Williamsburg and surrounding areas (Iowa City, Ottumwa: school district, property taxes, to live in)

[SortaMobile]

I'm a former Iowan who grew up near Ottumwa, so I know some key facts about Williamsburg and Iowa County: such as some of the major businesses like Kinze Mfg, Amana Refrig (now part of Whirlpool?) and the nearby towns like Marengo and the Amanas.

Can anyone give a sense of what it's like to live in Williamsburg, or for that matter Marengo and the Amanas? School quality...property taxes...etc.

[SortaMobile]

Yes, I know there are crickets in Williamsburg. Just didn't expect them to be chirping here in this thread!

[iowegian]

I have never lived in Williamsburg, but I've been there, and I can try to help you as much as I can since it appears we have no Williamsburgers on this board... I could tell you a lot about the outlet mall there but I'll probably just have to provide you with links since I am not a native.

First, here's the Williamsburg website: Williamsburg Information
It has general information like taxes, employers, municipal services, etc.

Here's Williamsburg's schools on GreatSchools:Greatschools.net Search: Williamsburg
All of Williamsburg's schools received a score of 8/10 for ITBS/ITED scores, which is good, especially for a small school district.
It rates higher than Clear Creek-Amana, which received a 6 on average. However, they are a growing school district and probably have newer facilities than Williamsburg, such as the new high school they're building in Tiffin. One disadvantage is the distance between Amana and Tiffin for high schoolers, whereas in Williamsburg and Marengo, all your schools are in the same town.
Marengo is in the Iowa Valley School District, and they also got an average of 6.

I know someone who worked at Amana and I believe they have been laying off people for a couple years now. The person I know got laid off and waited 6 months to find out that they weren't going to hire him back, so I'd say the job situation in the Amanas is probably not the best.
Williamsburg is close enough to Iowa City that you could commute via I-80 in about 20-30 minutes, depending on the part of town you work in. Same for Amana, Marengo would be a bit farther but still doable except in snow. You probably already know this as an Iowan. I don't know much about Kinze or the other jobs in the area.

So if you're choosing between the three, I'd probably pick Williamsburg. Hopefully someone from Iowa County can give you some more specific information, but I hope this helped a little