Tim Walker
AMR Reporter
Pocahontas County Convention and Visitors Bureau Executive Director Chelsea Faulknier is excited about the upcoming autumn days.
“The summer season has flown by,” Faulknier said. “We certainly can feel the cool temps in the air as fall is encroaching upon us. We know that fall festivities are coming up. Some of our most popular, long-standing events happen in summer and fall. You can check all that out by visiting our website, pocahontascountywv.com
“You will find the events calendar there. Of course, we’ve got fall foliage beginning as the temperatures have cooled. We are starting to see some color in higher elevations – a little bit of change there. The West Virginia Department of Tour-ism has a really great interactive fall foliage map that you can check out on their website – westvirginiatourism.com.”
“We are also excited to announce that a lot of our Monongahela National Forest partners received secure rural school funding, so more than $400,000 in funding for different projects across the Monongahela National Forest. Many of those projects happen right here in Pocahontas County.
“We have recently submitted our Pocahontas County CVB annual report that is required through West Virginia State Code. We submit that to all of our reporting agencies, such as the Pocahontas County Commission; the Town of Marlinton; the West Virginia Association of CVBs; as well as the West Virginia Legislature. This year, when compiling the information for that annual report, we discovered that 2024-2025 was our record-breaking year for Occupancy Tax in Pocahontas County. We saw right at $3.6 million dollars in Occupancy Tax for the entire county, so that’s a wonderful feat. That money goes toward not only allowing the CVB to help promote our destination, but to the county for different initiatives and services.
“The Snowshoe Highlands Area Recreation Collaborative (SHARC) has also signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Pocahontas County Commission and the Pocahontas County Office of Emergency Management and 911. This is a Rapid Extraction Module Support Team. This team is working with the county commission and the Pocahontas County Office of Emergency Management. They will provide technical rescue evacuation services in remote environments here in the county. They will also serve as deployable assets for four to six assignments anywhere annually. So, this not only supports our local, regional and state, but beyond, and enhances our outdoor recreation safety and our workforce resilience. Charles Evens, our SHARC Trail Maintenance Crew Coordinator and Back Country Recreation Coordinator was recently deployed in Northern California to assist with a wildfire out there. This was, I believe, the first deployment that Charles has had through this Rapid Extraction Module Support Team. We are really excited to see that agreement in place and the SHARC Team advancing with their purpose and responsibilities within that MOU.”
To see dates and times of all the fall events, visit the CVB’s website, pocahontascountywv.com