Gov. Jim Justice, joined by officials with Mountaintop Beverage, announced last week a project to build a new interchange connection for I-79 and the Morgantown Industrial Park, and a new bridge to cross the Monongahela River and connect the park to U.S. 119 and I-68. (Photo Courtesy of W.Va. Governor’s Office)

CHARLESTON — Last week, Gov. Jim Justice announced plans for a new interchange and bridge to connect U.S. 119-Interstate 68 and Interstate 79 to the Morgantown Industrial Park.

But Justice failed to announce his own ties to the park.

Justice traveled to the industrial park last Thursday to announce a new Department of Transportation project that is slated to begin next spring and cost taxpayers approximately $70 million.

The project would involve a new interchange connecting the Morgantown Industrial Park to I-79, which the park overlooks. The project would also involve building a bridge over the Monongahela River in three possible locations, connecting the park to U.S. 119, which links it to I-68.

“We’re committed to building this important bridge over the Mon River to provide the necessary level of access for this incredible industrial park,” Justice said in a statement last week. “We’ve got to have additional entry for these hundreds of trucks, because we can’t have them going through the middle of Westover every single day.”

The Morgantown Industrial Park already includes interstate access, though the proposed project would give the park more direct interstate access. The park also includes access to rail and river, allowing for barge transportation to Pittsburgh and to the Ohio River.

Speaking during a meeting Tuesday of the Joint Legislative Oversight Commission on Department of Transportation Accountability, state Sen. Mike Oliverio, R-Monongalia, thanked Cabinet Secretary Jimmy Wriston for making the project a priority.

“I want to thank you for your leadership on a challenging issue of an interstate exit we have all wanted in Morgantown and have run into some roadblocks,” Oliverio said. “I know there has been a lot of time, effort and resources in your department and I want to thank you for that. It appears that is moving in the right direction. We think we can produce great dividends following the construction of that bridge by growing that industrial park.”

The site is home to Mountaintop Beverage, the manufacturers of shelf-stable dairy products that is preparing an expansion project at the site. Mountaintop Beverage received a $25 million construction loan last year through the state Economic Development Authority and more than $25 million in funding through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Business and Loan Guarantee program.

According to the Morgantown Industrial Park’s website, the site also is home to 16 other companies and other entities. The new interchange and bridge could raise the value of the property and entice new economic development on the property consisting of hundreds of acres.

“We are working to get the interchange to Harmony Grove completed as soon as possible, but while the feds take their time, we are making things happen right now,” Justice said. “Come spring of 2024, we’ll be going full speed with this new bridge.”

Unmentioned by Justice when he announced the project was he has connections to the property going back decades. According to both his 2023 financial disclosure report with the West Virginia Ethics Commission and his U.S. Senate financial disclosure report filed last month, Justice has business and property interests in the Morgantown Industrial Park.

According to his Ethics Commission filing, Morgantown Industrial Park Associates, a limited partnership, is listed as a publicly traded security of which Justice has an interest. According to his Senate financial disclosure, Justice has corporate securities-non-public stock in Morgantown Industrial Park Associates LP. According to the report, the asset is worth between $50,001 and $100,000, and he earns incomes from dividends between $2,501 and $5,000 from the stock.

It was not immediately clear when the limited partnership was formed, but according to a 1990 letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from the Baker and Armistead law firm in Morgantown, Justice was listed at that time as a partner along with his sister, Stephanie Lynn Justice (Malo), and several coal industry leaders and companies.

A source in the governor’s office who spoke on background said Jim Justice Sr., the governor’s late father, was one of the first investors in what would become the Morgantown Industrial Park, along with other prominent state business leaders, including the late Republican Gov. Cecil Underwood.

But as the years went on, Justice’s father’s stake in the limited partnership shrank to just 5%.

According to tax records with the Monongalia County Sheriff’s Department, Enrout Properties in Morgantown is listed as the current owner and developer of the Morgantown Industrial Park. Enrout is co-owned by Glenn Adrian, a supporter of Justice’s who donated $2,800 toward his 2020 general election campaign for a second term as governor, along with another $2,800 from Kevin Adrian, who is listed as a contact on the Morgantown Industrial Park’s website.

Speaking by phone Tuesday afternoon, Glenn Adrian said that Enrout has been the sole owners of the Morgantown Industrial Park since at least 2006, taking it over from the limited partnership.

“We own the industrial park outright. Those were the former owners,” Adrian said. “We bought it in late 2006 and we own the park … just my brother and I and sons own the park now.”

Property tax records show that Enrout Properties paid $41,733 in taxes for the Morgantown Industrial Park between 2006 and 2011. The Morgantown Industrial Park has been within a tax increment financing (TIF) district since 2008 according to the Dominion Post, which allows generated property taxes within a set district to be used to fund infrastructure improvements in the district.

According to an annual report submitted to the Monongalia County Commission in 2022, the total base assessed value of personal property and real property of the Morgantown Industrial Park TIF district is more than $39.4 million, while the total current assessed value was more than $74.5 million. According to the report, the total current assessed value is expected to increase to $200 million by 2024 for both the Morgantown Industrial Park TIF and the adjoining Harmony Grove TIF.

In 2021, Enrout signed a collaboration agreement with the Division of Highways to conduct impact studies of a potential new interchange onto I-79.

“The proposed interchange is already having a significant impact to the county,” Adrian wrote to Monongalia County Commission President Tom Bloom in an August 2022 letter. “… Enrout has received several inquiries from other industrial type companies seeking information on sites within the park.”

“Other major manufacturing companies ranging from alternative energy battery storage industry to hydrogen generation facilities are currently exploring the potential of locating with (Morgantown Industrial Park,” Adrian wrote in another September 2022 letter to Bloom. “The (cautious) optimism expressed in previous letters has now been replaced with real opportunities if jobs and tax growth within Monongalia County.”