Photo by Alan Olson Moundsville City Manager Deanna Hess and Mayor Eugene Saunders discuss matters during a committee meeting.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include a comment made this morning by Wheeling City Manager Robert Herron, who said he told Moundsville City Manager Deanna Hess that Wheeling would be happy to partner with Moundsville on working to bring Uber to the region.

MOUNDSVILLE — There appears to be some type of misunderstanding between officials in Wheeling and Moundsville over whether the two cities should team up to help attract ridesharing services such as Uber to the area.

In November, Moundsville resident Donald Dare asked the city to consider allying with Wheeling, New Martinsville and other cities along the Ohio River to create a network of cities for Uber, as had been done in other places, to create a larger market to attract the company, and to assist in applying for grants from the Department of Transportation.

During a meeting of city council’s policy subcommittee this week, Moundsville City Manager Deanna Hess said she had spoken with Wheeling City Manager Robert Herron, who she claimed declined to partner with Moundsville in applying for the DOT grant.

“He was aware of the $15,000 grant available, but was not willing to partner with us, saying they’d prefer to do it themselves,” Hess said.

Herron, however, said he told Hess that Wheeling would be willing to work with Moundsville to attract Uber, and even suggested the city pass a resolution similar to what Wheeling did in welcoming Uber to the region as a way to get things started.

During this week’s meeting, when other council members asked if Moundsville would be willing to proceed with pursuing Uber on their own, Moundsville Mayor Eugene Saunders said he felt the city already was covered with transportation options.

“They get so much off every fare the driver makes,” Saunders said of Uber. “My brother was interested in Uber, and for a $50 trip, he has to (pay) them $15, so he only made $35.”

The committee decided to take no further action on the suggestion.

In other business, tensions rose during a discussion of the city manager’s role in Moundsville.

For several weeks, council has been considering a pay raise for the city manager position and the creation of an office assistant position to keep up with day-to-day operations and paperwork to free Hess to work on other things.

Councilman Allen Hendershot, who served as Moundsville’s city manager for several years prior to his election to council, questioned whether the current arrangement is making the most efficient use of Hess’ time.

“I understand that the office manager’s work might be getting done, but if that’s being done, then the city manager’s work isn’t getting done,” Hendershot said. “We’ve talked, on numerous occasions, to try to get someone to help with writing grants, and some of the things that weren’t getting done, and give them the time to do it.”

Hess acted instead to appoint City Clerk Sondra Hewitt to the position of office manager and to allocate the funds needed for this, Hess declined the pay raise council was discussing for her.

“If it’s going to cause all these problems, I’m going to appoint my city clerk to be my office supervisor, starting this next pay period,” Hess said.

Hess cited the city’s recent pursuit of a grant to assist in renovating the Four Seasons Pool, which council members handled instead of leaving the matter to Hess. The delay in getting council to come to any decision, she said, was so great that the city was disqualified from the grant.

Hendershot said he sees the lack of grant applications in recent years as evidence that the city manager’s job has become too mired in routine upkeep.

“I can’t believe that we’re satisfied with things the way they are. That’s six to one, because I’m not,” he said. “I can guarantee you the four years I was manager was 10 times as (productive) as the last four years where I haven’t been — $200,000 grants for the razing of the Fostoria site, sidewalks, upgrades, all those are grants that were paying when I was manager, and they have not been done in the last four years.”