HUBBARD TOWNSHIP — Trustees will be welcoming a new trustee to join their young duo in 2025.

With Rick Hernandez, who has served as a trustee since 2017, leaving to join the Trumbull County Board of Commissioners in 2025, both remaining trustees have less than five years of experience in the role. William Colletta was elected to the board in 2021, beating Hernandez and two other candidates in a four-person race in which voters were asked to select two. Jason Tedrow joined them after narrowly beating longtime Trustee Frederick Hanley last year.

Tedrow sees Hernandez’s departure as a step forward for the township, but a step backwards for the county.

“We make promises to the community that we’re going to put up a sign and that it’s going to cost them nothing, then we show up and say we want $10,000, but ‘someone also spearhead it for me, I’ll gladly assist so I can go take the photo-op,'” Tedrow said of Hernandez. “Through his entire tenure here, he almost lost our police department twice.”

While attention has been drawn to the Trumbull County Board of Commissioners being an all-Republican group, Tedrow said it isn’t, noting Hernandez was formerly a Democrat prior to running for the position in 2022.

“It looks like it is (all-Republican), but it’s not,” Tedrow said. “You can’t switch parties right before you put your name on a ballot and then say you know you’re actually affiliated with the morals and values and everything else that’s associated with that party.”

Colletta explained their first order of business will be replacing Hernandez, which they’ll do by following ORC Section 503.27, which sets guidelines for replacing a departing public official. Colletta said he’d like to review the candidates in an open session so the residents can hear them out.

Colletta acknowledged that drama between Hernandez and Tedrow was commonplace in their meetings, arguing about social media posts and more recently phone calls to legal counsel, but they’re past it now.

“They (Hernandez and Tedrow) did not like each other, very open and opinionated about it; unfortunately (they) weren’t very professional at the meetings,” Colletta said. “But we got through, so coming up now I think we have basically a young mindset with Trustee Tedrow and a senior mindset with myself.”

Colletta said they will decide how they’ll move forward in their reorganization meeting at the beginning of the year, as they’ll also have to fill the Eagle Joint Fire District’s chairman role, a position that alternates between city council and the township. Hernandez is the chairman now.