ST. ALBANS, W.Va. — The first order of business for the new Mayor of St. Albans will be to address the drug and crime issue in town.
Scott James, who was elected mayor earlier this month, will be sworn in Friday night and will officially take office Saturday.
Yeager Police Chief Joe Crawford will return to the St. Albans Police Department to serve, once again, as the Chief of Police. He previously served 24 years with the department, with the last five as chief until 2011.
“Bringing Joey on board as well as the Streets Crime Unit, we’re going to make a bigger impact on clearing the drug and crime problem up in St. Albans,” James said.
James has made a few other new hires since he was elected, but he said there have been no major changes for the most part.
“We’re keeping the majority of what we had that was already in place,” he said. “No need to come in and make massive changes right off. You want to keep as much continuity as possible, so it’s been a very active 3+ week period.”
Boosting tourism and attracting more people to town remains near the top of the list for James when he takes office.
“When people are looking to move into a community and you have these yards that have vehicles or a bunch of trash out in the front, that doesn’t make St. Albans a destination spot, so we’re going to enforce our ordinances and we’re going to be very aggressive in doing that,” he said.
James defeated longtime Mayor Dick Callaway and two other candidates, Dusty Herscher and Ron VanBibber, by winning 49 percent of the vote.
The mayor’s term runs for three years. In that time, James said he hopes he can make a difference.
“I love the challenge of taking something and making it better. When I leave office, I just want people to say ‘job well done.’ St. Albans is a better place than when I took office,” he said.
James will be sworn in at 7 p.m. Friday at the Hansford Senior Center in St. Albans.