WHEELING, W.Va. — The discussions of Bluefield State College coming to Wheeling to open a branch campus at the former Ohio Valley Medical Center property in downtown have heated up and in some cases have become personal.
Following a tense Wheeling City Council meeting Tuesday night that included West Virginia Northern Community College President Daniel Mosser blasting city leaders with allegations of a personal deal and not disclosing terms of a lease agreement, Wheeling Mayor Glenn Elliott told MetroNews Wednesday that Mosser’s actions were an attempt to ‘bully the council into making a decision.’
“It’s very disappointing to have someone who holds a Ph.D., a highly respected figure in the Wheeling community, come to a city council meeting and make false allegations simply because he does not like something that city council is considering,” Elliott said.
The opposition to Bluefield State College (BSC) potentially coming to Wheeling was made public by Mosser, Ginny Favede, President of Wheeling University and W. Franklin Evans, President of West Liberty University last week in a joint statement. The public statement reiterated the message sent in a letter to Elliott in February, that the institutions are able to provide the educational needs of the region. It’s a region that BSC’s main campus in Mercer County sits nearly 300 miles from.
Signed on January 5, BSC and the City of Wheeling entered into a non-binding memorandum of understanding (MOU) to assess the feasibility of a long-term lease deal on the campus for a new Engineering and Manufacturing Center for educational purposes.
Mosser told MetroNews Wednesday that there is much more on the table than the MOU. He said there is an estimated undisclosed $2 million in costs planned for a remodel of the OVMC space in question. The Intelligencer reported during the meeting that Mosser claimed that city leaders planned to charge no interest on the lease and build-out of the new center, and the MOU requires no monthly payments for the first year.
Elliott and Brent Benjamin, executive vice president and general counsel for BSC both denied any type of figures to MetroNews on Wednesday.
“At this point, all we’ve done is enter into a non-binding memorandum of agreement for both sides to investigate whether it is a good fit to have Bluefield State in the OVMC campus. We haven’t discussed any terms to a lease, any build-out cost or sharing,” Elliott said.
Benjamin stated, “The only thing that is there is a non-binding memorandum of understanding which simply allows the parties to explore it a little further.”
Benjamin, former state Supreme Court Justice, said BSC has worked well with city officials in looking into a portion of the hospital property. The 800,000 square foot campus was bought by the city in June of last year following the hospital’s abrupt closure in September 2019.
The general counsel said he could not answer the question of who contacted who first between BSC and Wheeling for the venture because he was not involved in early discussions.
Mosser told MetroNews Wednesday that he believes that Wheeling City Manager Bob Herron contacted BSC officials as early as November about renting space. In meeting minutes from the BSC Faculty Senate meeting on November 6, it’s stated that Ted Lewis, the Provost and Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs was contacted by Wheeling following an invitation to visit by business leaders.
“Dr. Lewis was recently invited by engineers and manufacturers of northern WV in hopes of developing more engineering and manufacturing programs in that area. Ohio Valley Medical Center is empty at the time and the city manager has contacted the college asking if they would be interested in utilizing that facility. Conversations have started and as it progresses, he will ask faculty to join in on the effort,” the minutes stated.
Elliott responded Wednesday by repeating what he told MetroNews last week, that there was no solicitation from the city.
“The city did not reach out to Bluefield State about this. We were contacted by Bluefield State officials once it was made known we had the OVMC properties available for lease. The city staff was contacted first by Bluefield State and then that was presented to members of the city council,” Elliott said.
Benjamin said the plan for BSC is to have three accredited programs in Wheeling: two-year degrees in civil engineering technology, electrical engineering technology and mechanical engineering technology with in-person courses in January 2022.
Mosser said his college, located blocks from the OVMC property, could have helped bring those programs to Wheeling but there was no call.
“If they are shopping for a two-year program in engineering, you’d think their first call would be here but it wasn’t. In fact, it wasn’t even their last call. In fact, they’ve never called me to date to discuss this,” he told MetroNews.
“All of the communication with the mayor since January 6 when it went public has been initiated by us presidents with the mayor.”
Mosser stated that there has been plenty of communications between city officials and BSC President Robin Capehart, including a ‘family’ connection. Capehart is the former president of West Liberty University from 2007 to 2015 and well known in the Wheeling area.
Mosser said during the council meeting that Capehart is Wheeling Vice Mayor Chad Thalman’s uncle. Thalman was stated in the Intelligencer’s report from the meeting that Capehart was previously married to his mom’s sister and they divorced several years ago.
“Everyone on city council is aware of that. The city manager is aware of that, and before we took a vote, the city solicitor said I had no conflict of interest,” Thalman stated during the meeting according to the Intelligencer.
Capehart was not available for comment on Wednesday.
Capehart did state in a news release on the MOU in January that the marketing department at BSC conducted surveys throughout West Virginia in 2019 to locate areas of interest for engineering technology programs. The results revealed a high demand in the northern panhandle of West Virginia where programs were not being offered, according to BSC.
Officials from BSC are not only looking at space for educational purposes but are also interested in facilities for student housing, food services and parking, according to Capehart in the release.
Benjamin, who attended the city council meeting on Tuesday night, told MetroNews on Wednesday that there has been a great deal of interest in Wheeling for these types of programs.
“Bluefield sees it as one of its obligations to provide educational opportunities. That is what we are trying to do. We are not trying to exclude anybody or supplant any current programs because that would not happen. Because they don’t offer these programs,” he said.
Mosser said there is no truth to the BSC study. He stated his college offers advanced engineering manufacturing in robotics and is fully capable and interested in starting such programs stated by BSC. Wheeling University offers a four-year degree program in engineering and science.
Mosser was only allowed to speak for three minutes during the public speaking session of the meeting but was yielded extra time by slots signed up for by Evans and Favede.
He told MetroNews that city leaders have gotten themselves into a deep hole with the OVMC property and it’s their own fault. He said the city is in ‘desperation mode’ to find a tenant.
“I think as this project goes on and you peel the onion and find layer after layer of problems. I think they are digging a deeper hole. I think they should probably stop digging and think about where they are. And then do the right thing for the city, do the right thing for the colleges and do the right thing for our students,” Mosser said.
Elliott told MetroNews the city took a ‘calculate risk’ with the more than $1 million purchase and said the role as the city council is not to determine who can enter into the market.
“We had to weigh the options of going forward with it against the option of doing nothing,” the mayor said. “Our fear was that those buildings would fall into disrepair and sit there empty for 10 to 20 years and become a problem for the future city council to deal with.”
No action was taken during the meeting Tuesday. The mayor stated that it’ll ultimately be up to the Higher Education Policy Commission in April to determine whether BSC can come to Wheeling.
He said, for now, thinking in narrow thinking terms must end in order for the city to grow.
“We are entering a new era here where I think we will see a lot of economic growth in the next 10 to 15 years. But it’s only going to happen if we don’t see every new investment, everything from the outside coming in as a threat. We have to think of it as growing the pie for everybody,” he said.
