Fairmont

Fairmont is a city in and county seat of Marion County, West Virginia, United States. The population was 18,313 at the 2020 census. It is the principal city of the Fairmont Micropolitan Statistical Area. The city was founded in 1819 as Middletown. In 1863, during the American Civil War, Confederate General William E. Jones and his men raided Fairmont and cut the Union's supply lines to take food and horses. By 1901, Fairmont was an important commercial center. In 1978, the remains of Fairmont's 19th-century coal mines appeared because the land appeared to be subsidence because of subsidence subsidence. The Monongahela River flows through the northern part of the city, and a tributary of the West Fork of the Buffalo Creek flows to the south. Fairmont is home to the U.S. Air Force's Fairmont Air Force Base. The Air Force Academy is located in Fairmont. The Fairmont Airport is located on the west side of the MonongaHela River. The airport is one of the busiest airliners in the United States, serving major airports such as Washington, D.C., Baltimore, and Chicago. It also serves as a hub for the West Virginia Air Force Reserve and the Air National Guard. The U.N. World Heritage Site is located near Fairmont, along with the World War II Memorial and the Virginia State Museum. The National Park Service has a branch office in the city.

History

Fairmont is the primary city name, but also Jordan, Monongah, Pleasant Valley, Pleasant Vly, White Hall are acceptable city names or spellings, Bellview on the other hand no longer accepted or obsolete and are no longer used as a designation. The official name is Fairmont, West Virginia. In 1789, Boaz Fleming, a Revolutionary War veteran, migrated to western Virginia and purchased a 254-acre farm from Jonathan Bozarth. In 1808, Fleming made his annual trek to Clarksburg to pay his brother's Harrison County taxes. Fleming complained to his cousin Dolley Madison about having to travel over a hundred miles each year from his home. Mrs. Madison supposedly suggested that he create his own county to save him all that travel. Fleming then focused on creating a new town near his farm, which was located on the west side of the Monongahela River. The town was incorporated as Middletown on January 19, 1820. In 1863, during the American Civil War, Confederate General William E. Jones and his men raided Fairmont and cut the Union's supply lines to take food and horses. Between 1891 and 1901, Fairmont's population had increased from 1,000 to 7,000. The City of Fairmont was chartered in 1899; as a result of the charter, the city absorbed the surrounding towns of Palatine (also known as East Side) and West Fairmont. By 2001, FairMont was an important commercial center. Many railroads including the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad on its way from Cumberland, Maryland to Wheelingtraveled through the city. By 1978, an issue with Fairmont’s land experiencing subsidence appeared because the remains of 19th-century coal mines were crumbling. The federal government spent money to fix the subsidence to prevent damage to the town.

Geography

The Tygart Valley River and the West Fork River join in Fairmont to form the Monongahela River. Fairmont has a humid continental climate (Köppen Dfa) with very warm summers and freezing winters. The wettest calendar year has been 1956 with 58.12 inches (1,476.2 mm) and the driest as with all of West Virginia 1930 with 26.25 inches (666.8 mm). The hottest temperature has been 108 °F (42.2 °C) on August 8, 1918, and the coldest 21 °C on January 21, 1994. The city has a total area of 9.00 square miles (23.31 km²), of which 8.62 square mile (22.33 km²) is land and 0.38 square miles [0.98 km²] is water. The most snowfall in a month is 46.5 inches (1.18 m) is November 1950. The least snow in a season has been 12.0 inches (0.30 m) between July 1918 and June 1919. It is not uncommon during winter for warm air from the Gulf of Mexico to raise temperatures above 50 °F or 10 °C, which occurs on average six times each January and over eight in December and February. Despite the abundant precipitation throughout the year, the relative dryness of cold air means that most precipitation is rain even during the winter. It can be expected during 3.2 mornings each winter, but which occurred on twelve mornings during the extremely cold January 1977.

Demographics

At the 2010 census, there were 18,704 people, 8,133 households and 4,424 families living in the city. There were 9,200 housing units at an average density of 1,067.3 per square mile (412.1/km²). The racial makeup of the city was 88.9% White, 7.5% African American, 0.2% Native American and 0.6% Asian. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 1.4% of the population. The median household income was $25,628 and the median family incomes was $37,126 at the 2000 census. About 22.0% of those under age 18 and 9.7% of people age 65 or over were living below the poverty line at the time of the 2000 Census. The average household size was 2.16 and the average family size was2.83. The city's median age was 36.8 years, with 18% of residents under the age of 18; 16.2%; 25% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 24.4%; and 16.5%. The city had a population of 19,097 people at the2000 census, with 8,447 households and 5,671 families. It had a median income of $27,944 and females $20,401; the per capita income was$16,062. It has a population density of 2,169.8 inhabitants per squaremile (837.8/km 2).

Arts and culture

Fairmont is home to Country Club Bakery, where the pepperoni roll snack originates. Fairmont has considered itself to be the "pepperoni roll capital of the world" Fairmont's National White Collar Crime Center provides nationwide support to law enforcement agencies involved in prevention, investigation, and prosecution of economic and high-tech crime. The Jacobs-Hutchinson Block building, also known as Peoples' National Bank and Friendly Furniture Store, houses more than 100 full-time employees. The Fairmont is also home to the NOAA Robert H. Mollohan Research Facility, which receives weather data from the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites. The hotel is located on the banks of the Colorado River, which runs through the center of the city. It is also the home of the Fairmont Hotel and Spa, which was built in the 1920s and 1930s. It was the first hotel in the U.S. to be named after a woman, and the first in the world to have a swimming pool. It also has a spa, tennis court, spa, and spa. It has been named the "Pepperoni Roll Capital of the World" in honor of the bakery that started serving the snack in the hotel's Country Club Cafe in the 1950s. The town is also known for its golf course, which is one of the oldest in the United States. The city has a number of cultural institutions, including the National Museum of American History and the Museum of Science and Industry.

Government

Fairmont has a Council-manager government, whereby the mayor serves as chairman of the city council and the city manager takes care of the day-to-day operations. The current mayor is Thomas Mainella and the current city manager is Valerie Means. The city council is made up of: Josh Rice, Anne Bolyard, Karl "David" Kennedy, Barry Bledsoe, Barry "Rick" Garcia, and Gia Deasy. The mayor and deputy mayor are: Tom Mainella, Donna Blood, and Nick "Nicky" Cinalli. The council's term expires in 2022, and the mayor's term is set to expire in 2024. It is not known when the next mayor will be elected. The Mayor's term ends in 2024, the Deputy Mayor's will end in 2022. The City Council's term runs until 2024, and then it runs again until 2022. It has a total of nine members, with the mayor and the deputy mayor in charge of each of the nine districts. It also has a city manager, Valerie Means, and a city council member, Josh Rice.

Education

Fairmont State University is a public university with an approximate enrollment of 3,800 students. Dunbar School is a historic building in Fairmont, West Virginia, that used to be an all-black high school. The school was designed by the architect William B Ittner. The college was originally established as a school for teachers, and was located on the corner of Fairmont Avenue and Second Street and moved to its present location in 1917. The institution offers master's degrees in business, education, teaching, criminal justice, and nursing, in addition to 90 baccalaureate and 50 associate degrees. The university is located in the town's historic downtown area, which is home to the Fairmont Museum of Art and Science. The museum is open to the public and has a collection of more than 1,000 pieces of art and memorabilia from the 1800s and 1900s. The fairmont museum is also home to a large collection of photographs from the late 1800s, 1900s, and 1930s, including some of the first photographs taken in the city. The Fairmont museum also has a small collection of photos from the 1930s and 1940s, which were taken at the time when the city was still in the early stages of its development. The city also has its own museum, which was built in the 1950s and is called the Museum of American Art and Design. The town's main square is called Fairmont Square, and it is located at the intersection of Main Street and Main Street.

Infrastructure

Fairmont is located in the North-Central region of the state, along West Virginia's I-79 High Tech Corridor. Fairmont Municipal Airport (Frankman Field) is a public use airport located two nautical miles (4 km) southwest of the central business district of Fairmont. It is owned by the Fairmont-Marion County Regional Airport Authority. Major highways include: Interstate 79, U.S. Highway 19, West Virginia Route 310, and W. Virginia Route 273. The city is home to the West Virginia Air Force Academy, which opened in 2009. It also has a National Guard Air Force Base, which was opened in 2010. The Fairmont Airport is a private airport owned by a private company. It has a runway that is used for airBaltic flights. The airport is located on the base of Mount Washington, which is a mountain range in the state. It was built in the early 1900s and is one of the oldest airports in the United States. It opened in 1910. It serves as a hub for the Air Force Air National Guard, which has a base in Fairmont and an airfield in Morgantown. The Air Force has a fleet of more than 1,000 aircraft, including the F/A-18 Super Hornet and the C-17 Globetrotter, which can carry more than 100,000 passengers a day. The F/F-18 is the state's largest air carrier, with a total length of 1,700 miles (1,800 km).

Air Quality, Water Quality, Superfund Sites & UV Index

The Air Quality index is in Fairmont, Marion County, West Virginia = 45.8. These Air Quality index is based on annual reports from the EPA. Higher values are better (100=best). The number of ozone alert days is used as an indicator of air quality, as are the amounts of seven pollutants including particulates, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, lead, and volatile organic chemicals. The Water Quality Index is 40. A measure of the quality of an area’s water supply as rated by the EPA. Higher values are better (100=best). The EPA has a complex method of measuring the watershed quality, using 15 indicators such as pollutants, turbidity, sediments, and toxic discharges. The Superfund Sites Index is 20. Higher is better (100=best). Based upon the number and impact of EPA Superfund pollution sites in the county, including spending on the cleanup efforts. The UV Index in Fairmont = 3.5 and is a measure of an area's exposure to the sun's ultraviolet rays. This is most often a combination of sunny weather, altitude, and latitude. The UV Index has been defined by the WHO (www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/radiation-the-ultraviolet-(uv)-index) and is uniform worldwide.

Employed

The most recent city population of 18,313 individuals with a median age of 39.1 age the population dropped by -0.72% in Fairmont, Marion County, West Virginia population since 2000 and are distributed over a density of 2,137.64 residents per square mile of area (825.36/km²). There are average 2.1 people per household in the 8,548 households with an average household income of $33,176 a year. The unemployment rate in Alabama is 6.30% of the available work force and has dropped -5.97% over the most recent 12-month period and the projected change in job supply over the next decade based on migration patterns, economic growth, and other factors will increase by 21.76%. The number of physicians in Fairmont per 100,000 population = 138.5.

Weather

The annual rainfall in Fairmont = 43.6 inches and the annual snowfall = 38 inches. The annual number of days with measurable precipitation (over .01 inch) = 147. The average number of days per year that are predominantly sunny = 155. 85 degrees Fahrenheit is the average daily high temperature for the month of July and 22 degrees Fahrenheit is the average daily low temperature for the month of January. The Comfort Index (higher=better) is 45, where higher values mean a more pleasant climate. The Comfort Index measure recognizes that humidity by itself isn't the problem. (Have you noticed nobody ever complains about the weather being 'cold and humid?) It's in the summertime that we notice the humidity the most, when it's hot and muggy. Our Comfort Index uses a combination of afternoon summer temperature and humidity to closely predict the effect that the humidity will have on people.

Median Home Cost

The percentage of housing units in Fairmont, Marion County, West Virginia which are owned by the occupant = 55.51%. A housing unit is a house, apartment, mobile home, or room occupied as separate living quarters. The average age of homes = 58 years with median home cost = $80,880 and home appreciation of -1.78%. This is the value of the years most recent home sales data. Its important to note that this is not the average (or arithmetic mean). The median home price is the middle value when you arrange all the sales prices of homes from lowest to highest. This is a better indicator than the average, because the median is not changed as much by a few unusually high or low values. The property tax rate of $6.05 shown here is the rate per $1,000 of home value. If for simplification for example the tax rate is $14.00 and the home value is $250,000, the property tax would be $14.00 x ($250,000/1000), or $3500. This is the 'effective' tax rate.

Study

The local school district spends $5,980 per student. There are 15.1 students for each teacher in the school, 485 students for each Librarian and 135 students for each Counselor. 5.68% of the area’s population over the age of 25 with an Associate Degree or other 2-year college degree, 12.06% with a master’s degree, Ph.D. or other advanced college degree and 8.89% with high school diplomas or high school equivalency degrees (GEDs).