These stories that we covered in Nevada County were deemed by the SWARK.Today staff to be the most important or memorable of 2025. All of them have in common a sense of new beginnings for an area whose leaders keep striving toward improvement for its citizens, students and businesses.
At the start of 2025, new leaders took office in Nevada County and the city of Prescott. For quorum court, James Cornelius (District 4), Regina Irizarry (District 7), Todd Butler (District 8) and Tommy Poole (District 9) were sworn in. On the Prescott City Council, Tony Gillard was sworn in to represent Ward 4, Position 1. All these members were fully participatory in the year’s meetings.
It seemed unlikely at the start, but Nevada County voters passed a sales tax with the funding intended to cover several county needs. With a 3/4-cent sales tax for jail building and maintenance scheduled to sunset in September, the court passed an ordinance in February to put on the May 13th ballot the question of whether voters of the county would approve of a new 3/4- cent tax to replace it that does not sunset and would be used for HVAC and roof repairs to the jail as well as fixes on the courthouse, landfill equipment fixes and replacement and county road work. The tax passed 354-182, and the quorum court now looks forward to overseeing those projects.
Prescott Public Schools had two superintendents serve in 2025, Robert Poole, who departed for Ashdown and Angie Bryant, who took office in July and then announced her retirement from the district after three months. Then in December the district announced the school board had hired Larry Smith, a 30-year educator who began his career teaching English and then served as principal, assistant superintendent and superintendent, according to the district’s announcement. His Facebook page lists service as assistant superintendent for Benton Public Schools and Bryant Public Schools as well as service as superintendent of White Hall Public Schools.
After ten years in the role, hundreds of community coffees and several dozen events organized, Jamie Hillery left her role as Prescott-Nevada County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director in early summer. Her replacement is Valarie Cobb, who had been an administrator for Prescott Public Schools prior to being hired. She sat down with us for an interview in October in which she explained her service to the county follows up on decades of public-mindedness in her family line.
The last meeting of the Prescott City Council of 2025 featured a rare moment of true celebration as Mayor Terry Oliver and City Accountant Carl Dalrymple announced that an over $1.2 million debt the city had incurred to Southwestern Electric Power Company for power used during the 2021 winter storms had finally been retired. The city had passed a sales tax to help pay it off, but that sales tax now sunsets. Hallelujah.