Senate Bill No. 135
(By Senators Love, Schoonover, Hunter and Fanning)
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[Introduced February 26, 1997; referred to the Committee
on Transportation; and then to the Committee on Finance .]
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A BILL to amend chapter seventeen of the code of West Virginia,
one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, by adding
thereto a new article, designated article two-c, relating to
orphan roads and establishing an orphan road acquisition and
upgrading program in all counties; authorizing the use of
able-bodied and willing welfare recipients and regional jail
inmates to perform labor on repairs and maintenance;
requiring the department of health and human resources to
furnish the division of highways lists of names of available
welfare recipients; and creating within the division of
highways a division of exempt employees to assist in the
oversight of orphan roads.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That chapter seventeen of the code of West Virginia, one
thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, be amended by
adding thereto a new article, designated article two-c, to read
as follows:
ARTICLE 2C. ORPHAN ROAD AND BRIDGE ACQUISITION PROGRAM.
§17-2C-1. Establishment of an orphan road acquisition and
upgrading program in all counties.
Authority is hereby granted to the West Virginia division of
highways to establish a program to acquire roads and bridges used
by the public which are not maintained by any governmental
agency. These roads and bridges which are not maintained by a
governmental agency are herein designated as orphan roads. The
Legislature hereby finds and declares it to be important for the
economic and social development of the state that a program for
the acquisition and upgrading of orphan roads be undertaken by
the state to improve them to the standards of state maintained
roads. In particular, the Legislature finds and declares that
basic grading, stabilizing and draining should be performed on
orphan roads and bridges to promote the well-being of the public.
§17-2C-2. Development of program.
The West Virginia division of highways shall develop an
orphan road acquisition and upgrading program in all counties.
The program shall be designed to improve these roads to state
road standards. The division of highways shall create and establish a division of exempt employees, consisting of a
director and two employees to be assigned to each highway
district to locate and designate each orphan road and to report
to the division of highways with suggested repairs and
maintenance. The division of highways is required to furnish
trucks or other proper motor vehicles and gravel to be used by
this workforce created by section three of this article in the
repair and maintenance of the orphan roads in each district and
county.
§17-2C-3. Workforce from welfare recipients and regional jail
inmates.
The West Virginia department of health and human resources
shall make available to the division of highways a list of
able-bodied welfare recipients who are available and able to work
a minimum of twenty hours a week at a manual labor job repairing
and maintaining those orphan roads under the supervision of the
district highway office. In those counties where there are not
sufficient able-bodied welfare recipients, the use of regional jail inmates
may be used, under guard, to perform the repairs and maintenance.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to establish a state
program for acquisition and upgrading of orphan roads and
bridges. It authorizes the use of able- bodied and willing
welfare recipients and regional jail inmates to perform labor on
repairs and maintenance; requires the Department of Health and
Human Resources to furnish the Division of Highways lists of names of available welfare recipients; and creates within the
Division of Highways a division of exempt employees to assist in
the oversight of orphan roads.
This is a new article; therefore, strike-throughs and
underscoring have been omitted.