Granville wants a recreational area on Monongahela River

Granville is creating a recreational area by Monongahela River and it will benefit the entire community.
It will include a boat slip and boat docks, where the community will be welcome to dock boats and fish by the riverside along W.Va. 100.
“It’s something in the community that people have wanted for a while,” said Granville Town Mayor Patricia Lewis. “Eventually we want to put restrooms down there with a few picnic tables where if people didn’t necessarily even have a boat, they would be able to go down along the river and fish.”
In Fort Martin, there’s accessible places for people to dock their boats, but in the Granville are Westover area, there’s no available space for boat docking. There’s nothing on this side of the river where people can put boats to get out on the river for recreation or fishing, said Lewis.
CONSOL Energy owns the property where Granville plans to put the recreational area, but town officials are working on obtaining that land.
CONSOL has agreed to sell Granville the property, but there must be a reappraisal.
“We hope to get the appraisal updated because it’s over six months old,” said Granville Town attorney, Michael Solomon. “We’d also have to get a survey done with the loading facilities.
“After those two things are done, I will petition with a certain court and pay into the court the amount of our appraisal and we would get immediate entry.”
It would take 30-60 days to gain entry. CONSOL can challenge the appraisal amount, and it would go through the court system. It would first go to court commissioners to determine what the fair market value is, said Solomon. Granville has ensured that CONSOL will get a fair market value for the property.
“If CONSOL’s not satisfied with what the commissioners come up with, they will also appeal it to a survey court and then it would be up for a jury,” said Solomon.
It’s hoped work on the facility will begin next spring and be usable by summer.