City of Morgantown Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Morgantown First Responders Vote ‘No Confidence’ In City Administration

First responders in Morgantown have held a vote of no confidence in the city council.

Members of firefighters’ union IAFF Local 313 and the police union Mon Preston FOP Lodge 87 have voted “no confidence” in the Morgantown City Administration.

A vote of no confidence is a vote in which members of a group are asked if they support

the person or group in power, usually in government.

In a press release, firemen cited a yearslong lawsuit with the city over holiday pay for their vote of no confidence. Police cited “recent administrative attacks on the police” including the city’s attempt to create a civilian review board.

The vote comes on the heels of an effort started this summer to recall all members of the city council, as well as a recent controversy around whether the city manager lives in Morgantown.

Huntington, Morgantown Earn Perfect Scores For LGBTQ Inclusivity, Non-Discrimination

The Human Rights Campaign has released its 2021 Municipal Equality Index. The index ranks cities on how inclusive they are.

The rankings are based on factors including nondiscrimination laws, municipal employment policies, inclusiveness of city services and law enforcement with regard to LGBTQ persons and municipal leadership on matters of equality.

The cities of Huntington and Morgantown have both achieved perfect scores for 2021.

Jack Jarvis from Fairness West Virginia presented the awards virtually, today.

“The index isn’t a perfect tool for measuring how inclusive our cities are,” he said. “But it’s one important tool we have. It allows us to see how our cities stack up against cities across the country.”

Huntington received a perfect score for the third consecutive year. Morgantown also achieved a perfect score of 100 for the first time this year. The national average score is 67.

“It’s time for the world to know that West Virginia can be a welcoming place where all kinds of people belong,” said Andrew Schneider, executive director of Fairness West Virginia. “We’ve known for a long time these communities are welcoming, and today’s report card proves that. I congratulate the leaders of Morgantown for all of their hard work this year toward inclusivity. I look forward to more cities joining the ranks of these all-stars, and to leaders at the state level stepping up to protect all Mountaineers from discrimination.”

Morgantown’s score in the 2020 MEI was 77, meaning the city jumped 23 points in a single year. Part of Morgantown’s significant score increase was because members of city council there adopted a bill to ban so-called conversion therapy.

“The city of Morgantown is a welcoming place where everyone is valued,” said Morgantown Mayor Jenny Selin. “We’ve worked hard together as a community to advance policies that will ensure our LGBTQ residents can live free from discrimination, and we will continue this important work in the future. All of our children, including our LGBTQ children and their friends, deserve the chance to grow up in communities that support them. I’m proud that our city has earned full marks on the Municipal Equality Index this year.”

Other West Virginia cities listed in the report are Charleston, Wheeling Charles Town, Lewisburg and Parkersburg. Charleston was the only other city from West Virginia above the national average with a score of 94.

Parkersburg scored just 13 in the report.

Huntington, Morgantown and Charleston were also designated “All-Star” cities for scoring above 85 points despite being in a state without LGBTQ-inclusive statewide non-discrimination laws.

The City of Charleston adopted the state’s first conversion therapy ban in August. Caitlin Cook, a member of Charleston’s City Council, was the lead sponsor of that bill and is a member of the city’s LGBTQ Working Group.

“We became the first municipality in our state to ban the harmful practice of conversion therapy on minors and established an LGBTQ working group to continue advancing inclusive policies in the Capital City,” Cook said. “Looking forward, it is my hope we can continue to value and uplift LGBTQ voices in our community as well as improve our inclusivity score.”

Across the country, there are 74 cities in this category.

Leaders from Morgantown, Charleston and Huntington joined Fairness West Virginia to announce the scores and celebrate the improvements. Watch a recording of the virtual ceremony here.

Morgantown Creates Civilian Police Review Board

Morgantown City Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to create a civilian police review board, the culmination of a year-long process sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer.

In the wake of Floyd’s murder and nationwide protests, Morgantown city officials and community members started to talk about how their city could benefit from a police board with civilian members. The city formed a special committee and it began meeting weekly to hash out the proposal’s details.

“I cannot thank the folks who showed up to the committee enough,” said Deputy Mayor Rachel Fetty during Tuesday’s meeting. “We received the contributions and the careful recommendations and thoughts of really every segment of the population that I can think of, from folks within the department, folks who are married to members of the Morgantown police department, folks who have experienced being policed as persons of color or as members of LGBTQ+ groups, or as human beings.”

The board is the second of its kind in the state, but the first to be created by a city. Bluefield has a similar police review board, formed in the wake of a consent decree by the Department of Justice.

The Morgantown ordinance approved by the council looks markedly different from earlier plans that would’ve given the power to investigate citizen complaints of police misconduct.

The power to investigate was removed from the plan following threats of legal action from West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey and the Mon-Preston Fraternal Order of Police (FOP).

Wheeling-based attorney Teresa Toriseva, who represents the FOP, told the Dominion Post Tuesday that she will file a lawsuit challenging the legality of the board. Under the ordinance, the police chief will carry out any police conduct investigations and then send the findings and disciplinary actions to the review board.

The review board will be able to accept the police chief’s actions or suggest their own recommendation, a level of oversight Toriseva says is in violation of state code. The FOP’s view on the board’s legality is not universally held.

“What is at issue here is the question of who runs the Morgantown police department, the chief or the FOP and Ms. Toriseva,” said Bob Cohen, a retired attorney and member of the Morgantown/Kingwood branch of the NAACP. “Here, Chief Powell has accepted the process outlined in the ordinance but the FOP says he cannot do so. Under a strange interpretation of West Virginia statutes, the FOP is attempting to dictate the chief’s process and to tie his hands. Council should not bend to their threat.”

Cohen was one of seven speakers during the public comment portion of Tuesday’s council meeting. Community members and representatives from the Morgantown Human Rights Commission, ACLU of WV, and Morgantown/Kingwood NAACP all spoke in favor of the bill.

“Whenever we help marginalized communities, we help everybody,” said Jerry Carr, president of the Morgantown/Kingwood branch of the NAACP. “So, I just want to make sure that people understand that no one got in this business thinking that it was just about helping that one group. This is something that’s ubiquitous, it can impact every facet of what’s going on, including the police department.”

Under the ordinance, civilians can file complaints against police officers with the board. The board will pass them onto the Morgantown police chief for investigation.

Fetty said this is a significant change from the previous system that required community members to go to the police department and file a complaint directly.

“At the end of the day, the most critical piece is that we will, as a community be contributing to this discussion about how policing will work in our community and how we’d like to see it unfold and how we can contribute and cooperate with the Morgantown police department to ensure that policing happens in a safe and careful way that is respectful of everyone’s constitutional rights, and respectful also of the rights that our officers have as employees of the city,” said Fetty.

Morgantown Man Pleads Not Guilty On U.S. Capitol Attack Charges

George Tanios, the owner and operator of Sandwich University restaurant in Morgantown, pleaded not guilty Tuesday in federal court on a number of charges related to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack.

Tanios and Julian Khatar of Pennsylvania face 10 counts, including conspiring to injure police. They were arrested by federal law enforcement last month and have now both pleaded not guilty.

During a previous hearing last month in West Virginia, prosecutors said Tanios purchased bear and pepper spray at a Morgantown store before the two men traveled to Washington, D.C.

According to court documents, Tanios handed chemical spray to Khatar who then used it on U.S. Capitol Police. One officer, Brian Sicknick, died the next day and investigators are still determining the cause of death.

Tanios was denied bond once already. His attorneys said they plan to appeal that decision at a bond hearing set for April 27.

October 17, 1785: Virginia General Assembly Establishes Morgan's Town

On October 17, 1785, the Virginia General Assembly established Morgan’s Town. It was named for Zackquill Morgan, the son of pioneer Morgan Morgan. Zackquill had settled in the area in 1771 and laid out the town in 1783.

In the early days, Morgantown, as it became known, consisted primarily of what is now the city’s downtown. It featured a few water-powered businesses and was a jumping-off point for boat builders heading north to Pittsburgh. The town began to take off with the founding of the West Virginia Agricultural College in 1867. Renamed West Virginia University the following year, the school would become the centerpiece of Morgantown.

In 1886, the arrival of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad sparked a regional boom in coal, oil, and gas. It also gave rise to Morgantown’s glass industry and the American Sheet and Tin Plate Company, both of which attracted an influx of immigrants.

Today, thanks in large part to the university, Morgantown is one of the state’s fastest-growing cities. In 2012, it had about 31,000 residents, placing it in a virtual tie with Parkersburg as West Virginia’s third-largest city.

March 15, 1988: Reformer Mary Behner Christopher Dies at 81

Reformer Mary Behner Christopher died in Morgantown on March 15, 1988, at age 81. The Ohio native came to West Virginia in the 1920s as a missionary for the Presbyterian church. From 1928 to 1937, she worked in the impoverished coal communities along Scotts Run, outside of Morgantown.

This once-prosperous region had fallen on hard times after the coal market plummeted in the ‘20s. Thousands of families, including numerous immigrants and African-Americans, were stranded by the economic depression.

Mary Behner was shocked by the poverty she encountered, but she was not easily daunted. Armed with an iron will and an abiding faith in God, she comforted mothers whose babies had died due to lack of milk, chastised coal operators for ignoring their workers’ needs, and created educational and social outlets for young people.

Her most visible contribution to Scotts Run was ‘‘The Shack,’’ a former company store that Behner converted into a community center. After her 1937 marriage to David Christopher, she continued to support social justice and service projects, particularly programs that helped children in need and that fostered an appreciation for different cultures.