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Editorial

The DP endorses candidates for office

Elections are the most direct impact many of us will have on our government, and it’s important everyone knows who they are voting for and what those candidates represent. Therefore, we would like to thank all the candidates for office who took the time to join us over the last few weeks to help us and our readers get a better understanding of who they are and what their mission will be should they get elected. We sent invitations to 26 candidates to join us for virtual interviews, and we were fortunate to be able to speak to 19 of them. In general, we paired candidates with ...

The infamous ‘hot coffee’ lawsuit

She became the poster child for “stupidity needs a warning label” and “you can sue for anything nowadays.” You might have heard the story: A woman orders a cup of McDonald’s coffee and sets it between her legs while driving. The coffee spills (of course, because that’s what happens when you put a takeout coffee cup between your legs while driving) and she receives some burns on her legs. She sues McDonald’s for $3 million and becomes rich because of her own stupidity. That story is wrong. We’re revisiting it today because Morgantown is experiencing its own “hot ...

MUB needs oversight

Now that Morgantown City Council has decided to table its ordinance creating more oversight for the Morgantown Utility Board, we’d like to offer some suggestions before council takes it up again. We do agree with city council that MUB needs greater oversight. As it has expanded beyond Morgantown’s borders, MUB seems to have gotten the idea that it need not be beholden to anyone. It has cooperated with municipal and county governments, there is no question about that — but it seems to have forgotten it is a subsidiary of Morgantown’s government and has instead acted as an ...

Journalism bill back on the table

Chances are the last thing you heard about the status of the Journalism Compensation and Preservation Act was that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) inserted an amendment into the bill that essentially blew it up, so lead sponsor Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) pulled the JCPA from the Senate Judiciary Committee’s consideration. To recap, the JCPA would create a temporary exclusion of news publishers under a certain size from anti-trust laws so that the publishers can band together to negotiate with internet platforms (primarily Google and Facebook). As it currently stands, platforms use ...

Rumors abound about found body

“Empty space eventually fills up with something. A void, cultivated in the aftermath of misfortune, begins to attract the wrong kind of attention.” — Rahma Krambo In the weeks since human remains were found at Coopers Rock, rumors regarding the person’s identity and what could have caused his/her death have abounded. It seems that every day, the stories grow more numerous and more specific — and the speakers more certain of their validity. The community has turned to us, as their local newspaper, for answers. We are honored and humbled by that trust. It is in the ...

What does peace of mind cost?

What does peace of mind cost? Somewhere between $15 and $70 a year for Monongalia County taxpayers, depending on the assessed value of your property. Among the traditional levies on the November ballot, this year will include a levy to fund Mon EMS, the county’s only remaining emergency medical service. As we’ve addressed in previous editorials, the nation is facing an EMS crisis, and West Virginia has been hit hard. Preston County lost two EMS agencies and Star City had to retire its volunteer ambulance service this year. And like many other things in life, it has all come ...