When Tom Howard was elected as Ohio County Sheriff in 2016, he faced competition in the primary and in the general election.
For the recent June 9 voting, Howard did not face a challenger in the Democratic primary, and no one ran in the Republican primary. The sheriff is well aware the Ohio County Executive Republican Committee could produce a candidate for the ballot in November, so for now, he’ll simply enjoy the 5,000-plus votes he collected although unopposed.
“If that’s what happens, I’ll be OK with it because when I filed, I didn’t know who else might,” Howard explained. “It’s been a busy four years, but we all worked as a team to get a lot accomplished, and I am very proud of that. I’m looking forward to the next four years.”
It’ll Be Fun, They Said
The sheriff of Ohio County, per state code, is the official collector of county taxes and selects a chief deputy to manage the law enforcement operation.
In Ohio County, though, Howard is very involved with his chiefs and deputies when it comes to fighting crime. There have been shootings, a murder, more than a hundred overdoses thanks to persistent drug trafficking, traffic issues and fatal accidents, the pros and cons of the gas and oil industries, and, oh yeah, something called a coronavirus pandemic.
“During the first four years we had a lot of things that most people in law enforcement don’t see during their entire careers,” Howard recalled. “We’ve had to deal with a lot of tragedy, but we worked through those things as a team, and that includes our community, too. The construction along Interstate 70 has been a nice surprise to this point, and no one has ever had to deal with a pandemic, stay-at-home orders, and the precautions we’ve had to take.
“Other than those kinds of things, we also restructured the department on the law enforcement side, and that included a lot of upgrades to our equipment and how we train,” the sheriff explained. “We have a terrific bunch of deputies who are well respected in the county because they all work with our residents. That’s why we have a great relationship with everybody because, and when someone grows tired of working with the public, it’s time to go.”
Splash Down
One of the tragedies the sheriff mentioned above involved two fatalities after a vehicle was toppled by a flooded Browns Run during a severe storm in July 2017. Michael Grow, who was 24 years old at the time, was killed the night of the storm, and his girlfriend, 19-year-old Page Gellner was discovered a week later near the creek’s mouth to the Ohio River.
Ever since, Howard and his chiefs have made sure all Ohio County deputies can swim.
“We do have a lot of water around here, if you take a look around,” Howard said. “So, we have made sure that each one of deputies can swim so they can save themselves in a bad situation. That has also allowed us to identify the deputies that can help save lives in the water because we do have a lot of flooding in Ohio County when we get those big storms.
“Chief Deputy John Schultz has played a huge role in that training because even before he was in law enforcement, he taught swimming,” he said. “And we know John has saved a lot of lives during his career, so we wanted to make sure our guys would be OK in those bad situations. When people think of what water we have in the county, I bet most people think only about the river and Big Wheeling Creek, but there’s much more.”
Important Visibility
During his 22-year career with the Wheeling Police Department, including eight as a PRO at Triadelphia Middle School, Howard learned the importance of community.
“That’s why we have made ourselves busier than we could have been because we believe it’s really important for the sheriff’s office to be out there,” Howard insisted. “And that’s going to continue, too, because if we have a good relationship with the residents in Ohio County, that ultimately makes our job easier because of the communication that takes place.
“We ‘ve been successful with bringing some things to Ohio County that have never been here, and one example is the Sheriff’s Camp at West Liberty University,” he said. “That would be coming up in July if we didn’t have to cancel it, but it will be here again next summer. We also had the state FOP Conference coming to Ohio County, and also the Prevention Resource Officer Conference that was supposed to be in August, but those two events have been canceled, too.”
And after the next four years when you term-out?
“We have been very busy but I have thought about what I’ll do once I complete my second term as sheriff,” Howard admitted. “That will give me and Chief Deputy John Schultz 30 years in law enforcement, and we have talked about a couple of things because we’re too old to do something new.
“We feel that we do have some options, but right now what’s really important to us is
to accomplish the goals we’ve set while keeping everyone as safe as possible,” the sheriff added. “Our first four years kept us very busy because of what’s taken place. It wasn’t long after I became sheriff when we had a tragedy caused by flooding, and it’s not slowed down since.”
