City Council

June 10, 2025 The regular meeting of the City Council of the City of Fairmont was held at 7:00 p.m. on the 10th day of June, 2025, at the Public Safety Building located at 500 Quincy Street in Fairmont, West Virginia. Mayor Bolyard called the meeting to order. Roll call of members was taken by the City Clerk. Councilmembers present were: First District Joshua D. Rice Second District Anne E. Bolyard Third District Rebecca Moran Fifth District Charles “Chuck” Warner Sixth District Daniel “Dan” Weber Seventh District Julia “Julie” Sole Ninth District Kandice “Kandi” Nuzum Absent: Fourth District Anthony T. Horton Eighth District Bruce McDaniel Also present were: City Manager Travis L. Blosser City Clerk Janet L. Keller City Attorney Kevin V. Sansalone Finance Director Priscilla Hamilton Director of Planning Shae Strait Marketing Manager David A. Kirk IN RE: COUNCILMEMBER MCDANIEL E XCUSED Mayor Bolyard made a motion to excuse Councilmember McDaniel from tonight’s meeting. The motion was seconded by Councilmember Warner. The Mayor declared Councilmember McDaniel excused by voice vote of Council. IN RE: OPENING CEREMONIES Rev. Roy Weese gave the invocation followed by the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag led by Councilmember Sole. IN RE: YOUNG LEADERS RE COGNIZED 1 Mayor Bolyard welcomed and recognized the Young Leaders of Marion County. The Mayor and Deputy Mayor Rice awarded certificates to each student. APPROVAL OF MINUTES IN RE: MINUTES FOR THE MAY 27, 2025 MEETING Mayor Bolyard noted that each member of Council had received a copy of the minutes from the Regular Meeting held on May 27, 2025 . She asked if there were any corrections, deletions, or amendments. Councilmember Nuzum moved to approve the May 27, 2025 Regular Meeting minutes as submitted. The motion was seconded by Councilmember Moran. The Mayor declared the minutes approved as submitted by voice vote of Council. PUBLIC HEARING S IN RE: AN ORDINANCE OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF FAIRMONT AMENDING AND SUPPLEMENTING ORDINANCE NO. 2071, DULY ADOPTED MARCH 27, 2025, WHICH PROVIDES FOR THE CITY OF FAIRMONT ’S CURRENT PAY PLAN AND LIST OF OCCUPATIONAL CLASSES AND CLASS TITLES TO PROVIDE FOR AN INCREASE IN THE CITY MANAGER ’S BASE PAY, TO CLARIFY THE TERMS ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN AND PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER, AND TO PROVIDE FOR ADDITIONAL COMPENSATION IN THE STEELWORKERS ’ PAY PLAN FOR EMPLOYEES WITH A BACHELOR ’S DEGREE FROM AN ACCREDITED COLLEGE O R UNIVERSITY AT $0.34/HOUR. Pursuant to a notice duly published in the Times-West Virginian on May 30, 2025, a public hearing was convened to obtain citizen input on an ordinance providing for an amendment to the Pay Plan. The Mayor asked if anyone present desired to speak to the proposed ordinance. PRISCILLA HAMILTON , Finance Director, spoke in favor of the proposed ordinance. She said that the City of Fairmont strides to keep the Pay Plan competitive and these changes brings us closer to that goal. There being no one else to speak, the public hearing was called to a close at 7:10 p.m. ANNOUNCEMENTS IN RE: PALATINE PARK Councilmember Rice updated Council on Palatine Park. He said great events are happening at the Park. 2 IN RE: MOMMA MIA TICKETS Councilmember Moran reported that tickets are on sale for Momma Mia. IN RE: HOMETOWN MARKET AND PRIDE BLOCK PARTY Councilmember Moran announced that the next Hometown Market is coming up. A pride block party will be held on Monroe Street in the green space on June 21st. IN RE: FUTURE YOUNG LEADERS Mayor Bolyard shared her appreciation for our future young leaders coming in and spending their time in this program. CITIZENS PETITIONS There were no citizens petitions for this meeting. CITY MANAGER ’S REPORT IN RE: ROTARY CLUB OF FAIRMONT MINI PARK Mr. Blosser reported the groundbreaking event was held at the Rotary Club of Fairmont Mini Park on Morgantown Avenue. He said that project will be kicking off in the next couple of weeks. The playground equipment for that site has already been ordered. IN RE: PICKLEBALL COURTS AT WINDMILL PARK The Manager announced that the ribbon cutting was held for the three new pickleball courts at Windmill Park. The courts are now open for use by the public. Randy Hines has reported that the courts have been packed with people waiting to use the courts. He added that benches will be ordered soon to be placed around the courts for those waiting to use the courts. IN RE: PODA DISTRICT Mr. Blosser stated that we have had our first PODA meeting. He has engaged the Social Bee Marketing Agency here in Fairmont as well as the Chamber of Commerce and Main Street Fairmont to be part of logo discussions around that for marketing materials that we need to build out for the PODA district. IN RE: CONGRESSIONAL DIRECTED SPENDING FUNDING Mr. Blosser extended a thank you to Senator Capito, Senator Justice, and Congressman Moore. He stated that we have submitted for two Congressional Directed Spending requests. One was for $3.5 million for the renovations of the Watson Fire Station and he 3 announced that the $3.5 million was submitted by all three Congressional representatives to the committee chairs in Congress. It will now move its way through the process and we feel very good about where we are. The Manager reported that we also submitted a $500,000 request for our city-wide façade improvement program. The deadline is not there yet for the senatorial submissions and there is not a budget line from a committee standpoint in the House, however, we are optimistic that gets submitted as well. He noted that we should find out in the next couple of days as those submissions start to come due. IN RE: FINANCE DIRECTOR COMMENDED The Manager commended the Finance Director, Priscilla Hamilton, for her leadership and the work that her team is doing every day as we start to wrap up this existing fiscal year and start our new fiscal year. IN RE: WATER AND SEWER PROJECTS The City Manager gave Council an update on some Water and Sewer projects.  The Clearwell Rehabilitation Project is a 1.5-million-gallon storage tank at the Water Filtration Plant; the new steel is on its way of being completed and will start sandblasting and painting. Hopefully, that tank will be back in service the beginning of next month.  The Sterling Heights Tank has been completely rehabilitated and is back in service. That is between a 250,000-to-275,000-gallon storage tank and helps us particularly in the Bellview community.  The Watson Tank has not gotten started yet but will once the Clearwell is back in production. He noted that this was a million-gallon storage tank. Once those are all completed, we will be one of a few utility systems in the state that all of our water storage facilities are being rehabbed under warranty or in pristine shape.  The Buffalo Lift Station upgrades will get started next week.  The West Fork Lift Station and force main upgrades, those are in process and hope those start soon.  We have seen a lot of wet weather here over the last couple of days and as a reminder of our system, we have a combined sewer overflow system where stormwater during heavy rain events is traveling through our distribution system and there are about 33 locations across the city that will discharge during those heavy rain events when it overflows.  We need aggressive investment in our Sanitary Sewer system. There is an on- going project that is both a sanitary sewer and a stormwater funded project and it has essentially installed flow meters throughout our sanitary sewer system and, in particular, those 33 outfall areas so that we can study how much flow we actually have. He went on to say that data is so critical for us because just talking about the upgrades we need to do at the sanitary sewer treatment facility, we are looking at about $191 million in upgrades that are necessary at the sanitary sewer treatment facility alone. That does not include the upgrades that we need in our sanitary system out in the actual collections side of that system in order to get it to 4  that treatment facility. He said that all of that has to do when we are looking at dollars, Congressional dollars. We talked about the money that we requested in Congressionally Directed Spending for the Watson Fire Station but we are also looking at those dollars in order to not have as dramatical rate impact on our sanitary sewer customers in order to finance those types of upgrades. He went on to say that he wanted to share that perspective so that folks know there is work ongoing. We are looking at that work and we are actively figuring out and making sure we get the data so that we can submit for funding and bring resources back so that it is not the rate-payer that has to bear the burden of these upgrades as substantially as they would if we do not bring in those resources. He closed by saying that he wanted to take this opportunity with the water and sewer update on some of these ARPA projects to also share that perspective. CONSIDERATION OF COUNCIL BUSINESS IN RE: ADOPTION,AN ORDINANCE OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF FAIRMONT AMENDING AND SUPPLEMENTING ORDINANCE NO. 2071, DULY ADOPTED MARCH 27, 2025, WHICH PROVIDES FOR THE CITY OF FAIRMONT ’S CURRENT PAY PLAN AND LIST OF OCCUPATIONAL CLASSES AND CLASS TITLES TO PROVIDE FOR AN INCREASE IN THE CITY MANAGER ’S BASE PAY, TO CLARIFY THE TERMS ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN AND PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER, AND TO PROVIDE FOR ADDITIONAL COMPENSATION IN THE STEELWORKERS ’ PAY PLAN FOR EMPLOYEES WITH A BACHELOR ’S DEGREE FROM AN ACCREDITED COLLEGE O R UNIVERSITY AT $0.34/HOUR. The City Clerk read the proposed ordinance by title. Mayor Bolyard entertained a motion for the adoption of an ordinance amending the Pay Plan to provide for an increase in the City Manager’s base pay, to clarify the terms Engineering Technician and Professional Engineer, and to provide additional compensation in the Steelworkers’ Pay Plan for employees with a Bachelor’s Degree at $0.34/hour. Motion: Councilmember Sole moved for the adoption of the proposed ordinance. Councilmember Weber seconded the motion. Roll call was taken by the Clerk. The Mayor declared the ordinance adopted by unanimous vote of those Councilmembers present and the ordinance designated as Ordinance No. 2075 was duly adopted. IN RE: INTRODUCTION, FIRST READING, SET PUBLIC HEARING, AN ORDINANCE OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF FAIRMONT AMENDING AND SUPPLEMENTING ARTICLE 177 FAIRMONT-MARION REGIONAL AIRPORT AUTHORITY AND MORE PARTICULARLY SECTION 177.06 QUALIFICATION; COMPENSATION OF MEMBERS THEREOF, TO ELIMINATE THE QUALIFICATION 5 THAT MEMBERS OF THE AUTHORITY MUST BE RESIDENTS OF THE CITY OR COUNTY WHICH SUCH MEMBERS REPRESENT The City Clerk read the proposed ordinance by synopsis for the first time. Mayor Bolyard entertained a motion for the introduction of an ordinance to eliminate the residency requirement for the Fairmont Airport Authority. Motion: Councilmember Warner moved for the introduction of the proposed ordinance. Councilmember Moran seconded the motion. The Mayor declared the public hearing set for June 24, 2025. IN RE: ADOPTION, A RESOLUTION OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF FAIRMONT AUTHORIZING THE APPLICATION TO THE COUNTY COMMISSION OF MARION COUNTY, WEST VIRGINIA, REQUESTING AN EXTENSION AND INCREASE OF THE CORPORATE LIMITS OF THE CITY OF FAIRMONT BY MINOR BOUNDARY ADJUSTMENT PURSUANT TO THE PROVISIONS OF WEST VIRGINIA CODE §8-6-5 TO PROVIDE FOR THE ANNEXATION OF A CERTAIN 9.63 ACRE TRACT OF LAND, SITUATE ON OR NEAR CARRIAGE DRIVE IN FAIRMONT DISTRICT, MARION COUNTY, WEST VIRGINIA. The City Clerk read the proposed resolution by synopsis for the first time. Mayor Bolyard entertained a motion for the adoption of a resolution providing for the annexation of Carriage Drive. Motion: Councilmember Sole moved for the adoption of the proposed resolution. Councilmember Moran seconded the motion. Discussion: Councilmember Weber asked, as a City, have we helped the Carriage Drive residents in some of the stormwater problems that they have had in the past. Mr. Blosser said that he did not know the answer, however, one of the things that we did this winter, as everyone knows we had a pretty aggressive winter and because of the fact that this request dates back to 2021 and there was a change in statute around minor boundary adjustment that put everyone on hold at looking at annexations. Then the changes that they made, required us to do some things and because of that, this winter we dispatched some plow trucks to hit that area when we got the significant snow fall but he did not know if we have done a significant amount of work on Carriage Drive at all being outside the City. He then said that regarding stormwater, probably, like are in 6 another incorporated municipality actually are in our management zone of water runoff so there is a potential that if they paid stormwater fees, we would have done that, yes. Councilmember Weber stated that he thought it would be a help to those people that live there. Councilmember Sole asked that since it borders both District 7 and District 8, how will that be determined for that tract of land on what City Council district those residents in that area would be in. The City Manage said that we do not have an idea yet. Mr. Sansalone said that he would assume that the County Commission . . . some of this will involve what precincts that it would fall into. The City Clerk said that the residents will have to be moved into a City precinct because currently they are outside the city limits so the County Clerk’s office will put those residents in a city precinct. Roll call was taken by the Clerk. The Mayor declared the resolution adopted by unanimous vote of those Councilmembers present. Mr. Blosser said that he wants to make sure that City Council is aware that just by the passage of this resolution, it did not automatically now make them part of the City. There is still a process that we will be going through. He wanted to share that there is some additional work that has to be done in order to facilitate the full process, which does involve the Marion County Commission. The Mayor noted that this is the first step in that journey. IN RE: ADOPTION, A RESOLUTION OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF FAIRMONT APPROVING THE RULES AND REGULATIONS OF THE FIRE CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION OF THE CITY OF FAIRMONT, REVISED, WITH AMENDMENTS BY THE FIRE CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION ON MAY 12, 2025 The City Clerk read the proposed resolution by synopsis for the first time. Mayor Bolyard entertained a motion for the adoption of a resolution approving the Rules and Regulations of the Fire Civil Service Commission. Motion: Councilmember Nuzum moved for the adoption of the proposed resolution. Councilmember Moran seconded the motion. 7 Roll call was taken by the Clerk. The Mayor declared the resolution adopted by unanimous vote of those Councilmembers present. ADJOURNMENT The Mayor entertained a motion for adjournment. Motion: Councilmember Warner moved to adjourn the meeting. The motion was seconded by Councilmember Sole. The Mayor declared the meeting adjourned by voice vote of Council at 7:30 p.m. 8