Elkins Mayor Marco looks back at 2023, and toward future
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ELKINS -- Elkins Mayor Jerry Marco said the city had a good year in 2023, and noted he is anxiously looking forward to 2024.
"I think 2023 was a very good year for the City of Elkins," Marco told The Inter-Mountain. "My dad used to tell me that if you are doing things well, you don't have to tell people, they will tell you. And I've had a lot of people approach me and tell me that the city has made some really good progress this year, and they are looking forward to what the future holds.
"We are looking forward to an outstanding 2024, but we are very pleased with the way 2023 went."
Marco said one of the most important things that happened for the city in 2023 was the wage adjustments across the board for City of Elkins employees.
"The best decision I feel city council made this year as a whole, was the competitive wages and the raises for our city employees, who do all the hard work and provide the services to our community," Marco said. "We had to have competitive wages in order to not be a training bed for other places, and that's what we were getting into. We would train people and get them their certifications and they would leave and go somewhere else for more money…
"It made sense for us to invest and try to keep the skilled people that we have. The employees definitely deserved it."
Marco said he is also pleased with an ongoing project that has the city removing dilapidated properties.
"It was great that we were able to obtain $300,000 through the Department of Environmental Protection to remove some of the dilapidated properties in the city," Marco said. "The properties had been an eyesore and a safety hazard for our community. We didn't want children or someone going into these buildings and getting injured, and it wasn't safe for our first responders to go into them either. So that was one of the big things we accomplished this year."
Marco also mentioned the city installing approximately 75 street cameras downtown, as well as dashboard cameras in all Elkins Police Department vehicles.
"The funding for the street cameras was a big deal for us in 2023," Marco said. "There was congressional funding that we were able to obtain for that, and the cameras will help us in a variety of ways when it comes to fighting crime. I feel like we are putting Elkins on the map in a very good way."
Marco is also pleased with the progress and potential growth of other projects and businesses downtown.
"The Event Center that is going to be built is going to be tremendous for us, and we're excited about all the folks who are investing in our area," he said. "I saw a lot of foot traffic downtown during the holiday season, and I love the fact that people are supporting the people who have invested in businesses downtown. We have a few more (businesses) that have contacted me and want to open their doors here. We are hoping to have all the store fronts filled downtown."
Marco noted the thing he will perhaps remember the most about 2023 was the delivery of the Capitol Christmas Tree to downtown Elkins.
"For me, that was a once in a lifetime thing," he said. "The turnout for the parade was tremendous, and knowing it came from our region is something the entire state can take pride in. It was a memorable moment, kind of like a Hallmark moment that I'm not going to ever forget. I'm so thankful and blessed that I got to experience it."
The mayor mentioned he was pleased to see big crowds for the Mountain State Forest Festival in October.
"We had a ton of people in for the Forest Festival this year," Marco said. "I think it's back on track after the COVID years, and I think it's going to continue to grow from here."