Reed Creek Supervisor Pam Cobler led a fast-paced, information-packed community meeting Tuesday at the Dyer’s Store Fire Department. A capacity crowd showed up to hear county updates from five county officials and had their questions answered, all within an hour.
The meeting was opened by Dyer’s Store VFD Chief Randy Smith and Assistant Chief John Chitwood.
County Administration
Deputy County Administrator J.R. Powell said that citizen input on the Comprehensive Plan which the county is working on is important. The plan would outline “where we want Henry County to be 20 years from now and what does it take to get there from where we are today.” Topics it addresses include land use, land development, community amenities, transportation and the economy.
An online survey was conducted for a couple of months, “but there are still many ways to be involved,” such as to read about the plan through handouts and on the website, make comments and read drafts of the plan, he said.
Powell described the county’s budget. The 2024 budget was $216 million, he said, with the majority – 62.2% — going to education. Sixteen percent goes to public safety.
“If there’s a (funding) need, we address it. That doesn’t mean we always get what we want … but there’s a plan,” he said.
The county has secured an agreement with the Virginia Department of Transportation to extend the Patriot Centre’s main roadway “to give us access to another 200 acres of land to continue economic development” there, Powell said.
Meanwhile, the $28 million improvements at Commonwealth Crossing “already has some really good prospects,” he said. It’s “just a matter of time and there’s going to be a really good industry coming to that locality in the Ridgeway area.”
The county’s 5-page Legislative Agenda, which is posted to the county’s website, outlines the county’s aims for this session of the General Assembly. They include increased funding for industrial recruitment incentives; transportation funding to improve the U.S. 220 corridor coming from Greensboro, N.C.; funding for School Resource Officers; improvements in the new Mayo State Park; housing; and public safety funding to support local fire departments and EMS squads.
Sheriff’s Office
Sheriff Wayne Davis said that the energies of the Henry County Sheriff Office (HCSO) are focused primarily on getting illegal drugs, such as methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and fentanyl, “removed from your community. The sales of narcotics affect everyone in Martinsville and Henry County.”
Reducing the numbers of drug sales also reduces the numbers of thefts, he said. In 2024, thefts were lower than before, and there was only one homicide, “which is a decade-low record. All other forms of violent crime are down as well.”
With the help of county administration, he said, the HCSO developed its first narcotics intervention unit, which has “two deputies patrolling day in, day out.”
In the new Community Engagement Unit, four deputies “engage the good people of this community who otherwise would not have the opportunity to engage with the sheriff’s office” by attending events such as community meetings, festivals, schools and recruitment events.
The DARE program is back in schools, he said.
The Adult Detention Center has a new program with Patrick & Henry Community College to teach job skills to inmates. The first program involves certification with herbicides and pesticides, and there are hopes to expand the program to other trades such as welding and electrical.
Homelessness is “a relatively new problem” to the area, he said, over the past 2 years. That has been attributed to larger cities sending homeless people to the local area. “It is not a crime to be homeless,” he said. He attributed “an influx of panhandling” to the increase in homelessness.
Public Safety
Director of Public Safety Matt Tatum summed up his department: “If you dial 911 for any purpose other than the Sheriff’s Office in Henry County, you’re getting someone from my office.” His department includes paid staff and volunteers.
The department has “eight people in the administrative side of things. We have four divisions within the department:”
Emergency management: “I look after … mostly the planning side of things, until a disaster hits,” he said. For example, he was seriously considering opening an emergency shelter on Monday to help the more than 3,000 electricity customers in the Bassett area whose power had gone out on a frigidly cold day.
Fire prevention: Kiah Cooper is the county’s new fire marshal, replacing Lisa Garrett, who retired on Jan. 1. Before, he had been the assistant fire marshal, a role now held by Kevin Hendricks.
Training division and volunteer coordination: They work with the 250 volunteers who make up Henry County’s eight volunteer fire departments and four volunteer rescue squads, making sure they are up to date on training. He encouraged the audience to look into volunteer opportunities: “If you have a valid driver’s license and 16 hours of training, you could drive an ambulance,” for example.
Operations commission: Thirty-two personnel are assigned to the 911 center, with eight people on each shift. That division has six vacancies.
In 2024 there were 1,852 calls for the fire departments, almost 9,500 calls for emergency medical service and 36,000 calls for the sheriff’s office, he said.
The Public Safety Department, in partnership with the Red Cross, installs smoke detectors in homes for free for families who cannot afford them, he said.
Tatum said the Public Safety Department has been hit hard by inflation. The rise in cost of groceries does not begin to compare “to what the emergency services are seeing,” facing nearly double cost on some specialty vehicles and equipment over just a few years. In 2021, a fire truck cost $316,000, and a smaller truck from the same manufacturer cost $516,000 just a year later. He just received quotes back for a truck for another fire department, coming in at more than $600,000.
A heart monitor for an ambulance costs $60,000, a stretcher costs $30,000 and a load system costs another $30,000.
“When this fire department calls and says, ‘We’re having a bingo, breakfast steak dinner” or other fundraiser, “please, if you can at all possibly, support it,” because the volunteer departments need their community’s support both in volunteering and funding.
Revenue and Treasurer
Commissioner of Revenue Tiffany Hairston said her department’s main goal is to “always be fair and equitable with our assessments.” The department assesses vehicles, houses, business equipment – “any property in Henry County, we tax it.”
The department follows guidelines laid out by the Constitution of Virginia and upholds the local county ordinances.
“We aren’t politicians. We don’t make laws,” said Henry County Treasurer Scott Grindstaff.
Hairston said the Corporate Transparency Act is new, and people who own businesses have until Jan. 14 to file with them. The fine is “$500 a day if you don’t do it, so please – it’s basically a big government tax. They want to make sure no one is money laundering. It’s a state finance group; they still require us to file and tell who” the owners and the actors in their businesses are.
The meals and occupancy tax is due on the 20th of every month, and business licenses have to be filed and paid by March 1, she said. The county also needs a list of business equipment, she added.
Personal property taxes is owed “based off of who owns the property on Jan. 1,” she said, adding that it is important that anyone who sells a vehicle should notify her office when it is sold.
“We depend on the DMV and citizens when they tell us who the owner is” of a vehicle,” Grindstaff said.
“There are over 73,000 cars in Henry County.”
The Commissioner of the Revenue’s office has 10 employees and sends out more than 30,000 real estate bills, she said. Reassessments will be done soon.
Hairston said assessors go out in pairs to look at houses and buildings, walking around outside. If they see that someone is home, they knock to explain what they are doing.
There are three levels for citizens to appeal a tax assessment: the Commissioner of Revenue’s office, the Board of Equalization and Circuit Court.
Grindstaff introduced Tiffany C. Hairston, an assistant in his office. She has almost the same name as the Commissioner of Revenue, except for a different middle initial, he said, which confuses many callers.
Questions and Concerns
After their talks, the speakers, along with school board members Ben Gravely and Champ Hardie, answered questions from the crowd.
A few people said that the assessors should be better identified, because people are uncomfortable seeing unknown men walk around in their yards. Hairston said she just bought some yellow vests at Walmart and will put labels on them, and their vehicles are labeled.
“My bull’s colorblind,” said one man, and the room erupted in laughter.
Willie Martin, a past Dyer’s Store VFD chief, said incentives are needed to encourage new volunteers, especially young people. “Most (volunteers) are over the age of 40 … What’s going to happen in the future?”
An EMT and firefighter program was in the county schools in 2023, Tatum said, “and we’re in the process of starting that program up again,” Gravely said.
Martin said he worries that high schoolers who complete those programs would go into paid rather than volunteer work.
“That’s a loaded one,” Gravely responded.
Tax incentives have been tried in different areas of the state, Tatum said, but that did not seem to be the right way to motivate younger people, because they pay less tax on income and don’t yet have much in terms of vehicles or property.
“The best recruitment tool is peer to peer,” Tatum said: “Talk with your buddies.” Invite them to the fire department.
Martin asked about a “situation” in the community, a business … “that is not zoned correctly and is creating some havoc.”
Cobler said it may be a matter best handled by contacting Powell’s office.
“It has been brought to someone’s attention before. It had been somewhat cleaned up,” but became bad again.
“Are you saying this community is concerned?” Cobler asked.
“Quite a few people are here for that reason,” Martin said.
“There’s a process to address those concerns, and that has begun,” Powell said.
