Unlike the uproar in 2006 that thwarted then-Gov. Joe Manchin's plan to move WVU Tech's engineering programs to the Technology Park in South Charleston, the announcement last week that the Montgomery campus will be moving to become part of West Virginia University's new campus in Beckley was met with a sense of resignation and inevitability.
It's interesting to note that a legislative audit in 2010 in many ways foretold the closure of the Montgomery campus. In brief, that audit concluded the state is trying to operate more four-year colleges than it has population or resources to support.
West Virginia, with a 1.8 million population, operates 11 four-year colleges, or one college for every 164,952 residents, the audit noted.
It found New Mexico, with 1.98 million residents, has eight four-year colleges, one for every 248,045 people: while Nebraska, with 1.78 million residents, has seven four-year institutions, one for every 254,776 residents.
The audit found even larger pools of potential students in neighboring states: Virginia operates one college for every 520,000 residents; Kentucky, one for every 535,000 residents; and Maryland, one for every 400,000 residents.
The audit also noted that many state schools share geographic regions, and are competing for the same shrinking pool of high school graduates, including West Virginia State, Marshall and WVU Tech.
It also noted that four institutions are in isolated locations that are difficult to access, being nine miles or more away from the closest interstate highways.
"The legislative auditor finds that by virtue of their isolation, these institutions may not remain viable," the audit found.
The colleges in question: Potomac State, Glenville State, West Liberty, and WVU Tech.
The audit also pointed out that despite having a comparative overabundance of four-year colleges, West Virginia has the lowest percentage of residents with bachelor's degrees, at 17 percent.
(Arguably, having too many colleges results in too many under-qualified students getting admitted to those institutions, but that's another issue for another day.)
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At the time the report was issued, the governor's office and Legislature were just beginning ongoing cuts in higher education funding.
Since 2008, state funding for higher education has been cut by 23 percent. Combine that with the shrinking pool of state high school students and multiple increases in tuition that is making college unaffordable for some, and I suspect if the audit were revisited today, it would find much more dire circumstances for many state colleges.
Obviously, the state has a system of colleges created prior to the interstate highway system, when the challenges of travel made location a key factor in selecting a college.
In the 1950s and 1960s, for a student in the Kanawha Valley planning to major in engineering, Morgantown was a difficult, 6- or 7-hour drive away, so Montgomery provided an attractive alternative.
Today, if that rising freshman has the opportunity to spend four years in Morgantown or four years in Montgomery, it becomes clear why WVU Tech was not been able to achieve the enrollment thresholds needed to make the institution viable.
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With plans to grow WVU-Beckley into a 5,000-student campus, let's trust that administration will heed recommendations of longtime former delegate and current Deputy Revenue Secretary John Doyle, among others, to raise in-state admission standards for the main campus, as is commonplace at many state universities.
Students not making the grade would have the opportunity to attend WVU-Beckley or other satellite campuses and transfer to the main campus.
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Finally, while I don't put a lot of value in opinion polls, and certainly not in polls conducted so far out from an election cycle, a series of polls showing Jim Justice leading Senate President Bill Cole, R-Mercer, in a potential 2016 gubernatorial race caused me to harken back to a column the legendary H. John Rogers published recently. Some excerpts on his assessment of Justice:
"He bought The Greenbrier hotel, our crown jewel. It combines five-star (or close) status with hillbilly accents. And he put us on the PGA tour, and he came as close as you can to getting an NFL franchise, and he brought Jerry West back home and treated him with dignity...
"In effecting all of the above, Jim Justice spent his own money! The only people in state history to do this are Johnny Appleseed and Bernard Coffindaffer.
"Justice knows how to get the job done. I'm willing to take a chance on what he plans to do."
At one point, Rogers declares, "Jim Justice is the last best hope of the Democratic Party (if he is one) in West Virginia, and could be the best governor that we have ever had (which, of course, is not saying an awful lot)."
While those polling for Justice are probably not as erudite or outrageous as H. John, I suspect they share some of the same sentiments.
Reach Phil Kabler at philk@wvgazette.com, 304-348-1220, or follow @PhilKabler on Twitter.