MORGANTOWN — The Monongalia County Commission on Wednesday voted to approve changes to the county’s voting precinct boundary lines made necessary by the West Virginia Legislature and deciphered by the Monongalia County Clerk’s office.
County Clerk Carye Blaney said there were “no challenges, no complaints and no suggestions for revisions” to the proposed changes, which have been posted for public comment since mid-December.
The changes will increase the number of county voting precincts from 41 to 43, but reduce the number of voting locations from 29 to 26.
Anyone with questions about their voting precinct or which West Virginia House of Delegates, Senate, magisterial or executive committee district they reside in can follow the “Monongalia Redistricting Map for 2021” link at the top of the clerk’s website monongaliacountyclerk.com and input their residential address.
Blaney said passage of the precinct changes isn’t the end of the process in the clerk’s office.
“As I’ve mentioned to you before, the work that we have to do behind the scenes now to get every voter’s record correctly inputted into the statewide voter system is a significant challenge because the Secretary of State’s office has implemented a brand-new statewide voter system, so all of the changes that have to be made have to be done manually,” she said.
“We have 60,000 active and inactive voters that we have to manually go in and change the records on. But we will work through the process, and we’ll make sure every one of our voters gets a notification and understands just exactly where they’re supposed to be voting in May.”
In other county news, the commission updated its employee vaccine policy to explain “fully vaccinated” means whatever the CDC says it means at any given time.
Any employee who isn’t what the CDC would consider “fully vaccinated” — currently vaccinated, plus one booster — must use sick or annual leave, or otherwise go unpaid, if they must be off due to the virus and cannot work from home.
Those who miss time despite being “fully vaccinated” per the CDC will be afforded administrative leave.
Lastly, the commission extended its contract with WVU for processing and transport of individuals arrested by WVU Police to North Central Regional Jail.
The contract stipulates WVU will provide the county $35 per trip through the end of 2022.
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