MARROW, West Virginia — The Ash County Commission will revisit a boundary vote after its clerk found two different sets of minutes for the same September meeting. Both documents are properly numbered and signed. One describes a vote to accept a survey east of the reservoir; the other records a decision to defer it.
The disagreement came to light when a resident asked for the map cited in the earlier filing. Staff could not find one attached to the commission’s copy. A second copy, located in a box of agendas awaiting binding, has the same date and signatures but says the survey would be considered after the county received a complete drawing.
At its meeting Tuesday, commission president Robert Ames said no property boundary would be changed until the records could be reconciled. The commission did not vote to void either document. State rules require a public vote to amend minutes once they have been approved, according to the county attorney.
The survey concerns a narrow county-owned strip beside the reservoir access road. The parcel has appeared in the tax index since 1974, but it is not visible on the current county map. A GIS employee said that happens when older surveys lack coordinates that can be placed reliably on the digital layer.
For adjoining landowners, the difference is practical. A maintenance easement follows one side of the strip. If the survey accepted in the first version of the minutes is used, part of a fence and a culvert would be maintained by the county. Under the second version, those responsibilities would remain undecided.
Ames and the other commissioners said they recalled discussing the survey, but not taking a final vote. Commissioner Elena Price said the signatures looked like hers. “I sign the minutes after reading them,” she said. “I can’t account for two readings of the same meeting.” The clerk declined to speculate on how the duplicate entered the box.
The courthouse camera facing the commission room was disconnected for repair that week, according to a facilities order. Audio from the meeting exists, but the last several minutes are difficult to hear because a microphone was turned away from the table. The clerk is preparing a transcript from the usable portion.
A resident who attended said she remembers a discussion about the culvert but left before the meeting ended. The public sign-in sheet lists nine attendees. The county has contacted the remaining names and asked whether anyone made a recording; as of Thursday, two had replied, and neither kept one.
The Register reviewed both copies in the clerk’s office. Their paper, typeface and page count match. The difference is contained in a single paragraph near the end, after a routine equipment transfer. Each copy bears three signatures and the clerk’s certification stamp. The stamp on the copy found in the agenda box is lighter.
The county attorney said an outside review of paper and ink would be possible but would not necessarily identify which text the commission intended to approve. The clerk’s bound index contains one entry for the meeting. Beside the survey item is a handwritten reference to an attachment number that staff have not located.
Residents may submit comments before the matter returns to the agenda next month. In the meantime, the county has suspended work on the culvert. A road crew that expected to clear it this week was assigned to drainage work on the south shore instead.
The clerk will preserve both sets of minutes with the file, Ames said. He asked staff to avoid labeling one as a draft until the commission can establish a sequence of custody. The public counter currently supplies the first version unless a requester asks for both.