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Morgantown Council gets a 2023 election update, buys some salt

MORGANTOWN — Morgantown City Council needed just 45 minutes in open session Tuesday to work through a light agenda.

City Clerk Christine Wade said her office has begun ramping up for the city’s next election, now about 250 days away, on April 25,2023.

Wade explained the city is looking at ways to increase marketing ahead of the election in order to remind potential candidates and voters that this will be the first election in which only a portion of the seven council seats will be up for consideration.

In 2021, the city’s voters passed a referendum doubling term lengths from two to four years and staggering elections so that no more than four councilors are up for election at once.

Council seats in the 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th Wards will be up for grabs in April.

In other news, council approved on first reading an “Off-airport concession and lease agreement” with EAN Holdings LLC, which represents Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Alamo Rent-A-Car and National Car Rental.

As the term “off-airport” would indicate, there will be no car rental kiosk at the Morgantown Municipal Airport.

Instead, vehicles booked through the airport will be delivered and parked in one of six parking spaces purchased by EAN as part of the agreement.

The city will receive 10% of all rental revenues generated via this service, according to Haws.

Lastly, council approved a bid from Laurel Aggregates to purchase 1,000 tons of bulk rock salt treated with magnesium chloride.

The winning bid of $136,500 was one of four received, but the only one to offer the treated salt, which remains effective at lower temperatures than untreated rock salt.

Haws said the city still has about 1,000 tons on hand and noted that as part of this bid, Laurel Aggregates agreed to hold an additional 1,000 tons in reserve for the city if needed.

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