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We visited Downtown Morgantown yesterday, and I agree with the above reply. The opioid epidemic seems to have hit Morgantown VERY hard. Very sad.
Several of my friends have been in Pittsburgh recently and said it was noticeably worse here too. The smaller area downtown may be highlighting the severity of the problem we are experiencing.
I live in downtown Orlando, but was back in Morgantown visiting last weekend and I saw more homeless people in downtown Morgantown than what I see in downtown Orlando.
I passed numerous homeless visibly tweeking and asking for money. While I'm not foreign to this stuff, the frequency of my encounters while in downtown Morgantown was alarming.
It is a shame.
That's an interesting observation. No offense to Florida, but they are known for having some of the highest concentrations of "weirdos" on the streets on the east coast. You are right though. We can't talk here at all about the issue either. Unbelievable that it has gotten worse here than a big city in FL.
I have been doing some digging since my last post. I found out that during the day there is only ONE police officer at a time assigned to the downtown streets at a time during the day. In the summer, the second shift ends at 10:30 pm.
Morgantown is small, but there is no way one cop can police downtown activity. They could be occupied on Pleasant St while a drug deal or fight or whatever is happening on Walnut St.
I posted the city manager's comments in a previous post. He stated that he wants to take a holistic approach and if the downtown is "nice" the criminal element will seek other areas. What a moron. No one would need a police force then if crime problems fixed themselves. ???
We are paying a $3 user fee primarily for paving city streets and more police protection. It's not being used downtown efficiently. I live outside the city so I can't vote. Anyone reading this from the city - I strongly suggest you contact the city manager or council. I am trying to shake some trees behind the scenes but I am only one person.
I have also found out some people that are being released from the regional jail are being dropped off downtown too. This is getting unsafe. I told my boss that if he values my employment he had better be prepared to post my bail if needed. I told him that if one of these transient dirt bags even attempts to touch me I am going to sit in the city manager's until something is done. I don't care if the police have to remove me. He laughed and agreed. He contacted the city manager himself recently. I don't mean to come across like a crazy person but I am not going to risk getting hurt when I have no choice but to work downtown. All of this is spinning out of control due to the idiots running the city.
I guess I should also add that since I last posted a second dead body was found along the rail trails last week (most likely an OD) and the condemned house fire on Forest Ave last week was started by transients/squatters.
Last edited by motownnative; 08-11-2019 at 10:48 AM..
That's an interesting observation. No offense to Florida, but they are known for having some of the highest concentrations of "weirdos" on the streets on the east coast. You are right though. We can't talk here at all about the issue either. Unbelievable that it has gotten worse here than a big city in FL.
I have been doing some digging since my last post. I found out that during the day there is only ONE police officer at a time assigned to the downtown streets at a time during the day. In the summer, the second shift ends at 10:30 pm.
Morgantown is small, but there is no way one cop can police downtown activity. They could be occupied on Pleasant St while a drug deal or fight or whatever is happening on Walnut St.
I posted the city manager's comments in a previous post. He stated that he wants to take a holistic approach and if the downtown is "nice" the criminal element will seek other areas. What a moron. No one would need a police force then if crime problems fixed themselves. ???
We are paying a $3 user fee primarily for paving city streets and more police protection. It's not being used downtown efficiently. I live outside the city so I can't vote. Anyone reading this from the city - I strongly suggest you contact the city manager or council. I am trying to shake some trees behind the scenes but I am only one person.
I have also found out some people that are being released from the regional jail are being dropped off downtown too. This is getting unsafe. I told my boss that if he values my employment he had better be prepared to post my bail if needed. I told him that if one of these transient dirt bags even attempts to touch me I am going to sit in the city manager's until something is done. I don't care if the police have to remove me. He laughed and agreed. He contacted the city manager himself recently. I don't mean to come across like a crazy person but I am not going to risk getting hurt when I have no choice but to work downtown. All of this is spinning out of control due to the idiots running the city.
I guess I should also add that since I last posted a second dead body was found along the rail trails last week (most likely an OD) and the condemned house fire on Forest Ave last week was started by transients/squatters.
Our city needs a major revamp of the charter. Instead of a city manager government, we need a strong mayor government with the mayor being directly accountable to the people for what happens. Also, the opioid epidemic is terrible everywhere and our city is no exception. Since it affects people of every economic strata, even traditionally wealthy cities now face the problem in a major way. We need the Federal Government to address this problem as the disease it truly is instead of making it just a criminal justice issue.
Our city also needs to radically change operating procedures. The growth and development outside city limits has been phenomenal and continues unabated. Downtown, it is mostly development brought about by The University. Anyone else who tries to develop there must run the gauntlet of boards, committees, regulations, rules, etc. … That needs to change for the city to compete with the outlying areas.
Morgantown is still a very safe city. In spite of the fact that most of the year there are 55,000 people living inside the city limits, there has not been a single murder within the city during the past 2 years. That is actually remarkable. That is not to say there aren't the once in awhile fisticuffs and so forth, or that the drug dealers don't cause some violence. That does happen, but it happens everywhere, lots of places much worse than here.
City council won't do anything. The current state of things is exactly the result they want. It amounts to a giant virtue signal for them so that they get to feel good about themselves.
Yes, you could send an email to the councilor of your ward. Even CC all of them and the mayor. They have the power to see that there is more of a police presence downtown. That would be a huge deterrent to these people coming here and hanging around for months.
Just sharing the stories that you know should get their attention. Combine that with the two deaths this month on the rail trails and the house that burned down on Forest Ave (the neighboring empty ones were filled with drug paraphernalia) you would think the issue would be on the front burner for them anyway to address.
I mentioned in a previous post that there were transients camping on River Rd and they started a fire. That encampment was removed and hasn't been allowed to start up again to my knowledge. That area I believe is outside of the city. Probably Westover or the County's jurisdiction. Regardless, this shows law enforcement can take care of a problem if there is the will to do it.
Our city needs a major revamp of the charter. Instead of a city manager government, we need a strong mayor government with the mayor being directly accountable to the people for what happens. Also, the opioid epidemic is terrible everywhere and our city is no exception. Since it affects people of every economic strata, even traditionally wealthy cities now face the problem in a major way. We need the Federal Government to address this problem as the disease it truly is instead of making it just a criminal justice issue.
Our city also needs to radically change operating procedures. The growth and development outside city limits has been phenomenal and continues unabated. Downtown, it is mostly development brought about by The University. Anyone else who tries to develop there must run the gauntlet of boards, committees, regulations, rules, etc. … That needs to change for the city to compete with the outlying areas.
Morgantown is still a very safe city. In spite of the fact that most of the year there are 55,000 people living inside the city limits, there has not been a single murder within the city during the past 2 years. That is actually remarkable. That is not to say there aren't the once in awhile fisticuffs and so forth, or that the drug dealers don't cause some violence. That does happen, but it happens everywhere, lots of places much worse than here.
The city is out of touch and clearly needs a change in the way they do things. Maybe they are starting to see that now with all of the drama over annexation and how it was handled. We either need a city manager who has spent some time here or go to a mayoral government as you suggested. If I recall there were many posters here that supported Glen Kelly to stay on as CM. I don't know much about him but I think he has spent enough time in our area to know our issues.
The city council members need to work on existing problems that have been pressing for years now. It's like they all have ADD. There seems to be a new distraction every month they get caught up in. BTW, Rachel Fetty is quoted here about the panhandling problem back when she won in 2017. I didn't even know they were harassing little kids. You would think she would be the one leading the charge on this issue. Other than this comment, I haven't heard her say a word more about it.
Another issue she sees is panhandling.
“There’s a segment of the population downtown that is intrusive and aggressively panhandling even young children, in a way that’s completely unacceptable,” she said. “I’d like to see us take steps to address that.”
I am not going to say too much about the drug problem. I don't think the federal gov't throwing money at the problem will help much unfortunately. Everything I read and hear tells me that a drug user's own family and friends can't get through to them most times. They are the best safety net a person can have. If family can't get them to accept help I am not sure what the gov't can do.
In fact, most here are saying the drug problem got worse when HealthRight started giving out free needles. I found out they are giving out Narcan kits too. Now people are coming here from all over. They just meet up with new addicts this way and the cycle continues.
The petition idea you had in another post is a good one. The council would definitely address that in a meeting. I would just keep the word "homeless" out of it if someone wants to start one. That seems to be a trigger word for some. We have more of a drug and vagrancy problem. If they hear from citizens who want to clean up downtown and make it safe it's their responsibility to listen. They are under pressure. I can't say which business but recently the CEO of a very large company downtown contacted the City Manager directly about the vagrancy. It's affecting their business. I wonder how many more are making contact. The post I shared from the employee working downtown stating she and her coworkers were being threatened and had OD's in their restroom mentioned her corporate office was involved too trying to get help.
I just noticed Hops on the Mon beer festival will be on High Street this year. I hope the city will make sure to clean the place up before hand.
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