Washington County board sees two supervisors step down, two others join

ABINGDON, Va. – Paul Price and Jack McCrady made and seconded the motion Tuesday to adjourn their last meeting as members of the Washington County Board of Supervisors – and then they had a party.

County leaders thanked them for their service and welcomed new board members Nicole Price and Joe Straten with a reception that followed the recessed meeting.

Nicole Price will replace Paul Price [no relation] on the board, after he chose not to seek re-election and she defeated a write-in candidate.
Republican Joe Straten replaces Democrat Jack McCrady, who he beat by a handful of votes in November. Both will take office next month.

Dulcie Mumpower, also recognized at Tuesday’s event, will begin her fifth term on the board in January.

“I have been the only woman on the board these 16 years,” said Mumpower, who also praised the board and its departing members in a short speech. “I’m very grateful and thankful that I will have another lady who will be joining me.”

Paul Price called raising low-paid county employees to a minimum $8 an hour wage as one of his most important accomplishments in his term on the board. He regrets that a joint Abingdon-county sports complex was not built and the size of a retail development near Interstate 81’s Exit 7 was cut in half, after the county and Bristol, Va., failed to come to terms over its planned site.

“It’s not that we’re hostile enemies,” he said of the county’s relationship with the city and town of Abingdon. “We just don’t sit on the porch and swing together a lot.”

Price said he’s hopeful that the future board – especially in the expected tough budget year ahead – will work better with the city and town.

“I hope that we will – that the future boards will not have a love theirself, hate their neighbor attitude,” he said, “That we will see how we need the town of Abingdon and how we need the city of Bristol, and how much more you can do with a cooperative attitude.”

McCrady said he’ll continue to serve his community in whatever way he can and may run for a seat on the Damascus Town Council, where he previously served.

Straten, who along with Nicole Price will be sworn in Jan. 5, said he’s already begun efforts to draw attention to Washington County from state economic development officials.

“I plan and I hope to do the kind of thing I campaigned on, and that’s to bring more jobs to Washington County,” he said.

Nicole Price also said she plans to fulfill campaign promises: to make government more open and help hire a county planner.

“I think what we need to look at is really planning for growth,” she said. “This piecemeal way of going about it and being reactionary [to specific issues that arise] hasn’t been in the best interest of the county. And I think we need to be looking ten years down the road, 15 years down the road.”
In the meeting preceding Tuesday’s reception, the board voted to approve a bid for construction of four ballfields in Damascus.

After lengthy delays, related to wetlands on the site, the $766,600 project is expected to start in early 2010.

McCrady, who has long championed the ballfield project for his district, called it “a great Christmas present for the Damascus-area children that it’s finally going to happen.”

The board also voted unanimously to declare a local state of emergency for the recent windstorm that knocked out power for several days and caused damage around the county, in hopes of drawing funding to help with the cleanup.

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