Metro could mean clout

By Misty Poe
Times West Virginian

FAIRMONT June 14, 2006 02:49 am

— If you combine of the population of the City of Fairmont and the unincorporated areas of Marion County, the grand total would be teetering around the 50,000 mark.
And if that were the case, the newly formed City and County of Marion — or whatever the new government would be called — would be the third most populated area in West Virginia, following only Charleston and Huntington.
And those kind of numbers mean clout, members of the Marion County Chamber of Commerce said.
“Getting some size is going to give us more control over our own destiny,” said Dr. Daniel Bradley, Fairmont State University’s president and one of four guardians of the chamber of commerce’s action plan for 2006.
Part of that action plan calls for investigating metro government as a way of looking for more local control over issues.
Fairmont City Council took a major step Tuesday night toward the journey of consolidating the city and the county through metro government. Council unanimously passed a resolution that would create a metro charter review committee.
A meeting this morning will decide whether any more steps will be taken. The Marion County Commission is poised to vote on a similar resolution when it meets at 10 a.m. If the commission approves the measure, the metro charter review committee will be created and charged with the year-long mission of drafting a charter for this new form of government.
“This is what we make it,” Chamber of Commerce President Tina Shaw said. “There are no do’s. There are no don’ts. We’re starting right out of the gate. It is what we want it to be.”
Making up the charter committee will be two appointed by city council, two appointed by the county commission and three community representatives.
After a year, the committee will come back with a charter looking for approval from council and the commission.
“Basically, the council and the commission are not committing themselves to anything other than studying the idea and being willing to review the charter when it comes back from the charter committee,” Bradley said.
And if the two bodies approve the charter, it will go to a vote of the people. But as Bradley pointed out, it will take a super majority — or 55 percent — to approve the consolidation of the county and the city.
City Councilman Tom Mainella expressed his approval for going forward with the investigation into metro government.
“I don’t know why we wouldn’t want to explore this,” Mainella said.
Shaw said that as the first in the state, the committee would approach the governor’s office and ask for funding to study the concept of metro government in Marion County.
With a third-party view of consolidating the county and the city, the committee could look at the successes and failures of other communities in similar efforts. Since this is the first case study in West Virginia, the committee and its consultants could look to examples like Jacksonville, Fla., and Miami, as well as Minneapolis and Louisville, Ky.
“All the resolution says is that we’re interested,” Fairmont Mayor Nick Fantasia said. “It puts the burden on (the metro charter committee), to go get the experts and to go get the money.
“What we get at the end of the day is a white paper to look at, and the county commission gets a white paper to look at,” the mayor said. “If everybody then decides to move forward, it goes on the ballot.”
E-mail Misty Poe at mpoe@timeswv.com.