Latest news with #WestRidge
Dominion Post
10-07-2025
- Automotive
- Dominion Post
Three-way agreement approved for $135 million Exit 155 project
MORGANTOWN — The old proverb teaches that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. On Wednesday, the West Virginia Division of Highways, Monongalia County Commission and developer WestRidge took the critical first step down what promises to be a long and difficult road toward a new I-79 Exit 155 interchange. In short, they sorted out the money. In a meeting attended remotely by Secretary of Transportation Todd Rumbaugh and Deputy Secretary Michael DeMers, the commission signed off on a three-way agreement that spelled out how the $135 million project budget will be covered. About half the cost – $67.2 million – will be provided by the state. Another 40%, or $54.3 million, will come through the US Department of Transportation MEGA Grant awarded in 2024, and the final 10%, totaling approximately $13.5 million, will be provided locally by WestRidge and the county. The local contribution includes design dollars already spent. As has been reported, the project will include new bridges carrying I-79 over Chaplin Hill Road, a new divergent diamond interchange, a westbound flyover at the intersection of Chaplin Hill and U.S. Route 19 to help clear heavy traffic leaving Morgantown, and a multi-modal path from the rail-trail in Star City to The Gateway. Improvements to Chaplin Hill Road up to the interstate will also be included. Exit 155 in Star City. 5-14-21 GH Ryan Lynch, representing WestRidge, noted the agreement harkens back to the three-way deal that got I-79 Exit 153 built and paid off in record time. Because of that experience, Lynch said both the county and the development team at WestRidge recognize when they have a willing partner in Charleston after years of false starts and half steps. 'With this administration and this DOH leadership, I feel very confident that we do, and that we're finally going to be able to really move this forward towards groundbreaking,' Lynch said. Lynch's comments summed up a reoccuring talking point – the renewed hope in Monongalia County brought on by new leadership and direction from the governor's office, the transportation secretary's office and DOH District 4 headquarters in Bridgeport. Specifically, the commission has lauded Gov. Patrick Morrisey's pledge to allocate funding and project support based on data, not politics. 'There's been a real change, and we've noticed it. We're now being told, and finally seen as an integral part of the state and economic development,' Commissioner Tom Bloom said, later adding, 'Where I'm excited, this is the first time that the first big project coming out of the state is in the north central area. I think that is probably a bigger surprise than anything else we've done. There's a new sheriff in town down there in transportation. I believe data-driven is key, and I believe we are now in the eyes and ears of Charleston and I can only see better things happening in the future. I appreciate that.' In a press release, Morrisey called the public-private partnership 'a model of what we can accomplish to invest in our infrastructure and grow economic development across the state.' Exit 155 and Chaplin Hill Road serve as the primary gateway to Morgantown, WVU, WVU Medicine and Mon Health Medical Center. It is the first I-79 exit south of the state line. Even so, parts of the interchange fail during peak travel times. The failure is particularly evident, and dangerous, during large sporting events and the increasingly large and frequent events hosted by Mylan Park. The state has pledged to install temporary traffic lights at the interchange's entrance and exit ramps until the reconfiguration project is complete. It was recently explained that those lights likely won't be in place until the end of the year. 'As you all have said, this is a gateway to West Virginia. It is the gateway to WVU, and it really needs to be a showcase. I think this project is going to take it to the next level and really help things out,' Rumbaugh said. While no timeline was offered during the presentation, the $54.3 million federal grant comes with a 2028 deadline, meaning those dollars will likely be spent first. Commissioner Sean Sikora said the 'big beautiful deal' is just the first step of many. 'This is the first step. We've got a lot of work to do, but we've got this memorialized, and we also have our marching orders to move forward. Our public is going to start seeing progress,' Sikora said. 'It's going to be two, three, four, five years, but we are working on it and we're phasing it so we can show progress and access those federal funds. I'm really excited to get this thing moving forward.'
Yahoo
08-07-2025
- Yahoo
Boy, 15, wounded in West Ridge shooting, police say
A 15-year-old boy was shot and wounded Monday afternoon in the West Ridge neighborhood on the city's Far North Side, according to Chicago police. An unknown gunman shot the boy while he was inside a residence on the 6400 block of North Washtenaw Avenue around 3:10 p.m., police said. The boy was transported to St. Francis Hospital in Evanston in fair condition, police said. Police provided no further details on the shooting. The offender was arrested on scene, police said. Belmont area detectives were investigating. tkenny@
Yahoo
11-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Partnerships part of the state's plan to address future road projects
Jun. 10—MORGANTOWN — The words "partners " and "partnerships " were repeated time and again Monday as Gov. Patrick Morrisey laid out foundational changes in how the state is going to address roads under his administration. The collaborative spirit is an apparent change in attitude rooted in necessity. Pointing to decades of under-investment in maintenance and significant bond debt taken on for construction projects through the Roads to Prosperity program, Morrisey said the West Virginia Department of Transportation will be doing more with less and operating with a renewed focus on maintenance. As for new construction projects coveted by public and private entities across the state, they may require some local skin in the game to get built—partners, if you will. Long story short, the state needs help. "We have to acknowledge that one of the things that we're talking about today are partnerships with counties. We're going to be working with the counties even more aggressively than you've seen in the past. That's critical because the state doesn't have the resources to address every single need that's out there, " Morrisey said, further explaining investment from the private sector can be brought to bear for high-priority projects through public-private partnerships. This should be music to the ears of many in Monongalia County. The process was pioneered here nearly a decade ago. On Sept. 1, 2016, former Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin was in town to formally open Interstate 79 exit 153. The $22-million interchange was the first major highways project in West Virginia, and possibly the country, that was born of an agreement between the county, state, Federal Highways Administration and a private developer — WestRidge. Within two years or so of its opening, sales tax-increment financing from the surrounding economic development (TIF) district fully repaid the state's investment. "You know, you would have thought the state would have celebrated that and set that up as a model going forward as to how we can work together collaboratively, because they put that interchange in for WestRidge, and they got their money back in two or three years, " Glenn Adrian said. "But it was like nobody really celebrated that or was really paying attention." But Adrian, co-founder of Enrout Properties, was definitely paying attention. Shortly after exit 153 was completed, public /private efforts for two additional projects began in earnest: the overhaul of the neighboring I-79 exit 155, again with WestRidge, and construction of a new Harmony Grove interchange providing interstate access to Enrout's Morgantown Industrial Park. Movement on both has been slow, despite local buy-in. On exit 155, Monongalia County Commissioner Sean Sikora pointed out that not only has $5 million in local support for the project's engineering and prep work been committed, but the county and its partners pulled down a $54.3-million federal grant for the work despite having a $66-million pledge from the state in hand. As for Harmony Grove, Adrian said former WVDOT leadership actually signed a public-private agreement with Enrout and Monongalia County in 2020. Through that agreement, any funding generated by the Harmony Grove TIF district beyond repayment to bond holders would go directly to the state to reimburse its portion of the new interchange. "The problem is, that had been forgotten, " Adrian said, explaining he spoke with Transportation Secretary Todd Rumbugh following Monday's announcement. "He was delighted to hear that we'd already set up a collaboration agreement to pledge tax increment to reimburse the state. He said, 'I don't think any of us knew that.'" Sikora said it's refreshing to hear a governor "speaking our language " in terms of implementing a data-driven approach to transportation spending. Further, he said Monongalia County has proven that a collaborative approach to major projects can work. "We're willing to think outside the box and come up with answers. We don't say, 'Hey, we have this problem, fix it.' We bring solutions to the table, " Sikora said, adding "The other counties shouldn't take this news with fear. We're looking to continue the growth here and in some of these areas so that we can help push for growth in other areas. A rising tide lifts all boats." Adrian had similar thoughts. "As Mon County typically is, we were ahead of the curve in recognizing the fact that we were willing to help the state get its money back for its portion of these projects, which goes hand in hand with what the governor was saying about working with the counties if they have a project they're interested in developing, " he said. "If we can get the projects we need and help reimburse the state leading to future investment here or elsewhere, that helps everyone."
Dominion Post
11-06-2025
- Business
- Dominion Post
Partnerships part of the state's plan to address future road projects
MORGANTOWN – The words 'partners' and 'partnerships' were repeated time and again Monday as Gov. Patrick Morrisey laid out foundational changes in how the state is going to address roads under his administration. The collaborative spirit is an apparent change in attitude rooted in necessity. Pointing to decades of under-investment in maintenance and significant bond debt taken on for construction projects through the Roads to Prosperity program, Morrisey said the West Virginia Department of Transportation will be doing more with less and operating with a renewed focus on maintenance. As for new construction projects coveted by public and private entities across the state, they may require some local skin in the game to get built — partners, if you will. Long story short, the state needs help. 'We have to acknowledge that one of the things that we're talking about today are partnerships with counties. We're going to be working with the counties even more aggressively than you've seen in the past. That's critical because the state doesn't have the resources to address every single need that's out there,' Morrisey said, further explaining investment from the private sector can be brought to bear for high-priority projects through public-private partnerships. This should be music to the ears of many in Monongalia County. The process was pioneered here nearly a decade ago. On Sept. 1, 2016, former Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin was in town to formally open Interstate 79 exit 153. The $22-million interchange was the first major highways project in West Virginia, and possibly the country, that was born of an agreement between the county, state, Federal Highways Administration and a private developer – WestRidge. Within two years or so of its opening, sales tax-increment financing from the surrounding economic development (TIF) district fully repaid the state's investment. 'You know, you would have thought the state would have celebrated that and set that up as a model going forward as to how we can work together collaboratively, because they put that interchange in for WestRidge, and they got their money back in two or three years,' Glenn Adrian said. 'But it was like nobody really celebrated that or was really paying attention.' But Adrian, co-founder of Enrout Properties, was definitely paying attention. Shortly after exit 153 was completed, public/private efforts for two additional projects began in earnest: the overhaul of the neighboring I-79 exit 155, again with WestRidge, and construction of a new Harmony Grove interchange providing interstate access to Enrout's Morgantown Industrial Park. Movement on both has been slow, despite local buy-in. On exit 155, Monongalia County Commissioner Sean Sikora pointed out that not only has $5 million in local support for the project's engineering and prep work been committed, but the county and its partners pulled down a $54.3-million federal grant for the work despite having a $66-million pledge from the state in hand. As for Harmony Grove, Adrian said former WVDOT leadership actually signed a public-private agreement with Enrout and Monongalia County in 2020. Through that agreement, any funding generated by the Harmony Grove TIF district beyond repayment to bond holders would go directly to the state to reimburse its portion of the new interchange. 'The problem is, that had been forgotten,' Adrian said, explaining he spoke with Transportation Secretary Todd Rumbugh following Monday's announcement. 'He was delighted to hear that we'd already set up a collaboration agreement to pledge tax increment to reimburse the state. He said, 'I don't think any of us knew that.'' Sikora said it's refreshing to hear a governor 'speaking our language' in terms of implementing a data-driven approach to transportation spending. Further, he said Monongalia County has proven that a collaborative approach to major projects can work. 'We're willing to think outside the box and come up with answers. We don't say, 'Hey, we have this problem, fix it.' We bring solutions to the table,' Sikora said, adding 'The other counties shouldn't take this news with fear. We're looking to continue the growth here and in some of these areas so that we can help push for growth in other areas. A rising tide lifts all boats.' Adrian had similar thoughts. 'As Mon County typically is, we were ahead of the curve in recognizing the fact that we were willing to help the state get its money back for its portion of these projects, which goes hand in hand with what the governor was saying about working with the counties if they have a project they're interested in developing,' he said. 'If we can get the projects we need and help reimburse the state leading to future investment here or elsewhere, that helps everyone.'
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
‘I think it's here': Uprooted Afghan family settles in Chicago after being rescued ahead of refugee program suspension
The route to Kilmer Elementary School is about a mile and a half each way for Hamid Azizi, who heads out every afternoon to walk his daughters home. What would seem like a mundane activity for most is a joyous occasion for the father of seven, who arrived in Chicago a little more than a month ago. The 30-minute walk has been Azizi's easiest journey in many years. At the start of the summer of 2021, his family fled its village in Afghanistan, moving quickly and often to evade the Taliban, which swiftly took control after United States armed forces began withdrawing from the region following a 20-year war. 'We were very, very worried about our situation,' Azizi, who speaks Dari, told the Tribune through a translator on a recent Tuesday afternoon at his apartment in the North Side neighborhood of West Ridge. 'Once the Americans left, we could not live in our own city where we grew up or in the other cities that I went to (with U.S. troops) because if anybody knew me and saw me, just to get some credit, they would tell the Taliban, 'This man worked with Americans.' I had to keep moving.' Azizi, 41, is one of thousands of Afghans who were waiting to resettle in the U.S. after being promised safety and relocation for serving alongside American troops as a member of the National Mine Removal Group, or NMRG. He assisted U.S. special forces in various zones in Afghanistan from 2017 until 2021, and received a Special Immigrant Visa, or SIV, intended to facilitate the resettlement of individuals who have risked their lives by collaborating with the U.S. government. Despite the stamp cemented in his passport for years, Azizi and his family had to find help on their own, and be rescued by organizations such as No One Left Behind after President Donald Trump's inauguration added a sense of urgency. Days after taking office, Trump signed an executive order that suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, pausing foreign aid and ending operations of U.N. organizations such as the International Organization for Migration that were vital for processing refugees. The administration also suspended government programs that buy flights for refugees who have SIVs. 'We found ourselves in this interesting situation where you had Special Immigrant Visa holders who were still being processed, but there were no flights for them to travel on because they basically had to buy their own flights,' said Andrew Sullivan, executive director of No One Left Behind, a nonprofit focused on evacuating Afghan and Iraqi SIV applicants to safety. 'For many of these folks, they left their lives behind in Afghanistan. Many of them have been sitting on a State Department processing platform in either Albania or Qatar. It's not like they can work there. They really just don't have the finances to buy flights.' Sullivan said the executive order thwarted thousands of families' prospects for resettlement, a process that often takes years. And many of those families, like Azizi's, have been on the run. Within a month of U.S. troops leaving, Azizi had to flee from Parwan, his home province where the U.S. military had a significant presence. His wife and six daughters —his son, the youngest of seven children, wasn't yet born — kept a few essential items and hid in homes of various relatives in nearby provinces and villages, staying mere weeks or days at a time. '(The relative whose home we were staying in) would say 'don't leave, because (the Taliban) are all over the village. Don't go out, because they're going to get you. You're safe in the house until they find you,'' Azizi recalled. 'But after that, (the relative) said we couldn't stay anymore because it was dangerous for them, and then in two, three days, we went to another relative's house, which was by the river.' With the Taliban rapidly taking over rural areas, Azizi said his family went to the bordering city of Kabul, the country's capital, 'because it had not fallen yet.' Azizi's wife, Fahima, knew a family in Kabul who took them in for a couple months. But on Aug. 15, 2021, the Taliban seized control of Kabul, signaling a full recapture of Afghanistan. Civilians soon swarmed Kabul's main international airport hoping to evacuate. Azizi said his family attempted to get on a plane out of Kabul. 'We were one of the people that went to the airport. They were flying everywhere and there were barriers and everything. But my younger daughter, Zhra, stayed behind. I couldn't take it that my daughter won't have a family, won't have a father, a mother. I can't just go and leave her behind,' Azizi said. 'We all went back from the airport. We got her, and from there we stayed but at that time we knew the Taliban said, 'We have forgiven everybody, blanket forgiveness — but not for people who worked for the Americans.'' Will Reno, a professor at Northwestern University, said the images out of Kabul's airport were a stark representation of America's frantic departure from a country it occupied for 20 years. 'That first day or two was chaos when there were people on the airfield grabbing onto the landing gear of the aircraft — that got that very bad, politically, pictures like that,' said Reno, who was a contractor for the Department of Defense while the U.S. was involved in Afghanistan. Reno said in the days following the U.S. withdrawal and the Taliban takeover, there was a rush to get high-priority groups such as military intelligence and Afghan special forces that trained American soldiers onto evacuation aircrafts. He explained that President Joe Biden's administration was late in getting a system in place that would effectively vet and process all SIV holders and their families, leaving many, like Azizi, to flee, as the situation with the Taliban became increasingly dangerous for them. Despite the desperate circumstances, Azizi shared fond memories of working with U.S. troops. 'Those times were our best memories; they were like our brothers,' Azizi said. 'We will eat together, either on the floor, or if we find a table, we'll all sit together. If, God forbid, one of us got injured or something like that, we all would get together, be around him like a family. So the relationship was very nice, very beautiful and brotherly.' As a member of the National Mine Removal Group, Azizi's team was the first line of defense for American soldiers, clearing hazardous devices off a battlefield and seeking out snipers trying to target U.S. troops. Azizi said there were several teams of NMRG personnel stationed across the war zone. One of his friends was a guard with the NMRG and immigrated to the U.S. on an SIV years before the war ended, when the U.S. still had an embassy in Afghanistan. In Kabul, Azizi's family continued moving around, hiding in homes of friends and acquaintances. This went on for several months, Azizi said. The family finally found a reason for optimism after connecting with the 1208 Foundation, a nonprofit providing immigration assistance to the surviving members of the NMRG. The organization helped the Azizi family cross into the last leg of its tireless run and eventually paved the way for No One Left Behind to link up with Azizi's family. Eventually, Azizi's family left Kabul for Islamabad, Pakistan, where they lived for 11 months. Through a website launched by No One Left Behind, Azizi was able to fill out an online form to share his visa status and resettlement plans. They didn't have much in terms of money or food, 'but plenty of hope,' Azizi said. Life on the run was especially hard on Fahima, who gave birth to her son, Mohamad, at home without medical care, all while caring for her six other children. In January, No One Left Behind helped Azizi and his family fly to Doha, Qatar, where the organization had sent many Afghans and Iraqis who have already immigrated to the U.S., many through the SIV program, to help facilitate the process. The endgame was America, but Azizi said he knew the 'situation with Trump' was not ideal for refugees seeking asylum. Anticipating even more upcoming limitations for Afghans, and the looming threat of the Trump administration introducing a travel ban that could restrict their entry, No One Left Behind urgently started tapping into existing infrastructure and raised money to buy flights for families and individuals in places such as Albania and Qatar. Between Feb. 1 and March 17, the group said it successfully booked flights for 659 Afghans. And since they began this 'all-out sprint,' Sullivan said, No One Left Behind has spent $1.5 million on 1,300 flights for stranded Afghans with a U.S. visa. 'Life is not easy for people who just come from one place to another place, especially for kids,' Azizi said, looking around his new home. 'We were very, very happy when they told us, especially when we're leaving the (hotel) room and there was a bus to take us to the airport. It was a different feeling … we are really going right now.' After 50 days in Doha, Azizi's family got on a flight to Chicago. No One Left Behind covered the cost of their one-way flights from Doha International Airport to O'Hare International Airport. 'When they told us we are going to take you all, buy tickets for all of you, and you don't have to pay it back — wow, (we asked) how is that going to be possible?' Azizi said. 'We couldn't believe it.' In West Ridge, a volunteer from No One Left Behind comes by weekly to help the family with chores or tasks that require an English speaker. She carries around an English/Dari phrasebook and flips through it regularly, but uses the Google Translate app for faster communication. She helped set up Azizi's three-bedroom apartment off Devon Avenue, furnished with just enough: two comfortable couches, a dining table with six chairs, a bookshelf fashioned into a shoe rack stacked with tiny sandals and sneakers. There isn't a TV, so Azizi's cellphone is typically where his youngest children, Mohamad and Hfsah, watch cartoons on YouTube. Azizi laughed that his phone is not his anymore. Although No One Left Behind offers resettlement assistance to several of the refugees it helps, Sullivan said the group prefers sending its families and individuals to cities in America where they know someone — even just a friend. If there isn't any contact person, the group will send Afghans to areas with a higher volume of Afghan refugees, such as Sacramento, San Francisco or the greater Washington, D.C., area, so there's a sense of community and shared language. In Azizi's case, he got in touch with his friend from the NMRG who resettled in Chicago while the U.S. was still in Afghanistan. The friend invited the family to stay at his home for a couple weeks, then borrowed $3,000 to give to Azizi to secure a month's rent for their apartment. The No One Left Behind volunteer set up a GoFundMe for Azizi's family to help raise money that could go toward rent and basic necessities. The situation for Afghans has become more fragile in some of the places where many have temporarily sheltered, like Azizi's family did in Pakistan. Having hosted millions of refugees, Pakistan has recently increased deportations. And an agreement that made Albania a way station for Afghans expired in March, Sullivan said. Sullivan said for individuals like Azizi who have SIV status, going back to Afghanistan was not an option. 'If they got deported, they would, by definition, go back to a Taliban-controlled immigration checkpoint and fly back into Kabul, where they would be greeted by Taliban immigration authorities who would see their passport and see a U.S. visa in it,' he said. 'We very much worry that it would very much open them up to questioning at the very least, and at the worst, detention, torture and possibly murder from the Taliban.' During the final months of U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, an American documentary film crew followed the intimate relationship between American Green Berets and the Afghan officers they trained. Since its release in 2022, the film 'Retrograde' faced criticism for failing to protect the identities of its subjects, leading to the killing of one of the Afghan men by the Taliban. Earlier this month, the Hollywood Reporter wrote that the man's family is suing the producers and distributors of the documentary, including Disney and National Geographic, faulting them for the man's death. Azizi said he was also featured in the film and knew of the man who was killed by the Taliban. Had he not found his way out, Azizi said, he might have faced a similar fate, or would have had to endure the harsh restrictions of Taliban rule. Fahima would not be allowed to work or move freely, and their six daughters wouldn't be allowed post-secondary education. When he drops his daughters off at school and picks them up — both times on foot — he said he often thinks about all the what-if's. His 14-year-old daughter Surya has dreams of becoming a doctor. His youngest daughter, Hfsah, 4, wants to be a hairstylist. Roya, 13, would love to be a teacher. When the girls enrolled at Kilmer, the culture shock and language barrier made going to school dreadful. But now, Azizi said, he watches them run up to their teachers in the morning and looks on as they're immediately enveloped in a hug. 'I'm super proud and full of happiness,' he said. While fleeing from place to place, Azizi said, the family often took pictures to capture the memories of being in each location. Even though circumstances were far from ideal, he said they were together, safe, healthy. It was worth capturing. They have pictures in Pakistan, in Doha, and now in Chicago, as they traverse the new neighborhood curiously. A few weeks ago, Azizi said, as he was taking a selfie with his children, his daughter Sarah, 7, turned to him and asked, 'Baba, where are we going next?' Azizi wiped his tears as he recounted that moment. 'Because we were leaving every city, going to different places, my little girl was thinking maybe America is not home as well,' Azizi said. 'I said, Sarah jaan, we are not going anywhere. I think it's here.'
