Washington County Commissioner Greg Nohe attends his first commission meeting Wednesday. (Photo by Amber Phipps)

Washington County Commissioner Greg Nohe was present for his first meeting as a member of the commission Wednesday after being appointed and sworn in late last week.

“I appreciate being here, and I look forward to working with all of the elected officials and the community and the commissioners to make Washington County a better place to live and raise a family,” he said.

Commissioners Charlie Schilling and Eddie Place said they were looking forward to working alongside Nohe for the next year.

The commissioners approved the agreement with the Washington County Sheriff’s Office to assign Deputy PJ Brockmeier as the school resource officer at Frontier Local Schools.

“We’re absolutely thrilled,” said Sheriff Mark Warden. “He’s already making changes up there with the kiddos, and the staff love him.”

Frontier was the last district without a school resource officer, and Warden had a goal to make sure every district had one assigned.

Schilling said this accomplishes the goal of promoting positive interactions between students and law enforcement.

“If you’re a child and the only time you’ve ever seen a sheriff is when they’ve come to your house at night because of your parents … that sheriff’s uniform looks pretty scary,” said Job and Family Services Director Flite Freimann. “That SRO is there to protect the kids … but also so they can see a deputy sheriff and not be afraid and know they can go to them for help.”

County Engineer Roger Wright said as the Devola project comes to a close for the winter, if any residents experience issues they can contact a phone number on the newly installed tank if any issues arise.

Next week’s regular meeting is moved to Wednesday, Dec. 3 because the commissioners will be attending the County Commissioners Association of Ohio Winter Conference in Columbus later that day and Dec. 4.

Schilling said they’re going to the meeting to address commissioners having to balance the budget each year and their concerns with how that’s done.

“We oftentimes receive what I called ‘unfunded mandates’ from the state … that’s hard to deal with as commissioners when we’re required to balance our budget,” said Schilling. “So we’re going to have some meetings next week at the CCAO conference and hopefully we can get legislation back to start to see some change there.”

Unfunded mandates are state requirements that are imposed without the necessary funds being provided. Schilling said they’re going to look into ways for the state to start funding those imposed requirements.

The Rotary Club of Marietta delivered over 40 turkey meals to selected veterans and their families Wednesday afternoon.

Schilling said members of the club began cooking and packaging Tuesday afternoon with deliveries going out Wednesday around noon.

He said Southeastern Ohio Port Authority President and CEO Jesse Roush, who was sworn in as the club’s president in July, is helping with the meal deliveries so those families have a meal for the holiday.

Amber Phipps can be reached at aphipps@newsandsentinel.com