Multiple updates on the Highland County Visitor’s Bureau were discussed during the weekly Wednesday meeting of the Highland County Board of Commissioners.

Jamie Wheeler, executive director of the Visitor’s Bureau of Highland County, said multiple new projects are on the horizon.

She said that included the full roll-out of the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks which was inscribed in September. Because of that, she said the office is working with the Ohio Travel Association, the Ohio History Connection and the other counties involved on how to promote it. She said that included putting out brochures and pamphlets, among other things.

Another project coming is America 250 in 2026. Wheeler said that a work session was held at the recent travel conference to discuss how Ohio would celebrate the moment, with some ideas including history trails or donut trails.

Wheeler also said the organization was scheduled to move into its new office space on North High Street later this year or earlier next year, with the organization excited about the “better visibility.”

She also said that following the last two years being in other counties, 2024’s version of the Tri-County Battle of the Bands will finally be held in Highland County. She said the event would be held on Saturday, Aug. 10, 2024, at Crossroads Park.

Wheeler also said that the Highland County Visitor’s Bureau was awarded multiple times from two separate events. She said the Association of Convention and Visitor’s Bureau in January gave the organization first place for its website and second place for its video. Earlier in October, the Ohio Travel Association awarded the organization a Citation of Excellence Award for radio and was a finalist for web, blog and video.

“She downplays this,” Casey McIntosh, board chairman of the Visitor’s Bureau of Highland County, said. “There were more than 230 entries for a lot of these, for these categories when she does this, and Jamie worked extremely hard… We were finalists in four categories. So, for what we have and what we do, this was a big deal. It was a really big deal.”

Wheeler then said one other new aspect the organization was moving its radio advertising off traditional radio and onto streaming. She said this change allowed it to pinpoint where it wanted its advertising to go, such as 50 miles from the center of Highland County. Because of this, she said she saw that they got 175,000 impressions from its ads.

In other news, Angela Canepa, deputy director of the First Responder Communications Initiative with the Ohio Department of Administrative Services, was in attendance to discuss updates on the possible new MARCS Tower coming to Highland County.

Commissioner Terry Britton said the process has kind of stalled and the county is spinning its wheels trying to find locations for the project.

Canepa said typically the controlling board would like to have the request “way in advance” to beat the end of the year and get in the last board meeting, with a possible deadline of the end of October. However, she also said that wasn’t a hard deadline, because if it isn’t in by then, it would just be discussed in the January controlling board meeting.

For one of the possible locations, Canepa said that after discussing it with one of the parties, they indicated it wouldn’t work out, which both Britton and Dave Bushelman, Highland County Emergency Management Agency director, said was news to them.

Canepa also said that one of the aspects holding discussions back is state offices are trying to get away from leasing on private property, now moving into purchasing the land or putting the projects on government property.

Commissioner Dave Daniels said a couple of the possible locations are one owned by the Marshall Township Trustees, one very close to Rocky Fork Lake and one in Sugar Tree Ridge.

For the former, he said the trustees turned the commissioners down, but that they might go back to them while also saying there might be a consideration of possible financial compensation.

Regarding Sugar Tree Ridge, he said it didn’t give ideal coverage. He said it would duplicate or overlap on coverage already received.

Concerning the Rocky Fork Lake area location, he said it would be a good location but the elevation would be different and need to be discussed.

Bushelman said he has looked at a couple of locations and also spoken to a landowner willing to discuss the leasing or purchasing of their land. He also said one of the issues he’s had in the process is getting the elevations back for the locations, which Canepa said shouldn’t be happening. She said when she returned to the office, she would work on getting them to him.

In other news, Bushelman said an issue on the horizon will be the required LLA upgrade that needs to be finished by July 1, 2025. He said this was a requirement to upgrade all MARCS radios capable of being upgraded in the county and then replacing those that cannot be upgraded. He said they were looking at $700,000 for all of the police, fire and EMS across the county. He also said this process would be very costly, giving smaller departments a hard time and something needs to be looked at for this aspect.

Jared Warner, Highland County Health Department director, reported that due to a good turnout from last week’s drive-through vaccine clinic, another one will be held Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Hillsboro firehouse and will have flu, COVID-19, shingles, pneumonia and a couple of other vaccines available.

Alex Butler, Highland County auditor, said that October’s sales tax receipts were again up compared to last year’s, with 2023’s receipts at $768,164.35, now up to $7,808,600.93 for the year.

The board agreed to table discussions on the flooring repair of the Probation Department to wait for more bids to be received.

The board made one approval, that being from Canon Solutions America, Inc. for a Statement of Work for the Highland County Laserfiche Cloud Project Implementation.

Reach Jacob Clary at 937-402-2570.