MORGANTOWN — Henceforth it is required that all Morgantown residents under the age of 18 have access to free food.
Further, Facetime phone calls shall remain legal in public spaces within the city and a new parking garage will not be constructed for Morgantown High School.
After much debate and some borderline unruly behavior from a roster of public speakers, Morgantown (High) City Council came to a consensus on the above issues during a mock city council meeting held Wednesday in the Morgantown Public Safety Building.
The meeting was part of the city’s Municipal Government Week activities.
The participants all “volunteered” from Morgantown Deputy Mayor Joe Abu-Ghannam’s Business and Marketing class at MHS.
“I thought it went really great,” Abu-Ghannam said. “I just gave them these issues today. I wanted to catch them off guard and see how they’d react. They came up with opinions and thoughts I hadn’t even considered.”
Liliana McInelli played the role of city manager.
“I thought the issues were interesting and the people were very argumentative and very convincing at some points. It was a good experience,” McInelli said.
Abu-Ghannam was joined by Mayor Jenny Selin, Councilor Danielle Trumble, Deputy Clerk Heather Carl and others who portrayed members of the public with thoughts to share.
Senior Kaley Mersing presided over the meeting as mayor.
“Almost,” Mersing laughed when asked if anybody had to be thrown out. “But we worked past it.”
Mersing took part last year as a member of the mock council. She was among several of the participants who have attended actual council meetings representing MHS.
As for a future in public office?
“I can see myself working towards that. I think it would be nice to have a voice for my community,” Mersing said.
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