pushed for placemaking that made Rockwood the county's first approved Special Focus Area plan, and led implementation of the bikeway system for five years. He retired from the Planning Department in the summer of 2023 and was married to Janit Llewellyn, who had just retired from the Parks and Recreation Department.

Jessica Schneider — D, Clover Hill District. Schneider had spent eight years on the Bexley HOA as architectural review chair and board member, four of them as president, working to knit together the 450-home community through volunteer projects and social groups. She had an extensive hospitality and restaurant background as a bar manager and chef and had worked twenty years as a private caterer and personal chef. She also held a degree in interior design, began her design career with a flooring company in Milwaukee and ran her own residential and commercial design business in Wisconsin and Illinois for nearly twelve years before relocating to Virginia. Her volunteer work included Family Shelter Services, Moms Demand Action / Everytown Survivor Network, SPCA-Paws for Health, the NAACP Chesterfield Chapter, Chesterfield CIS and the National Organization for Women Virginia Chapter.