MORGANTOWN – Morgantown Human Rights Commissioner Caleb McClung has been appointed by City Manager Jamie Miller to serve as the city’s LGBTQ+ liaison.
Morgantown City Council created both city and Morgantown Police Department LGBTQ+ liaison positions in May 2020.
According to the enabling legislation, McClung’s primary role will be to serve as “an accessible and friendly ear to the city’s LGBTQ+ community and elevate LGBTQ+ related concerns to the city manager and other city officials.”
The volunteer, unpaid position is also tasked with developing, planning, organizing, directing and implementing public information, employee support, and community education and organization effort with the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer communities.
“I would hope that I wouldn’t need to explain or convince anybody of the importance of my position. I’ve lived here in Morgantown for almost 10 years now. There is a reason for that. There are a few cities in West Virginia with such an active and hopeful queer community. Morgantown is one of them, I’m proud to say,” McClung recently told Morgantown City Council. “And while I have gratefully seen progress and growth in other cities across our state, we must face the times we live in. The LGBTQIA+ community is being targeted now more than ever under this administration, including by our own state attorney general. Especially our transgender community needs our protection now more than ever. I have experienced this hate firsthand around this campus, both during and after college; both in and out of drag. Our youth is in crisis.”
McClung, who has a Master of Fine Arts from WVU, was appointed to the Morgantown Human Rights Commission in early 2026.
“Caleb is our newest HRC commissioner and is well-suited to the position. This is an especially important time to have the liaisons, given the political environment in West Virginia,” HRC Chair Annie Cronan Yorick said. “Also, it’s great to celebrate the new appointment during Pride Month.”
McClung can be contacted at lgbtq@morgantownwv.gov.
“Now more than ever, people need to know that there are resources available and somebody to turn to,” he said, adding, “This position did find me more than I found it, I should say. But I’ve always felt like I’m one to step up when need be. And if not me, then who? Especially now. And so I hope to do that for this community in the time coming.”
