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PARKERSBURG — The Wood County Assessor is trying to get the word out about a misleading post on social media that people have begun taking seriously.

Wood County Assessor John Kelly appeared before the Wood County Commission on Thursday to inform them that a Facebook post is getting a lot of attention statewide.

“It is pretty confusing,” Kelly said. “It has gone viral and it has had over 1,000 shares.”

The post claims West Virginia House Bill 2601 passed this last session and was signed into law and claims the passage of the bill eliminates the personal property tax on all motor vehicles starting in 2026, replacing it with a full income tax credit for 2025 payments and ending the annual vehicle tax going forward.

“This landmark legislation, introduced in the 2025 legislative session, allows West Virginians to stop paying upfront property taxes on their cars, trucks and motorcycles, receiving a full refund via their state income tax return instead,” the post claims.

The problem, Kelly said, is the legislation referenced in the post was never passed in either houses of the legislature or signed into law by the governor.

The proposed legislation was introduced and referred to the House Finance Committee during the 2025 legislative session, but it ended up dying in committee with no action taken on it, Kelly said.

“It basically says that the personal property tax on all vehicles has been eliminated which it hasn’t been,” he said. “It is all BS.”

However, his office and other assessors around the state have had people regularly calling them and asking about it. There have been instances where officials tell people it did not pass and it is not a law, but people don’t believe them.

“They have been flooded with questions about it,” Kelly said of assessors from around the state. “We can verify that it has not passed.”

Even if it had passed, a measure to do away with personal property tax would need a constitutional amendment and would have to be voted on statewide in the 2026 General Election in November.

Kelly wanted the commissioners to be aware of it in case they were approached by someone out in public who had questions about it or believed it was real.

“This thing is going viral all over Facebook,” Kelly said. “We had people who came into our office (Wednesday) asking about it.

“It is a bad situation where you have someone putting out really bad information.”

Commissioner Jimmy Colombo warned about how things have gotten overblown on Facebook, especially with sports news when people post things about certain players moving to a different team or other such rumors that don’t turn out to be true.

“That happens a million times a day,” he said. “It is sad how people manipulate words.”

Kelly said he understands how online rumors are viewed by many and acknowledges Facebook can be a very powerful tool to share information.

“Unfortunately we have a lot of people who misuse it and spread misinformation,” he said. “In this case, someone put really bad information out and they shared it and it keeps getting shared and it has gone viral.

“It just isn’t true.”

Kelly said his office can address anyone’s questions on this issue.

Brett Dunlap can be reached at bdunlap@newsandsentinel.com