(Meeting Updates - Photo Illustration - MetroCreativeConnection)

PARKERSBURG — The Wood County Commission set its meeting dates and who serves on what committee in the upcoming year during its regular meeting on Thursday.

Commissioners Blair Couch, Jimmy Colombo and Robert Tebay unanimously agreed on meeting times and more for how they will meet and conduct business in 2025.

The commission agreed its meeting times will remain at 9:30 a.m. on Mondays and Thursdays. They will handle probate cases on the third Thursday of the month with the Wood County prosecutor present if possible.

Officials have highlighted how often they meet and how accessible to the public they are as a commission. They have said they meet more than any other commission in the state, twice a week.

Couch will remain as president with Colombo as President Pro Tem.

Colombo nominated Couch for Commission President again with Tebay seconding the motion.

“We have accomplished so much in the last several years,” he said. “We have paid off our obligations and we are out of debt.”

He pointed to the county paying off the Wood County Justice Center early and to moving the Mid-Ohio Valley Health Department to St. Joseph’s Landing, a more modern facility. The county has bought new vehicles and they are paid for.

Colombo also pointed to the new Wood County Resiliency Center getting built.

“We built that building and there are some people who do not like it,” he said. “There are people who may not like it today, but 15 years from now people will wonder how we did without it.”

Like the Judge Black Annex, which was a building the county bought years ago and renovated, it is now used extensively, Colombo believes the same thing will happen with the Resiliency Center.

“It was teamwork,” he said. “We have always worked well together.

“We did it together.”

In nominating Couch, Colombo said all of what has been accomplished happened with Couch as the commission president.

“He was our front man for all of these things,” he said. “I appreciate that.”

Couch said the commission works together well and they take any criticisms together.

Colombo said they have worked to be transparent.

The agenda for meetings will be posted outside the doors of the courthouse, in the Office of the County Administrator and on the county’s website at woodcountywv.com.

The commission also made its committee assignments. The commission agreed to keep their current committees and boards they served on in 2024.

All three commissioners will serve on the Wood County Commission on Crime, Delinquency and Corrections as well as the Local Emergency Planning Committee.

Couch will serve on the Wood County Parks and Recreation Commission (Mountwood Park), the Parkersburg-Wood County Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB), the Health Department of the Mid-Ohio Valley, the Mid-Ohio Valley Regional Council, Downtown PKB, the Community Corrections/Day Report Center Board and the Wood County Fire Service Board.

Couch did say he was continuing to serve the health department board and the CVB, but is stepping back from leadership positions on both boards. He will still serve as vice chairman of the health department board with Patsy Hardy as chair.

Tebay will serve on the Wood County Airport Authority, Wood County Development Authority, the West Virginia University Extension Board and the Workforce Investment Board.

Colombo will be the commission’s representative on the Wood County Recreation Commission, the Wood County Planning Commission, the Enhanced 911 Communications Advisory Board and the Wood-Wirt Interstate Planning Board.

Colombo said developments in Davisville, the Wincore purchase (by Fernweh Group LLC and its affiliates) and the truck stop facility in Mineral Wells represent significant development in the area.

“That represents a massive investment in this area which is good for us, it is good for the sheriff’s department, the assessor’s office and more,” he said. “We want to tell people in our area that things are happening and that they can have confidence in our area.”

Brett Dunlap can be reached at bdunlap@newsandsentinel.com