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Matewan Hoping to Use Grant Funding to Make Change

This morning we take a look at the Turn this Town Around Project in Matewan, where they too found out about possible grant funding for the community. They…

This morning we take a look at the Turn this Town Around Project in Matewan, where they too found out about possible grant funding for the community. They hope the available funds are the key to revitalizing the town.

This is part of our continuing series on how the towns of Grafton and Matewan are turning themselves around through a special collaborative project between West Virginia Public Broadcasting, West Virginia Focus magazine and the West Virginia Community Development Hub.

Kelly Webb is a 24-year-old resident of Matewan. But she isn’t your prototypical resident of the small town along the Tug River. The Detroit, Michigan native has only been in the area for 6 months, but in that short time she’s grown fond of her new home and wants it to succeed.

“The younger generation I feel is an important part to community service project, we basically set the precedent for generations to come and learning from the older generations and getting the youth involved, it just sets a pathway for when we have children,” Webb said.

Webb along with a group of approximately 20 others were in attendance in Matewan recently to find out the next step in the process of Turn this Town Around. It’s a project headed up by the West Virginia Community Development Hub to revitalize both Matewan in the southern part of the state and Grafton in the north. At meetings in both areas this week the residents found out about the available funding to their projects. A total of $75,000 could come to the community to support ideas like computer labs, walking and biking areas, tours and renovations of the historic jail.

“Everyone is going to have to band together and really participate to turn the town around,” Webb said.

The meeting this week served several purposes. First, to make the people of Matewan aware of the available funds, but also to make sure they realized there is no time like the present to brainstorm projects that would help the town. Kent Spellman is the executive director of the West Virginia Community Development Hub and wanted the crowd to know the funds from the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation wouldn’t be there forever.

“Let me put it this way, there is a sense of urgency about this, the next meeting is July 1^st and that’s when the attendance taking starts, so there is a sense of urgency for you to quickly identify the projects and build teams around them so you can access this funding in its entirety, there is going to have to be a lot of phone calling, e-mailing and talking to neighbors,” Spellman said.

What Spellman was talking about was the need to create small teams for each project. The hope is with the available funding that 20 different projects could be funded. Spellman and others hope to get more people involved in order to complete all of them in the time frame allowed.

Spellman thinks Matewan is a perfect place to undergo the challenge.

“This is sort of like a little trial by fire to see, what does Matewan really think of itself and what can it really accomplish, this is a challenge and it is a stretch and we understand that, but I think you’re up to it,” Spellman said.

Over the coming weeks the groups will meet with members of the development hub at workshops to work through the application process for each of the projects. Applications are due by August 1.

Webb said the people of Matewan realize that outside help was needed to turn the town into what they hope it could be.

“I realize that the people here are just beautiful people, they’re amazing, they live in the mountains and they’re in a rural community, but they make it work and realizing that sometimes there needs to be someone from the outside to come in and say hey we want to help you,” Webb said.

The groups will meet at workshops starting July 1^st.

Grant Funding Coming to 'Turn this Town Around' Communities

The Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation has announced it will give $150,000 to two West Virginia towns participating in the Turn This Town Around…

The Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation has announced it will give $150,000 to two West Virginia towns participating in the Turn This Town Around Project.

Leaders in Grafton and Matewan will be given the money for projects they develop to revitalize their communities.

Through the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation, the towns of Grafton and Matewan will receive up to $75,000 each in grants to help pay for as many as 20 revitalization projects in each community. But there are strings attached. A core team of at least three people have to work on a project, and commit to attending workshops. In Grafton, one of those people, Douglas Flohr, is working to expand the farmer’s market. Flohr says grant money would help.

“Almost immediately, it’s canopies. We were talking with the folks in Bridgeport, we don’t want people just pulling up with a pickup truck and selling stuff out of the back of the truck. If we can provide canopies, once we get folks selling their produce, when they start making money, it will grow,” he said.

“We see local artists coming, anybody with something will be able to sell at this market. The seed money will allow us to buy some infrastructure right up front.”

The revitalization projects included in Turn this Town Around fall into three areas. The first are regarded as low-hanging fruit, which means they can be completed by the end of this year. Each individual project can receive up to $2,500. The second area is intermediate. That means the project can be completed by next July. The final area is bold, transformational, which may take years to complete. Flohr says he hopes to be involved with several different projects in all these areas.

“I don’t think we are ever going to see a blossoming of Grafton in the downtown area. I think we see it as a place where there are boutique shops, come in and get some coffee, that type of thing. It’s not going to be a strip mall. We aren’t going to see J.C. Penny again,” he said.

“I think the farmer’s market will help us economically to bring folks to the downtown area. It’s a community. It’s giving people a place where they want to live.”

Another member of the farmer’s market team, is Peggy Barney. She’s also on another team working on civic infrastructure. This includes getting an after business hours conversation group together in Grafton, to meet and talk about how to improve the community. Discussion like this used to happen but it fell by the way side.

“We’ve talked to different groups, there are different people who are interested in getting that re-organized. Different businesses, each month, a different business would sponsor it,” said Barney.

“It would be at their business or a location of their choosing. It’s just a meet and greet, getting to know everybody.”

Barney has lived in Grafton for many years. She says throughout that time, she’s seen her community change a great deal. She’s very excited about the Turn this Town Around process, which she says is different from past revitalization efforts.

“I have been involved in efforts like this for some time over the years. I have seen Grafton go from a very prosperous town to losing all our industries,” she said.

“This is a little bit different than anything that has been done before. Looking around the room, you can feel the energy.”

The teams must submit applications for the funding by August 1.

Will Heritage Help Turn Matewan Around?

As part of the West Virginia Focus Magazine project called Turn This Town Around, experts with the West Virginia Community Development HUB are helping Matewan focus, pursue, and execute plans to revitalize the town.

Monday, marked the 94^th anniversary of the Battle of Matewan; a showdown between the United Mine Workers of America and Baldiwn Felts detectives hired by coal operators. The Mingo County town marked the anniversary over the weekend with a re-enactment. Re-enactment organizers hope the momentum of the project will help them complete a 14 year old dream.

Donna May Patarino lives in nearby Kentucky but has organized the Matewan re-enactment for the past 14 years. She, like many involved in the project, think that heritage will play a key role in the revitalization efforts.

Patarino says she wants children to know the stories of the past to appreciate the amenities of today.

“They have no idea what it would have been like to live on company owned property and have to shop at the company grocery store, go to the company doctor go to the company school," she said, "and I feel like they need to know."

The mine war re-enactment depicts efforts in the coalfields to unionize, demand fair wages, and better working conditions.

A crowd of about 100 people sit and stand under white canopies as they watch and listen to the reenactment.

On June 25, 1938, 18 years after the showdown, President Roosevelt signed the Fair Labor Standards Act which established minimum wages, overtime pay, record keeping, and child labor standards for private sector and government workers.

Moving Mountains

So what are some of things that need to ‘turn’ in order to “Turn this Town Around”? Some of the challenges include:

Geography: It’s unlikely that they found Matewan by mistake. The roads that lead to the small town with a population of less than 500 are riddled with switchbacks as they weave their way up the edge of the mountains, far off the beaten path.
Flooding: The town sits at the foot of towering mountains in the Tug River Valley, so flooding has historically been an issue.
Corruption: Mingo County has also endured a few black eyes over the past nine months as the county’s circuit judge, prosecutor, chief magistrate and a county commissioner resigned following their convictions.
Poverty: More than 30 percent of residents in Mingo County live below the poverty level -almost double the rate for West Virginia’s at nearly 18 percent poverty rate from 2008 to 2012 according to the US Census Bureau.

“This looks like the town that time forgot,” eighth grade West Virginia history teacher Claire Webb said. “That was my first impression but I’ve been here just a couple of hours now only but the people here are just so rich and warm.”

Webb teaches at Wildwood Elementary School in Jefferson County.

For Webb, the trip was humbling. She says, Jefferson County is a different West Virginia than Mingo County. As basically a suburb of Washington D.C., her home county has a different environment socially, and economically. The same census report says Jefferson County has more than 50,000 residents with an 11 percent poverty rate, that’s six-percent less than the state average.

“We have different challenges we have a different perspective we have different lives in West Virginia and it’s all about where you’re from,” she said, “and these communities in the southern part of the state and the coalfields, it really is I do feel sometimes an alternate universe.”

“I’m so grateful to my fellow West Virginians for their love for their state that allows them to live here and deal with these immense challenges that exist on a day to day basis that exist with living in a southern coalfield.”

Mingo Momentum

The West Virginia Community Development HUB and volunteers aren’t starting from scratch. Federal, state, and local lawmakers are already investing time, money and energy into the region. Here’s a look at some of the work meant improve the region.

Geography: The geographic challenges are being addressed in part with the King Coal Highway; an incomplete road that runs close to Matewan. It’s an example of public private partnerships that allow coal companies to mine coal and leave road beds for paving.
Corruption: Just this week, Governor Earl Ray Tomblin appointed Family Court Judge Miki Thompson to the vacated Circuit Court Judge seat. Former Judge Michael Thornsbury left the seat vacant after pleading guilty to scheme that would protect the former sheriff, who was fatally shot.
Flooding: The late Senator Robert C. Byrd secured federal money to construct a flood wall more than 2,000 feet long, varying in height between 6 and 29 feet above the ground. The wall was completed in 1997.

While residents claim the floodwall has worked to protect the town from high water, Patarino says it’s kept more than flood waters out.
“It seemed like … people were afraid to come across those railroad tracks and come into town to shop at our businesses,” she said. “That’s why we’ve got to focus on our history. That’s why we’ve got to focus on that because that’s bringing people here and we’ve got to do all we can to turn this town around.”

Still Patarino says Matewan has a lot to offer visitors.

“Matewan has so much to offer and really you can name just a few small towns across America that have as much rich history as Matewan does. And a lot of those small towns are no more and we’ve got to hold onto our small town.

The reenactment is performed on the main street in downtown Matewan. The show climaxes during a shootout between union organizers and Baldwin Felts detectives hired by coal operators.

If they build it, will they come?

Patarino has worked on the Matewan Massacre drama for 14 years and has been preaching every sermon she can in favor of an amphitheater.

“We can teach our history on a regular basis to our young people,” she said. “We can bring music events in we can do all sorts of things at our theater for our young people that we would no other way be able to do.”

Patarino says the momentum of the Turn this Town Around is igniting even more hope for the $300,000 amphitheater dream.

Leigh Ann Ray, Project Manager for the Mingo County Commission says the county got involved about a year ago and gave $48,000 for engineering and architectural work for an outdoor theatre. Based on those drawings the theatre will cost about $300,000. Some of those funds have already been raised. Town officials were not available to share the financial progress of the project.

Meet Matewan: A Town Worth Fighting For

The small town with a population of less than 500 people already has a big history. During the 1920’s coal miners were fighting for equal pay and better working conditions. While dramatized, historians say the 1987 Jan Sayles film Matewan captures the atmosphere of the regional situation at the time.

While much has changed, the fighting spirit of Matewan is still alive and well. As one of the winners of the Turn this Town Around Project, the community has pulled together, yet again, in the last two months hosting community clean up days, and a community meeting which was standing room only.

More than 75 people packed into the United Mine Workers of America Local 1440 Union Building late last month to hear from Kent Spellman of the West Virginia Community Development HUB. The HUB is providing tools, technical assistance and possible funding for Matewan during the ‘Turn Town Around’ project.

Kent Spellman of The West Virginia Community Development Hub talks during the community meeting for Matewan as part of the Turn This Twon Around project.

Some of the proposed projects include a garden club, a souvenir shop with longer hours, a Hatfield and McCoy Festival, historical underground coal mine, and more.

“We came into an abandoned high school that was recently shut down in our local home town that we actually both graduated from,” Justin Bradford said.

Bradford along with his partners already have a jump start on one of the goals; making a community center out of the high school.

Bradford is co-owner of the Old School Fitness Center, formerly Matewan High School. The owners have worked out a lease agreement with the town and worked to renovate several rooms. Bradford said so far Old School Fitness hosts a small arcade, usable gymnasium, and a workout or fitness center.

Bradord said the community support has been overwhelming. He sees the center as a place for folks to exercise during the cold winter months. Bradford also hopes to provide monthly gun shows, professional wrestling, and even the Rough and Rowdy Feud.

You might be familiar with the Rough and Rowdy brawl, a boxing match between amateur fighters. The feud would be exclusive to Kentucky and West Virginia fighters similar to the Hatfield and McCoy Feuds that played out along the border of the two Appalachian states.

Pride in the ability to withstand a ‘tough blow’ is part of West Virginia culture. But Spellman says the project is meant to help channel and organize that pride, without settling.

“Here in West Virginia we are really, really proud of our ability to survive all sorts of challenges and adversarial situations,” Spellman said. “Whether it’s floods or declining population or the railroad closing whatever it is we are really, really proud of our ability of surviving.”

“I’m going to challenge you to quit being proud of surviving. Quit being proud of surviving, start being proud of thriving,” he added.

Hopefully that means each citizen will then thrive as well. Spellman says the project will only work if it’s locally determined, and locally driven.

A re-enactment of the Matewan Massacre along with a festival is scheduled for Saturday May 17. The Rough and Rowdy Feud is scheduled for June 6 and 7.

How We Chose the Eight West Virginia Contestants For "Turn This Town Around"

“Turn This Town Around” is a unique and groundbreaking project to select two West Virginia communities to receive training, coaching, and technical assistance to help them achieve success in revitalizing their communities.

“Turn This Town Around” is a feature of West Virginia Focus, in partnership with West Virginia Public Broadcasting and the West Virginia Community Development Hub.

You are encouraged to vote right now for the two towns from a selection of eight contestants: in the north – Grafton, Hundred, Petersburg, and Rowlesburg; and in the South – Alderson, Hillsboro, Matewan, Pineville.

Lots of folks are asking how the eight “Turn This Town Around” contestants were selected. Most commonly, they ask because they want their town to have a shot at this opportunity.

We think that’s great. We wish we could provide that opportunity to every West Virginia community that steps up.

That being said, by my count there are 149 incorporated municipalities and 2,941 unincorporated communities in the state. In this first round of Turn This Town Around, we have the capacity to devote our resources to two communities.

So how were the eight contestants selected? There were several considerations. We knew we wanted to focus on one northern and one southern community. We thought selecting the two out of a field eight would narrow the focus and increase the competition. So we selected four northern and four southern communities.

Some of the thinking that went into the selection included:

· Where could we really make a visible difference in the course of a year?

· Where we did not already have a strong presence or relationships?

· We wanted towns that represented some geographic diversity.

· Which towns had attracted our attention as communities with potential that hadn’t been realized?

Yes, the selection of the eight was fairly arbitrary.

But here’s the point: Turn This Town Around is an experiment – a very exciting one that we believe has huge potential – but an experiment nonetheless. This is its pilot year. This will be a great learning experience for all of us, one that we hope will help us improve and expand the process in coming years.

And unlike some community development initiatives, Turn This Town Around will be very well documented. Tools, tips and techniques will be openly shared. The lessons learned will be made available to any West Virginia community that is interested.

If you want to revitalize your community, but weren’t selected for Turn This Town Around, pay attention, because you can do this at home! Learn from Turn This Town Around and apply those lessons to your town!

While the Hub and the many service providers in the WV Community Development Network will be providing whatever assistance we can to the Turn This Town Around communities, it is a central principle of community improvement that the community must determine and drive the process. Mobilize your community and get to work – don’t wait for us!

We’re exploring ideas about how we might open the process up next year to give your community an opportunity to join the Turn This Town Around campaign. Stay tuned!

VOTE: Which Two West Virginia Towns Should Get "Turned Around"?

It’s been a rough month in West Virginia, with the water crisis and all the negative, stereotypical coverage of Appalachia around the 50^th anniversary of the War on Poverty.

Let’s take all our anger and frustration and turn it into something positive. Let’s “Turn This Town Around.”

We’re partnering with West Virginia Community Development Hub and New South Media, Inc. to inspire two West Virginia towns – one north, one south – to develop their own solutions.

It starts with YOUR vote – you get to choose which two towns (out of eight candidates) will be part of this effort. Then, the community will take over. They’ll receive training and other resources to complete a project that builds on their efforts to revitalize their town.

As publisher Nikki Bowman of New South Media wrote in “West Virginia Focus” magazine:

The two towns you select will become living laboratories. Our goal is to help ignite change, to rally the community with a set of goals and deliverables, to showcase the successes and failures, to identify challenges, and to figure out what works and what doesn’t. The West Virginia Community Development Hub, a leader in community development, will coordinate the effort. The Hub will connect the two communities with training on civic engagement, leadership development, and project management; provide a community performance coach; help them assess their strengths and vulnerabilities; develop a community vision and plan; and link them to technical assistance providers in key areas like civic engagement, the local food movement, community sustainability, and organizational development.

You can (and should) read more of Bowman’s article here, which includes detailed information about each town.

You can check the current voting standing on the West Virginia Focus Twitter and Facebook pages.