MORGANTOWN — “Water doesn’t understand city limits,” RK&K Civil Engineering’s Jeff Stanislawcyzk told the Monongalia County Commission. “It goes where it goes.”
And when it rains a bunch of it goes down Star City’s Fenwick Avenue on its way to the Monongahela River.
Stanislawcyzk explained that roughly 59 acres naturally drain down Fenwick, 22 of which are in the city of Morgantown. That water joins runoff from no-man’s land — a strip of county land between Morgantown and Star City.
A week after the commission floated the idea of pulling $1 million in American Rescue Plan dollars from the Upper Popenoe Run stormwater project with Morgantown and the Morgantown Utility Board, representatives of Star City said they’re looking for help with about $800,000 of a $1.2 million stormwater project to corral the runoff flooding its residents on and around Fenwick Avenue.
The lack of movement on Upper Popenoe, which was a talking point for the commissioners last week, was brought up more than once by Star City. The commissioners were quick to quash that dichotomy.
“What’s going on with Upper Popenoe is a separate matter and we’ll deal with that,” Commissioner Sean Sikora said. “Whether that goes or whether that doesn’t go shouldn’t have anything to do with this Fenwick problem.”
The commissioners were also quick to point out that if much of the water is flowing out of Morgantown, then Morgantown also needs to be part of the conversation.
Star City Mayor Herman Reid said he believes one of the issues is Morgantown not raising storm drops when it paves city streets, hampering the ability of existing infrastructure to collect runoff.
“Of course they don’t have the flooding there in Suncrest because that water flows downhill to us,” he said.
Commission President Tom Bloom initially said he would prefer Star City and Morgantown get together before the commission get involved. The group eventually agreed to pull together another work session with Morgantown, and likely MUB, represented.
“We have to have a three-way conversation. We can’t come in, and I don’t see us coming in, without their help. Not because of finances. I’m talking about the structure that’s causing the problem,” Bloom said. “That’s what we have to look at.”
The commissioners said they are interested in being part of the solution. Sikora said he also believes Morgantown would be open to the discussion because the underlying issue is ultimately one the city is familiar with.
“It’s not lobbing accusations. It’s just ‘Hey, we live downstream and you’re causing us problems.’ It’s the same conversation the city has with us when they say ‘You don’t have any zoning or subdivision regulations so people build on our border and cause us problems.’ So they should understand that conversation because it’s happening to them all the time,” Sikora said, adding, “It doesn’t have to be an adversarial conversation.”
