Adams County commissioners call emergency meeting to name acting prosecutor

Adams County officials called an emergency special meeting at 1:15 p.m. Wednesday in West Union to decide who would step in as acting county prosecutor after a vacancy opened in that office. The notice sent to the public said the Board of Commissioners needed immediate consideration and possible action because the county had to maintain continuous legal representation for Adams County and its officials.

The meeting was set for the commissioners’ office at 215 North Cross Street, Suite 102, and the county said it was acting under Ohio Revised Code 121.22(F), the emergency provision of the state’s open meetings law. That choice matters because it signals the vacancy was treated as an operational problem, not a routine personnel change. The prosecutor’s office sits at the center of county government, advising departments, managing legal risk and representing public interests when filings and decisions cannot wait.

Adams County’s website lists Aaron Haslam as county prosecutor and Diana Young as the main contact for the office, which is located at 110 West Main St., Room #112, in West Union. The county’s current commissioners are Barbara Moore Holt, Kelly Jones and Jason Hayslip, the three officials responsible for taking any action on the appointment.

Ohio’s Open Meetings Act requires public bodies to give advance notice of special meetings that states when and where the meeting will take place and the specific topic the body will discuss. In this case, the county’s notice identified the issue plainly: the commissioners were expected to consider an acting prosecutor because the office had become vacant. That left the public with a clear warning that a fast-moving legal transition was underway, even before the board acted.

Haslam resigned April 16, and commissioners named West Union attorney Ariana Norris to serve as county prosecutor. The quick appointment matched the urgency of the notice and underscored how exposed county government can become when its top legal office is suddenly empty. Adams County had also used a special commissioners meeting on Feb. 11, 2026, to handle Children Services Board appointments, but the prosecutor vacancy carried a more immediate institutional consequence: county government needed legal representation without interruption.