MORGANTOWN — And lo, in the Monongalia County Commission’s final meeting of 2021, there occurred a Christmas miracle…
An agreement brokered by Delegate Joe Statler, R-Monongalia, appears to have brought the years-long feud between the Monongalia County Commission and the West Virginia Supreme Court over family court rent payments to an end.
State code (51-2a-20) mandates WVSC will pay county commissions “a reasonable amount” for space provided to accommodate family court.
The county and the state stopped agreeing on the definition of “reasonable” in April 2015, when the commission informed the court its rent would jump from $12 a square foot to $18 upon moving from the former magistrate building to the Monongalia County Justice Center. The WVSC took exception, explaining it already paid Monongalia County the highest rate in the state.
The state insisted on two appraisals, the first of which resulted in the county bumping its asking price to $20 a square foot. The second, which included comparable properties at the state’s insistence, came back at $24.90.
Between February 2016 and February 2019, the county billed the WVSC at a rate of $24.50 per square foot for the 5,780 square feet used by the family court — and the court paid $12.
The state auditor’s office got involved in 2019, explaining that an agreement needed to be in place for payments to continue. Neither side was willing to budge and the rent payments stopped.
On Wednesday, however, the commission approved three measures, including an agreement from the state to pay $196,000 in back rent for the 34-month period between February 2019 and November of this year.
The second sets the rate at $12 through June 30,2022, and the third raises the rate to $14 per square foot from July 1, 2022, through June 30, 2027.
“I’m glad this phase is over and that there’s an agreement out there,” Statler said, explaining much of the groundwork for the deal was laid while he was working in Charleston as a lobbyist on behalf of the county commission.
Statler served in the House of Delegates 51st District from 2014-18. In 2018, he finished sixth in a race for five seats. He worked for a short time as an unpaid “legislative liaison” for the county until voters sent him back to Charleston in 2020.
“I believe it was a fair agreement. At least it gives you the back pay from all the time … that was in question,” Statler said. “It also gives you a negotiated price going forward. And there was a disagreement between the two entities as to how much property they actually take up in that building down there, and that was settled.”
Commission President Sean Sikora said the back pay component is critical as there was no lease in place, meaning the state could have simply refused to provide payment for the nearly three-year stretch starting in early 2019.
“This has been a thorn in our side for a number of years,” Commissioner Tom Bloom told Statler. “But by you coming up with, which was a great idea, the compromise for back pay, which was something we didn’t think was going to happen, but you were able to throw that in … I want to thank you personally because this has been a long time coming.”
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