Phil’s flip to politics

The prospect of running his own business allowed Phil to help raise Monica and let her work in the shop. Eventually, Monica became his campaign manager when Phil ran for school board.

Monica even designed the campaign sign he still uses to this day. Early in his political career, his campaign budget was low, so he would take old political signs and paint over them to make them his own. Phil raised $790 in 2022 for the reporting period spanning Jan. 1 through July 14, according to a report from the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board.

During his campaign, Phil makes it a point to show the pay raises county supervisors received from 2018 to 2023. A sign mentioning those dollar figures is prominently displayed wherever Phil campaigns.

When Phil first ran for a Board of Supervisors spot in 2018, the salary was $71,240. For the 2023 fiscal year, the salary is set at $92,558 without benefits.

Phil’s initial promise back in 2018 during his first bid for a supervisor position was to not seek or accept a raise during his term. He still stands by that promise. With the $20,000 raise in pay between 2018 and 2023, Phil plans to take that money every year and donate it to every school in Johnson County that has an agriculture or Future Farmers of America (FFA) program in place.

“Agriculture is the one thing that every single person in the world is involved with every day,” Phil said.

During his time on the school board, Phil said he supported bringing those programs into the school system because they offer young people access to different trades and open the door to new job opportunities.

Phil was also chairman of the board’s finance committee and ties his work there to the current salary increases with the board of supervisors.

“The budget for the Iowa City school district is larger than the county’s budget,” he said. “[The school district] also has more employees than the county has employees. I oversaw the largest bond issue at the time in the state of over $193 million-plus of spending to renovate our schools … and I did all of that for free,” Phil said.

He was one of two board members at the time to vote against sending the bond to the full referendum and said there wasn’t enough in it for special education, career and technical education — and it left Hills Elementary out. Though the referendum passed, Phil saw it as his responsibility as a leader in political office to oversee the bond.

“Sometimes you’re on the winning side of it, and sometimes you’re not, but you still have to go on and make sure everything you do is for the betterment of the community,” Phil said. “You can’t hold grudges and things like that, you just have to go on and continue to work … I’m running to be a voice for everyone in the community — and I mean everyone. Not just of one party, not just of one community, but the entire county.”

He likened his political approach regarding finances to the way he manages Phil’s Repair. It wasn’t until his third time running for school board that he thought it would go his way, he said. With his persistence and current politics, Phil believes the seat could fall his way as more people pay attention to where their money is going given high inflation and a looming recession.

Timeline by Jami Martin-Trainor/The Daily Iowan

Looking at his eight campaigns, Phil and Anita are familiar with the struggles that come with achieving success, but they see their Republican Party affiliation as an extra barrier in a largely Democratic county. Among the county’s 90,213 active voters, 46,645 are registered Democrats, and 16,571 are registered Republicans. The rest are mostly registered as no-party voters.

“A lot of people in this town and in this county only look at the consonant behind the name and immediately get turned off,” Anita said. “Some of them lump all Republicans in the same category not realizing that there’s different shades of Republicans.”

Phil ran uncontested in the June Republican primary with Jammie Bradshaw. They will face off against Democratic candidates Jon Green and V Fixmer-Oraiz on Election Day.

Phil and Anita both mentioned the benefit of having people from different backgrounds represented on the board.

“When you have five people of one political thinking making decisions for a community that is very diverse in their thinking,” Phil said. “I would think the community would recognize the benefit from having a diverse group of leaders.”

Phil’s older brother David is a self-proclaimed “liberal Democrat.” Even though he doesn’t always politically align with his brother, David said they end up supporting the same goals.

Phil said he plans to treat a supervisor’s seat as a full-time job, referencing the amount of pay received, while some still consider the role a part-time endeavor.

“You don’t take this on to pad a resume,” Phil said of the position. “You take this on to provide a service to the community.”