James Gregory had a crazy 2020.
He was not alone in this, but the new District 2 supervisor faced a year that kept coming. With both his daughter and his wife working in health care, the pandemic hit hard.
Last summer, right as he was in the middle of running for his office in county government — in a six-way Republican primary to succeed retiring Supervisor Tom Thurman — most of his family got the coronavirus, and his father eventually died from it.
He won his election, and moved from his home in Prescott Valley — where he had been a police officer — to Camp Verde to be close to his constituents shortly after taking office at the beginning of 2021.
“It was a busy year,” Gregory said. “It was a pandemic, and it affected a lot of people and it affected me personally. That’s why we were setting up the vaccination sites and making sure that people were signing up. From my view, even before I was in office all the way until the vaccine came through after I came into office, I took it personally. We wanted to make sure we could set up an infrastructure where we could handle as many shots as we can, and just make sure that we can recover as quick as we can.”
Gregory has been in office only a short time, but coming into that position in a moment of turbulence, he has already received praise from Camp Verde Mayor Dee Jenkins for his help in setting up a vaccine clinic run by Northern Arizona Healthcare in Camp Verde. Gregory sees dealing with the pandemic as his top priority so far, but he also believes that the area is poised to come out of it strong again.
“I think we’re primed to make a full recovery, and look forward,” Gregory said. “[We will] learn from the past, but let’s get [businesses] back open, governmental services back open. Let’s move forward.”
With the pandemic hopefully approaching its end, Gregory is beginning to get used to his job as a supervisor and making an effort to get to know the staff of the county government. As a former police officer, serving 25 years with the Prescott Valley Police Department and reaching the position of patrol lieutenant, Gregory sees his current job as a continuation of a life of public service.
“A lot of [being a patrol lieutenant] is the same as being a supervisor, because it’s important to communicate and listen to community concerns,” Gregory said. “Anywhere I can get county resources in to help out I can do that. It’s still continuing with public service. I feel like I’m serving the community, and it’s been enjoyable.”
After having moved to Camp Verde just recently, Gregory is in an unusual position of still getting to know the community he represents, though as a resident of the county for most of his life, he speaks of memories of coming to Camp Verde to spend time enjoying the Verde River as a youth.
Gregory feels that it was his interpersonal relation- ships and his reputation with people in the district that allowed him to win the multi-candidate election.
With District 2 being the only one in the county that spans both sides of the mountains, Gregory expressed a hope of keeping the two sides of the county united.
“I’ve heard the Verde side and the Prescott side, but with the Board of Supervisors that we serve with now, I don’t feel that it’s ‘us against them,’” Gregory said. “We need to make sure that we get our fair portion of county government resources, but I think we all work together very well, and I don’t see that as being a major issue, especially with this new board.”
One of the first issues that Gregory dealt with upon taking up his position on the board was dealing with the controversial Verde Connect project, which would have built a new road connecting State Route 260 with Cornville Road using a $25 million federal grant. The project was proposed by the previous board but eventually killed by it. Gregory voted to reaffirm that position.
Despite that, Gregory has expressed a desire to do something about transportation in the Verde Valley, feeling that the area’s traffic problems are getting out of hand, and only going to get worse as the area continues to grow. He sees the next step as gathering information about what alternatives might exist, including the county paying for a $75,000 traffic study to examine the issue.
“If there were a simple answer I think we would have already done it,” Gregory said. He sees a wider Cornville Road — itself likely to garner controversy from local residents — as a potential option, but also admits he does not know the solution.
Gregory sees the growth of the Verde Valley in the coming years as one of the key challenges, but also one of the key opportunities, for the county.
“It is a big challenge,” Gregory said. “I would like to see very organized growth. What I mean by that is nice houses — I don’t want to see a lot of urban sprawl within the community. I would like to see it very nice and controlled, but we’re not going to stop people coming in so we need to make sure that we control it where it’s nice housing.”
