Mt. Hope, WV (WOAY) – Mount Hope is moving forward with a plan to build an RV park on land the federal government purchased decades ago after two major floods forced more than 100 families from their homes in the Bailey’s Bottom area.
Mayor Michael Kessinger says the city has spent six years developing a vision for the flood-buyout property, which deed restrictions limit to recreational use. The broader plan includes an RV park, an outdoor amphitheater inside the historic Lonnie Warwick Municipal Stadium, and trout habitat restoration along Dunloup Creek.
Kessinger says the growth of New River Gorge National Park has created an opening for Mount Hope to capture tourism dollars flowing through the region.
“We just began to think creatively of what could happen, what the area needs, the region needs,” Kessinger said. “And fortunately, we were a little bit before the curve in our ideas of getting an RV park, and along with the amphitheater and the stream restoration for the trout. Those were the original vision for this area.”
Not everyone in town is ready to get behind the project as planned. Resident Jim Maynor, who works in economic development and has lived in Mount Hope most of his life, says he supports growth but takes issue with where the RV park would be built. He says many opponents feel misled, believing the project was originally discussed for a different area, nearer to Killsyth.
“My concern with the project is not the project in itself, it’s just the location of the project,” Maynor said. “We live in a residential town. We don’t want RVs and campsites in our backyard.”
Maynor and Kessinger say they have agreed to form a steering committee to work through community concerns.
Maynor summed up his position this way: “We’re in the right church, wrong pew. We need to move it on down this way a little bit.”
Fellow resident Jim Helton, a 25-year military veteran who returned to Mount Hope to live near his mother, said his concern is whether an RV park offers the kind of lasting benefit the city needs.
“I know Mt. Hope needs to grow, but it needs something permanent,” Helton said. “Not a temporary seasonal thing … I just can’t see it as a trailer park.”
Kessinger acknowledged the location concerns but said the deed-restricted land at Bailey’s Bottom is what the city has to work with.
“Where we’re at right now is, this is what we have, and this is what we have to work with,” he said. “We want to work together, work this out, get as much intelligent community involvement as we possibly can to figure it out.”
The mayor says if the project stays on track, the city could go out to bid as early as late summer or fall, with construction possibly beginning by spring.
