Abbott Named Executive Director

The Zanesville-Muskingum County Port Authority named a new executive director during a special meeting.

Friday the Port Board voted to hire Matt Abbott. Abbott served as Assistant Superintendent at Foxfire Schools and is president of the East Muskingum School Board.

He replaces Mike Jacoby who served as executive director for nearly five years and left in February to take a position at Shale Energy as executive director for the Appalachian Partnership for Economic Growth.

Abbott was chosen from ten applicants.

President of the Port Authority Board Richard McClleland commented on the hire, “The people that we had were out of county and some of them certainty didn’t have the experience we look for and Mike, as you know was trained in this position and made it much easier for the board because he knew the steps we should go through, where Mr. Abbott doesn’t have that, but seemingly his enthusiasm will overcome that.

McClelland believes Abbott’s lack of experience in economic development will be overcome by his dedication and with the board’s assistance.

“I think they’ll be a significant learning curve, but he’s young and I think we can handle it. We have people on the board that’s been here a good while so we think we can help him,” said McClelland

Abbott begins his new position on Monday and says he is very excited and humbled that the board has the faith in him to oversee economic development in our area.