Pingley

Pingley

ELKINS — Elkins Operation Manager Bob Pingley has resigned his position, after being placed on leave with pay earlier this month.

Pingley’s resignation took effect Tuesday, Elkins City Councilman Rob Chenoweth, the chair of the city’s Personnel Committee, told The Inter-Mountain Thursday evening.

On Aug. 12, City Council placed Pingley on leave until the next council meeting, without any comment on why the action was being taken.

At Thursday evening’s Elkins City Council meeting, council went into a nearly half-hour executive session near the beginning of the meeting on the subject of “Operations Personnel Matter.” After emerging, Mayor Jerry Marco said no action had been taken during the executive session.

Chenoweth then said, “Based on the resignation of Mr. Pingley this week, I make the motion to appoint Melody Himes as the interim operations manager.’

The motion was approved, with all present council members voting in favor. Councilman Chris Lowther was absent from Thursday’s meeting.

“Thank you for your confidence in me,” Himes, the city’s operations assistant, told council members during the meeting.

Mayor Jerry Marco said at the end of Thursday’s meeting that he will appoint a special hiring committee within days to conduct the search for Pingley’s permanent replacement.

Once again, city officials declined to give any details about the Pingley situation, with Chenoweth telling The Inter-Mountain it was a personnel matter and no further information could be disclosed publicly.

Taking part in Thursday’s executive session were all present council members, Marco, City Clerk Jessica Sutton and City Attorney Gerri Roberts.

Pingley has served as the city’s operations manager since April 2008.

During his tenure the city completed construction of a new $37 million water treatment plant in 2018.

The city of Elkins was also named the 2018 Water System of the Year by the West Virginia Rural Water Association during the organization’s annual awards banquet in Charleston.

Also in 2018, city water department employees walked off the job in June regarding pay issues. Later that year, the city adopted a “step and grade” Classification and Compensation Plan which includes the opportunity for annual review of wages and possible wage increases based on employee evaluations and available revenues.

The next Elkins City Council meeting will be at 7 p.m. Sept. 2 at City Hall.