Alice Richmond has been running the Page County Blog since 2007. She first started doing it when she realized the local county government needed some investigative journalism to keep it from passing ordinances that took people’s homes away if they lived in the flood plain. With a group of neighbors, she organized Page County Watch. This group started attending public county meetings. Over the course of two years, members of this group saw the county government harass small businesses until they ran away from Page County, sign a trash contract with Warren County that had no escalation in it for 15 years and did not cover its costs, install a new phone system at the highest bid price submitted, purchase land for a new county office building (Emerald City) at a price way, way, way above assessed value, and buy more land for a hypothetical business park (CloverGate) at a price well above market value. While doing all this, the county found itself surprised with a budget shortfall of $6M.
Alice decided she just couldn’t take it any more. Running the Blog and telling people what was going on was just not enough. Holding County Town Hall meetings which the Board refused to attend was not acceptable. Being blocked out of getting information by a county staff that was dodging questions was intolerable. If you love your community, you show that by serving it. The Blog serves the community by providing information to the citizens and opening a public forum. Questioning what the local government is doing is a positive act. In order to question it from the inside, and make sure its actions are disclosed to the public, as they are meant to be under Virginia Sunshine Laws, Alice decided to run for District 1 Supervisor.
Many people think Alice should tone it down, keep it mild, and stop rocking the boat. But, that’s not going to happen. Alice is running on a platform of open, responsive government that does what the people want . . . but the people can’t want it unless they know all the information. So Alice is still planning to post and reveal all the information, both before and after the election. Open government requires that the people know everything, all the time, and that they have the forum to participate in their own governance.
So, here’s the information about Alice’s background, in case anyone cares:
Resume of Alice Elliott Richmond
Education:
1979-1981 Harvard Graduate School of Business, Boston, MBA
1973-1975 University of Pennsylvania, Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering.
1971-1973 Delaware County Community College, Media, Pennsylvania
Experience:
2000 – present. Online college teacher in business courses. Teaches Organizational Behavior, Leadership, Entrepreneurship, Decision-making for Strayer and DeVry Universities.
2005 – present Vice President-Business Development, SimplyRFID, Warrenton, Virginia. (http://www.SimplyRFID.com)
1996-2005 Independent business consultant, researcher, and writer in topics of personal interest. Presented research at the 5th annual WorldWideWeb conference in Paris on Enticing Online Shoppers to Buy – a Human Behavior Study, published by Elsevier Press, Journal of Computing Technologies, May, 1996. Taught online business courses for Ellis College of New York Institute of Technology. Taught in the classroom at Lord Fairfax Community College. Consulted for Neopost, AT&T, Intelus, RJO, and others in commercialization of emerging technologies.
1990-1995 President, ZAXOR Software, Gaithersburg, Maryland. Founder of this document imaging and business re-engineering startup, which won a Maryland State Grant for entrepreneurship and jobs creation. Raised funds, developed software, installed at Genetic Therapy, Prince George’s County, Jackson and
Mears, and various law firms.
1987-1990 Unisys Corporation and others, consultant in business development. Rockville, Maryland. Traveled extensively to assist this Burroughs-Sperry merger to integrate corporate cultures and proposal bids in a technology environment.
1984-1987 Computer Sciences Corporation, Director of Program Control. Falls Church, Virginia. Managed sixty plus engineers and MBAs who prepared bids and proposals, and managed project costs, for this systems integration group.
1981-1984 COMSAT, Washington D.C. Business development analyst. Roamed the halls of Comsat’s extensive, well funded corporate laboratory, helping technologists to prepare business plans for commercialization of their discoveries. Identified, nurtured, and negotiated the acquisition of a thin film gallium arsenide manufacturing facility. Arranged international joint ventures in Mexico, Holland, and Italy. Extensive international travel.
Personal: Married to Jim Richmond, retired from the land development industry. Three sons, all grown and living in the Washington DC area. Four grandchildren.
