by Neil Richard
The basic idea behind this interview series is to interview local leaders that live, work, or have an important impact on King George County. We have asked various citizens for recommendations on who they see as a local leader. Additionally, we feel that everyone has a story and it deserves to be told. So we want to know their story. As you can see with the questions below, we want to share their story with the rest of the citizens in King George County. If you have somebody you would like to nominate for a future interview, please contact us.
Dr. Neiman Young, County Administrator, King George County
Dr. Young's educational background is as extensive as you would expect for someone with a PhD. He put the GI Bill to good use while he served in the Army and started with a Bachelor's degree in Business from Excelsior College in Albany, New York. His MBA was earned from Liberty University right here in Virginia and his PhD in Public Policy and Administration came from Walden University in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Additionally, he is a graduate of the Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.
Dr. Young said that it may sound like a hodge podge of places but he took pride in being a product of the military education system. He said he highly recommended these universities to those in the military as an ideal option to further their education.
During his time in the military, Dr. Young was deployed several times with Special Operations in Africa and South America as well as two tours in Afghanistan and a tour in Iraq. He retired as a Major.
On my mother's side, my grandmother died when I was real young, like six or seven years old. My mother's father, there's not a lot that really stands out. He didn't really talk to us much.
But as far as grandparents as a whole, my grandmother on my father's side was a character developing individual in my life. She believed strongly that men don't cry, that if they have babies, then you take care of them. That you take care of your children. She wouldn't be as forgiving of our mistakes versus the girls in the family. But at the same time, you could see she showed a favoritism to the males in the family. It's an ongoing critique among my cousins now, who gets bragged about the most, and it's usually the grandsons.
What historical events influenced your life the most?
I know everyone says 9/11 but for me 9/11 was the marker that changed the whole trajectory of my life. I remember sitting in my trailer in Fort Polk, Louisiana, watching the events unfold and then eight months later I was in Iraq. If you remember, after 9/11, there was a shift in focus to Iraq and that's when they started the Shock and Awe Campaign. I remember watching that, Iraq was on the television on CNN, it was night, and we were watching it at Fort Polk in the office during the day. And they were blowing up buildings in downtown Baghdad. It was amazing. Well, 90 days later I was living in one of those buildings that we had bombed and it was surreal to me.
I think that when I say it was a trajectory change in my life, it was because prior to 9/11 and post Desert Storm, the Army was like what I called green welfare. You signed up, but there wasn't much activity going on across the world. You'd go to the motor pool, fix trucks, and then go home. Get up in the morning, do PT, go to the motor pool, maintain trucks, clean weapons, and go home. So it was basically easy. And I think that at one point our military had really grown rusted and complacent.
Once 9/11 hit, we had never seen anything like that before. Now there was a threat of death and war and sacrifice and it became a reality to everyone in the military. So we had to make that choice, either get out, try to dodge the war, or raise my hand and get overseas to fight. I made that choice that I was going to raise my hand and go fight. As a Staff Sergeant in Fort Polk, I deployed to Iraq, completed my first tour, and earned a commission for Officer's School. When I became a Lieutenant, I stayed stateside for three or four years with no chance of deploying because there had been so much collateral damage, they quit using artillery in Iraq and Afghanistan. So everybody on base wasn't deploying. I felt like I was stuck even though they were increasing the number of troops. And here I was back to going to the motor pool and then home.
So I told my wife that I was going to join Special Operations because it was a way to get back into the fight. But I felt that the military had been so good to me, I had an MBA by then, had a good family life, good quality of life, and I had been in nearly eleven years. Military had given me everything I had asked for and now they're asking for people to come help fight and so I joined Special Operations. After training, it was six months home then six months gone.
But all of that was built off of the towers falling in 2001.
I never knew because of 9/11 how many times I would be in a combat zone. How many friends I would gain. How many friends I would lose. How much it would touch our lives. It was life-altering.
Outside of work and home, what is your favorite place in King George?
I really don't spend a lot of time outside of those venues. I'm either at work or at home. I don't have a lot of hobbies. There's no place I feel that I can commit a lot time to outside of work and home because I spend so much time at work, by the time I get home, I try to extend it out to the fullest.
Now, my favorite place in King George is the landfill. I love the landfill. Every time I have a new visitor come to the County, you'd be surprised how many people I take to the landfill. They'll ride out there with me to the landfill and that's a place of pride for me simply based on the fact that I find it interesting. They say that King George is known for the eagle population but the majority are at the landfill because it's a food source. Then you have a conversation with people that they don't know what happens to their trash. But being able to see the whole process is interesting. I use that as an ice-breaker for when visitors come to the County.
It's interesting. The engineering, the environmental considerations, to see the tipper, the monster trucks they have. You have somebody come visit and you don't know what to do with the day, that's a good few hours to spend touring out there. It's my go to place for visitors that come from out of the County.
What person, place, or thing do you think is the most underappreciated in King George County?
But I'm looking for a professional mentor. You would think that you could talk to city managers or other county administrators but that's not likely because they're pretty busy. So I'm kind of in a void right now.
Instead what I do is try to learn a little bit from a lot of people that I feel are especially impressive, whether there are good things about them or bad things about them. I try to take a piece from individuals I come across in my professional and personal life. In addition, when I seek counsel on things I'm thinking about to make sure they're not too far out there, I spend time with Mike Bennett and Eric Gregory. I really utilize their counsel and rely on their confidence and don't have to worry about our discussions leaking out. And if it's too far out there, they'll give me a fair critique and advice on how to polish or another direction to take. I view that as mentorship. I really appreciate having a relationship with those two gentlemen.
What is your ideal vision for King George County in the future?
Professionally, I would like the future of King George to be a financially stable community that is not dependent on the landfill revenue nor consumer retail revenue. I would like to see our County nab some strong industrial businesses to bring in. I would like to see us come up with creative and responsible solutions to unleverage our landfill and not remain dependent on its existence. I think that's one of the greatest threats to future generations of King George County. That's why I have a big push to pursue the debt mitigation plan and if we're going to build big buildings, then we're going to tax for them. Unleverage, unleverage, unleverage. Let's put that money away for investments and make the County stable for future generations.
You said "professionally." Do you have a personal opinion?
Personally, I'd like to see a downtown area for King George County. I know there's a lot of talk about an inter-modal path and and pedestrian paths. I'd like to see something similar but it would have to be something that adheres to the culture of King George. Not an old town Fredericksburg. Something that's unique to King George that fits our culture. Where I can take my wife out to dinner then after dinner there are some options to go walking or some type of entertainment. I'd like to do that in my own community rather than in Fredericksburg or somewhere else.
What do you feel are the top 3 issues to address in King George?
Top three issues? Water, internet, and I won't say debt anymore simply because we're working to address it now. So I'd say the Courthouse issues are something that we have to figure out. Those are the issues in the County.
I don't mind mentioning that because I feel we have to be honest with ourselves. What are our community's problems. But more importantly, don't stick our heads in the sand, let's address them. I have been working with the Board and others inside and outside the County and we're really starting to take a hard look at these problems and working to come up with solutions to address them so we're not facing the same issues five years from now.
What do you feel are the top 3 successes in King George?
The landfill. It was very smartly crafted, smart fiscal policy was put into place to restrict those funds to capital improvements. Additionally, we worked with a private partnership to manage the facility as well as a very favorable tipping fee. Our tipping fee is $5 per ton but other localities, the highest I've seen is only $2.20. So we're already twice anything I've seen in Virginia. The smartest thing the past leadership has done was the financial policy that took all the revenue from the landfill could only go to the capital fund for capital projects. They made it fiscally impossible to depend on that money to fund County operations, services, salaries. I thought that was genius because if we had made that mistake back then, we would be in serious trouble now and especially in 22 or 23 years when the landfill closes. That was on the level of being called the forefathers of King George County. I just pray that we get opportunities like that in King George County and I pray that when they do come, myself and the Board and other leaders in the County have that insight to make and craft those smart agreements. Big fan of that.
I think the YMCA is another success story in King George County. Not only because of the great things they do for the community but I think a real problem that we have in the County is our regional reputation. We're viewed as the little guys in the region, the county guys, the rural guys. And I'm always a fan of putting things in the County that show the rest of the region that King George is here and we're a regional competitor. And the YMCA is across all these other localities and to have them invest in our community shows the rest of the region that King George is a major player. I'm always sensitive to that and I think that was smart for the Board of Supervisors to support that.
Third success, I originally thought the debt mitigation plan but the reality is we haven't seen it to fruition yet. We can say how great it is but until we start seeing some numbers and some hard quantifiable data, I'm kind of hesitant to call it a success.
Rather, I think that we have a lot of great initiatives on the horizon that we're working towards. Once they're in place and complete, I think they're going to be success stories and set up King George for success over the next 25 years.
What person, place, or thing do you think we lack in King George?
Number one, I think we're lacking medical infrastructure. I hear people say we need a hospital but what I'm looking at is five, ten, fifteen years from now and I'm depending on the Weldon Cooper studies and projections for our population that it will grow eight to ten percent. But what's interesting in those numbers is that our population will be an aging population with retirees from Northern Virginia taking advantage of the tax rates and a slower pace of life. And we don't have that infrastructure in place to support our projections so I think that's something we need to work on or we might get in trouble in ten or fifteen years.
Anything else we're lacking?
A lot of people say Chik-fil-A or that type of business. All of that is great but what keeps me awake at night are the necessities. I'm always concerned about what are the necessities and how do we get them. I think we're lacking one major investor in our community to help us stabilize. All it will take is one major investor to invest in King George County and everybody else will follow suit. Of course we're not going to get Google or Amazon but I think it's only a matter of time before we do get a national player that comes and spots King George County and it's really going to set us up for success for the next three to five decades. I guess how to wrap that up into a nice package is a major, a national-level investor in the community.
Introduction
The basic idea behind this interview series is to interview local leaders that live, work, or have an important impact on King George County. We have asked various citizens for recommendations on who they see as a local leader. Additionally, we feel that everyone has a story and it deserves to be told. So we want to know their story. As you can see with the questions below, we want to share their story with the rest of the citizens in King George County. If you have somebody you would like to nominate for a future interview, please contact us.
Dr. Neiman Young, County Administrator, King George County
Basic Biographical Information
Dr. Young's educational background is as extensive as you would expect for someone with a PhD. He put the GI Bill to good use while he served in the Army and started with a Bachelor's degree in Business from Excelsior College in Albany, New York. His MBA was earned from Liberty University right here in Virginia and his PhD in Public Policy and Administration came from Walden University in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Additionally, he is a graduate of the Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.
Dr. Young said that it may sound like a hodge podge of places but he took pride in being a product of the military education system. He said he highly recommended these universities to those in the military as an ideal option to further their education.
During his time in the military, Dr. Young was deployed several times with Special Operations in Africa and South America as well as two tours in Afghanistan and a tour in Iraq. He retired as a Major.
Dr. Young currently serves on the Executive Committee of Virginia Local Government Manager's Association and is the Vice Commander of American Legion Post 329.
Personal Questions
What do you remember about your grandparents?
I have one grandmother on my father's side that's still alive. She's like the matriarch of the family. What I remember about her is that she always treated the males in the family differently by being tougher on them and holding them to higher standards. So a lot of her morals and values were passed along to myself and all the men in my family.On my mother's side, my grandmother died when I was real young, like six or seven years old. My mother's father, there's not a lot that really stands out. He didn't really talk to us much.
But as far as grandparents as a whole, my grandmother on my father's side was a character developing individual in my life. She believed strongly that men don't cry, that if they have babies, then you take care of them. That you take care of your children. She wouldn't be as forgiving of our mistakes versus the girls in the family. But at the same time, you could see she showed a favoritism to the males in the family. It's an ongoing critique among my cousins now, who gets bragged about the most, and it's usually the grandsons.
What historical events influenced your life the most?
I know everyone says 9/11 but for me 9/11 was the marker that changed the whole trajectory of my life. I remember sitting in my trailer in Fort Polk, Louisiana, watching the events unfold and then eight months later I was in Iraq. If you remember, after 9/11, there was a shift in focus to Iraq and that's when they started the Shock and Awe Campaign. I remember watching that, Iraq was on the television on CNN, it was night, and we were watching it at Fort Polk in the office during the day. And they were blowing up buildings in downtown Baghdad. It was amazing. Well, 90 days later I was living in one of those buildings that we had bombed and it was surreal to me.
I think that when I say it was a trajectory change in my life, it was because prior to 9/11 and post Desert Storm, the Army was like what I called green welfare. You signed up, but there wasn't much activity going on across the world. You'd go to the motor pool, fix trucks, and then go home. Get up in the morning, do PT, go to the motor pool, maintain trucks, clean weapons, and go home. So it was basically easy. And I think that at one point our military had really grown rusted and complacent.
Once 9/11 hit, we had never seen anything like that before. Now there was a threat of death and war and sacrifice and it became a reality to everyone in the military. So we had to make that choice, either get out, try to dodge the war, or raise my hand and get overseas to fight. I made that choice that I was going to raise my hand and go fight. As a Staff Sergeant in Fort Polk, I deployed to Iraq, completed my first tour, and earned a commission for Officer's School. When I became a Lieutenant, I stayed stateside for three or four years with no chance of deploying because there had been so much collateral damage, they quit using artillery in Iraq and Afghanistan. So everybody on base wasn't deploying. I felt like I was stuck even though they were increasing the number of troops. And here I was back to going to the motor pool and then home.
So I told my wife that I was going to join Special Operations because it was a way to get back into the fight. But I felt that the military had been so good to me, I had an MBA by then, had a good family life, good quality of life, and I had been in nearly eleven years. Military had given me everything I had asked for and now they're asking for people to come help fight and so I joined Special Operations. After training, it was six months home then six months gone.
But all of that was built off of the towers falling in 2001.
I never knew because of 9/11 how many times I would be in a combat zone. How many friends I would gain. How many friends I would lose. How much it would touch our lives. It was life-altering.
Outside of work and home, what is your favorite place in King George?
I really don't spend a lot of time outside of those venues. I'm either at work or at home. I don't have a lot of hobbies. There's no place I feel that I can commit a lot time to outside of work and home because I spend so much time at work, by the time I get home, I try to extend it out to the fullest.
Now, my favorite place in King George is the landfill. I love the landfill. Every time I have a new visitor come to the County, you'd be surprised how many people I take to the landfill. They'll ride out there with me to the landfill and that's a place of pride for me simply based on the fact that I find it interesting. They say that King George is known for the eagle population but the majority are at the landfill because it's a food source. Then you have a conversation with people that they don't know what happens to their trash. But being able to see the whole process is interesting. I use that as an ice-breaker for when visitors come to the County.
It's interesting. The engineering, the environmental considerations, to see the tipper, the monster trucks they have. You have somebody come visit and you don't know what to do with the day, that's a good few hours to spend touring out there. It's my go to place for visitors that come from out of the County.
What person, place, or thing do you think is the most underappreciated in King George County?
What's underappreciated and another favorite place of mine is the old Middle School. That building is underappreciated. You're aware that we're in the middle of determining what we're going to do with it. A lot of people have not been in there and I've spent some significant time in that building and if you go see the stage and the rooms and all the space, I can't believe that we haven't done anything with it. So I started using it for the military exercises and I think that it is underappreciated and it's been neglected and I don't want to let such a beautiful building go to waste.
Another place that's not noticed. I'm a big fan of King George Cleaners right next to Food Lion. Love them. Great service. Prices are outstanding. It's amazing the cost to get a suit dry cleaned there versus what I was paying in North Carolina. The first time I ever went there, I said I needed a suit cleaned and they told me it was just six dollars. I love those guys and have come to know them well. They're Korean and in military communities there's always a heavy Korean population. Not so much when I came to King George. So after talking to them some and getting to know them a little better. Finding out they were Korean, they found out I liked Korean food like kimchi and that I speak a little Korean. So we really developed a tight relationship over there.
Another place that's not noticed. I'm a big fan of King George Cleaners right next to Food Lion. Love them. Great service. Prices are outstanding. It's amazing the cost to get a suit dry cleaned there versus what I was paying in North Carolina. The first time I ever went there, I said I needed a suit cleaned and they told me it was just six dollars. I love those guys and have come to know them well. They're Korean and in military communities there's always a heavy Korean population. Not so much when I came to King George. So after talking to them some and getting to know them a little better. Finding out they were Korean, they found out I liked Korean food like kimchi and that I speak a little Korean. So we really developed a tight relationship over there.
Professional Questions
Who is your inspiration or mentor?
I don't really have one but I'm in search of one. That's based off the fact that I've changed professional fields and naturally when you change professions, your personal life shifts as well. So all of my mentors prior were military personnel. By far my greatest inspiration at that point was General Colin Powell. I was inspired by him and tried to mimic his career path which didn't work out too well for me. But you shoot for the stars and wherever you land is still higher than where you took off. But he was a great inspiration. I've read My American Journey, his autobiography, six times and I still think if I read it tomorrow, there are some leadership lessons in his book that will still be relevant to my professional life here.But I'm looking for a professional mentor. You would think that you could talk to city managers or other county administrators but that's not likely because they're pretty busy. So I'm kind of in a void right now.
Instead what I do is try to learn a little bit from a lot of people that I feel are especially impressive, whether there are good things about them or bad things about them. I try to take a piece from individuals I come across in my professional and personal life. In addition, when I seek counsel on things I'm thinking about to make sure they're not too far out there, I spend time with Mike Bennett and Eric Gregory. I really utilize their counsel and rely on their confidence and don't have to worry about our discussions leaking out. And if it's too far out there, they'll give me a fair critique and advice on how to polish or another direction to take. I view that as mentorship. I really appreciate having a relationship with those two gentlemen.
What is your ideal vision for King George County in the future?
Professionally, I would like the future of King George to be a financially stable community that is not dependent on the landfill revenue nor consumer retail revenue. I would like to see our County nab some strong industrial businesses to bring in. I would like to see us come up with creative and responsible solutions to unleverage our landfill and not remain dependent on its existence. I think that's one of the greatest threats to future generations of King George County. That's why I have a big push to pursue the debt mitigation plan and if we're going to build big buildings, then we're going to tax for them. Unleverage, unleverage, unleverage. Let's put that money away for investments and make the County stable for future generations.
You said "professionally." Do you have a personal opinion?
Personally, I'd like to see a downtown area for King George County. I know there's a lot of talk about an inter-modal path and and pedestrian paths. I'd like to see something similar but it would have to be something that adheres to the culture of King George. Not an old town Fredericksburg. Something that's unique to King George that fits our culture. Where I can take my wife out to dinner then after dinner there are some options to go walking or some type of entertainment. I'd like to do that in my own community rather than in Fredericksburg or somewhere else.
What do you feel are the top 3 issues to address in King George?
Top three issues? Water, internet, and I won't say debt anymore simply because we're working to address it now. So I'd say the Courthouse issues are something that we have to figure out. Those are the issues in the County.
I don't mind mentioning that because I feel we have to be honest with ourselves. What are our community's problems. But more importantly, don't stick our heads in the sand, let's address them. I have been working with the Board and others inside and outside the County and we're really starting to take a hard look at these problems and working to come up with solutions to address them so we're not facing the same issues five years from now.
What do you feel are the top 3 successes in King George?
The landfill. It was very smartly crafted, smart fiscal policy was put into place to restrict those funds to capital improvements. Additionally, we worked with a private partnership to manage the facility as well as a very favorable tipping fee. Our tipping fee is $5 per ton but other localities, the highest I've seen is only $2.20. So we're already twice anything I've seen in Virginia. The smartest thing the past leadership has done was the financial policy that took all the revenue from the landfill could only go to the capital fund for capital projects. They made it fiscally impossible to depend on that money to fund County operations, services, salaries. I thought that was genius because if we had made that mistake back then, we would be in serious trouble now and especially in 22 or 23 years when the landfill closes. That was on the level of being called the forefathers of King George County. I just pray that we get opportunities like that in King George County and I pray that when they do come, myself and the Board and other leaders in the County have that insight to make and craft those smart agreements. Big fan of that.
I think the YMCA is another success story in King George County. Not only because of the great things they do for the community but I think a real problem that we have in the County is our regional reputation. We're viewed as the little guys in the region, the county guys, the rural guys. And I'm always a fan of putting things in the County that show the rest of the region that King George is here and we're a regional competitor. And the YMCA is across all these other localities and to have them invest in our community shows the rest of the region that King George is a major player. I'm always sensitive to that and I think that was smart for the Board of Supervisors to support that.
Third success, I originally thought the debt mitigation plan but the reality is we haven't seen it to fruition yet. We can say how great it is but until we start seeing some numbers and some hard quantifiable data, I'm kind of hesitant to call it a success.
Rather, I think that we have a lot of great initiatives on the horizon that we're working towards. Once they're in place and complete, I think they're going to be success stories and set up King George for success over the next 25 years.
What person, place, or thing do you think we lack in King George?
Number one, I think we're lacking medical infrastructure. I hear people say we need a hospital but what I'm looking at is five, ten, fifteen years from now and I'm depending on the Weldon Cooper studies and projections for our population that it will grow eight to ten percent. But what's interesting in those numbers is that our population will be an aging population with retirees from Northern Virginia taking advantage of the tax rates and a slower pace of life. And we don't have that infrastructure in place to support our projections so I think that's something we need to work on or we might get in trouble in ten or fifteen years.
Anything else we're lacking?
A lot of people say Chik-fil-A or that type of business. All of that is great but what keeps me awake at night are the necessities. I'm always concerned about what are the necessities and how do we get them. I think we're lacking one major investor in our community to help us stabilize. All it will take is one major investor to invest in King George County and everybody else will follow suit. Of course we're not going to get Google or Amazon but I think it's only a matter of time before we do get a national player that comes and spots King George County and it's really going to set us up for success for the next three to five decades. I guess how to wrap that up into a nice package is a major, a national-level investor in the community.
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