Mecklenburg County manager Jerry Fox, who led county to new millennium, dies at 91

As Mecklenburg County’s population shot up by almost 300,000 people between 1980 and 2000, one man helped the county from its manager seat: Jerry Fox.

Fox earned local respect and national recognition for his role in the transformation of uptown Charlotte and building a strong local workforce as Mecklenburg County manager. Fox died Wednesday night, his family confirmed to The Charlotte Observer. He was 91.

Current Mecklenburg County Manager Dena Diorio, who described Fox as “lovely, and very smart,” said he excelled at managing the county’s growth “effectively.”

“He brought Mecklenburg County from a small county to where we had explosive growth,” she said.

Fox’s dedication to the county didn’t waver in retirement, she added, including making time to sit down with her to talk over a meal.

“Jerry was always very generous with his time and his counsel, and I used to see him at conferences all the time, even though he was long retired,” she said. “... He really stayed engaged.”

His legacy will live on in his work and at UNC Charlotte, which renamed a graduate program in 2012 to the Gerald G. Fox Master of Public Administration to honor his 40 years of government service.

“His managerial skills, professionalism, respect for the democratic process, and personal integrity exemplify the values the MPA program works to instill in its students,” the program’s website states.

From Wichita Falls to Charlotte

Born Nov. 11, 1932 in Chicago, Fox was the first in his family to go to college after winning a football and academic scholarship to Beloit College, a small liberal arts school in Wisconsin. His family never had a car, so he took the bus or hitchhiked the 70 miles each way between Beloit and Kenosha for visits home.

Before taking the county manager role in Mecklenburg, Fox served several other local governments, including as city manager for Wichita Falls, Texas. He was visiting Lawrence, Kansas, in 1979 when he got a call from a friend with horrifying news.

A tornado that blew through Wichita Falls killed 46 people, displaced 20,000 and caused more than $400 million in damage. That’s about $1.7 billion in 2023 dollars.

Fox returned home immediately, assigned priorities and worked with power and phone crews to restore service. His response to the tragedy would become his Texas swan song, which one resident there described as his finest hour.

“He was a sight to behold, the way he conducted the emergency operations center,” John Hampton, an alderman at the time, said. “He was in control, very unruffled in his steady, normal way.”

When Fox walked into a Charlotte Chamber of Commerce meeting days after taking the Mecklenburg County manager role, he made a good first impression with Charlotte business people by discussing a positive partnership between business and government.

“Fox, in calling for ‘an interchange of ideas and views,’ suggested making elective and appointive government leaders ex officio members of the chamber board,” according to a Charlotte Observer story from August 1980.

Through the next two decades, much of the skyline Charlotteans recognize today took shape as national banks built headquarter towers uptown.

Hired by a board of five white commissioners who all went to the same church and lived in the same neighborhood, Fox worked as manager while the county commission’s diversity increased and as control swung back and forth between Democrats and Republicans.

“Early on I adopted a philosophy which has helped me never get fired,” he said in 1999. “I know that I’m a CEO, but I have to deal within a political arena. So I’ve always said that our job is to make that elected body look as good as possible — whether we agree politically or philosophically.”

At commissioners meetings, he was known to avoid the spotlight, offering measured advice when asked but leaving decisions in the hands of commissioners.

Tax hikes, jail overcrowding in Mecklenburg

Halfway through his tenure as Mecklenburg manager in 1990, Fox’s reputation among the Board of County Commissioners was mixed. Some praised him for steering the county through a decade of immense growth, but others blamed him for the growing pains that came with it: specifically steep tax hikes and jail overcrowding.

In 1990, Fox proposed a 7.6% increase to the tax rate, the fifth increase in a row.

“The manager historically gives us a tight budget,” commissioner Peter Keber told the Observer at the time. “... It’s unrealistic to think the job will get done without some increase each year.”

An Observer editorial about his review the same year called him a valuable manager who had a tough year.

Fox was also the the inspiration for the name of the Foxhole landfill in southern Mecklenburg, a 563-acre facility that opened in 2000, the result of a 15-year effort by the county. He called it “a perfect legacy” because he had to persevere so long to work with residents to get it built.

20 years with Mecklenburg County

At the turn of the millennium, Fox announced his retirement. When he left, the county employed 4,500 people. Today it employs more than 5,900.

When Fox first became county manager, he recommended a $200 million budget. Twenty years later, he worked with the budget team to allocate $1 billion of revenue for the first time in the county’s history.

Parks Helms, commissioners chairman at the time who preceded Fox in death, sung his praises to the Observer in 2000.

“I can only tell you that I love Jerry Fox,” Helms said. “It would be hard to find someone who doesn’t respect Jerry Fox as a person and as a manager. Jerry has made me look good and I’m grateful to him.”

In a retirement statement to county commissioners, he wiped away tears as he thanked his wife, Dee, for her support. He quoted gospel writer Saint John in his brief speech.

“He states: In the twilight of life, God will not judge us on our earthly possessions and human successes, but rather on how much love we have,” Fox said. “I should pass God’s judgment with flying colors because of my love for this community, the county organization and my job.”

Fox was preceded in death by his wife of 57 years, Dolores “Dee” Condon Fox, who died in 2015. The couple shared three children and multiple grandchildren.

Information on a memorial service was not immediately available.

Staff writer Mary Ramsey and Observer archives contributed to this report.