West Virginia gave $5 million to a Catholic school in Ohio. A judge just blessed the deal.

A judge approved the $5 million taxpayer-funded grant to a Catholic trade school after officials promised not to spend it on their religious mission

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Years after a West Virginia government agency gave a private Catholic school in Ohio a $5 million grant, partly to expand its anti-abortion advocacy efforts—and got sued over it—a judge has signed off on the entire deal after school officials promised not to use that money to advance their faith.

It is so damn infuriating, and the result comes after the judge hinted that he might strike down at least half the grant because it was so obviously illegal.

Here’s how this even became an issue:

In 2022, in the wake of COVID, the U.S. government passed the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act, and West Virginia’s Water Development Authority soon announced that the $250 million of that money under their purview would be distributed via what they called the Economic Enhancement Grant Fund. Basically, non-profits or government agencies could apply for grants to build things like “a water system, a wastewater/sewer system, stormwater system or an economic development type project.” That would be perfectly fine. After all, these were secular projects that would benefit people across the state.

When the agency released its list of grant recipients last October, one of them raised some eyebrows: $5 million had been awarded to the College of St. Joseph the Worker, a private Catholic trade school based in Steubenville, Ohio.

The project consists of the acquisition, construction, and equipping of multiple education facilities for the in-class and on-site training of the five major construction trades of HVAC, carpentry, masonry, electrical, and plumbing (including areas for tools and equipment storage), materials for training, and all necessary appurtenances thereto

On one level, this might have been okay. Even if this was a private Ohio-based Catholic institution, they could have been working on (secular) water-related projects to benefit the state of West Virginia. If you wanted to fight that in court, you’d have an uphill battle.

But the description didn’t suggest anything like that. The summary said the money would go toward construction of buildings at the college so that they could teach various trades. West Virginia wasn’t going to be a direct beneficiary of any of this.

That grant, by the way, was the largest on the list. The next closest was worth $1,257,495, roughly a quarter of what the Catholic college would receive.

The College of St. Joseph the Worker (screenshot via YouTube)

It was also bizarre because the college just opened up in the fall. It’s not like the school had a track record of success. They didn’t have evidence that their graduates performed trade work in other states because they literally didn’t have any graduates yet. Hell, the whole college existed in a small building next to an auto repair store.

The College of St. Joseph the Worker (via Google Maps)

It seemed like they were just tapping into West Virginia’s coffers—with money intended for specific water projects—in order to build up a private religious school in ways that wouldn’t help West Virginia at all. Unless, of course, these students were being trained in order to later move to WV and build various projects… but that wasn’t guaranteed at all.

But wait! It got worse! According to the grant application, acquired by reporter Steven Allen Adams of the Parkersburg News and Sentinel, the money wasn’t just for construction of these buildings!

According to information provided from several state agencies through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, the College’s grant proposal for the $5 million would allow the school to expand across the river into West Virginia for several training programs, a satellite campus, scholarships, and the creation of a think tank focused on social conservative public policy.

Specifically, the grant would be used as follows:

• $2,150,000 to create a “construction and real estate development company” in Weirton, West Virginia.

• $1,650,000 to recruit West Virginia students (through scholarships and dorms) with the expectation that about 20% of them would return to the state after graduation.

• $200,000 to create a second campus in West Virginia.

• $1,000,000 for “advocacy activities.” What activities? They intended to expand into bioethics ($250,000) and hoped to build a research facility called the “Center for the Common Good” in order to “support broadly life-affirming policy in West Virginia” ($750,000).

Just to repeat that last part, they wanted a million dollars to promote anti-abortion policies… and the state’s water agency gave it to them! Even though that money was intended for water infrastructure projects, and even though the school was a registered non-profit, which meant any “advocacy” would have to exclude lobbying work.

Adams later explained how this “research center” would function:

This think tank would focus on conservative public policy – specifically citing abortion and immigration/border policy as examples – using research, op-eds, speeches, educational tools, presentations, and proposals for the West Virginia Legislature.

Good luck explaining how any of that would help West Virginia with water issues.

How did this happen?

When college officials announced that they received the grant, they said they planned to invest $10 million in expansion, with half that money now coming from West Virginia taxpayers. (That press release didn’t say anything about the “advocacy” aspect of the grant.) Incidentally, the $5 million grant was far more than the school’s entire net worth, according to the Coal Valley News:

The $5 million is nearly double the $2,583,421 that College of St. Joseph the Worker Inc. reported as its fair market value of all assets for calendar year 2023, according to its IRS tax records. The College of St. Joseph the Worker Inc. reported receiving $806,701 in contributions, gifts and grants for calendar year 2023 — less than a sixth of the state’s $5 million grant.

That made the planned $10 million overall investment even more questionable since they didn’t have anywhere near that kind of money.

When the Parkersburg News and Sentinel asked WV officials about the advocacy aspect, the reporter got the cold shoulder:

When asked about whether it was appropriate for EEGF dollars to be used to create a conservative public policy think tank, the Governor’s Office avoided the question.

“Any additional educational or ethical components mentioned in the application are secondary and fall outside the scope of the administration’s main focus: to get newly-trained workers in the workforce as quickly as possible,” [C.J. Harvey, communications director for Gov. Jim Justice] said.

They were not secondary. They were part of the project! They were listed in the application! A million dollars is a million dollars, even if “advocacy” is the last thing mentioned in the list.

The problem wasn’t just the awarding of this grant for dubious reasons; there may also have been some laws broken. All funds dispensed through the Economic Enhancement Grant Fund were supposed to be approved by three different cabinet officials, including the Secretary of Economic Development. But the WDA Executive Director Marie Prezioso said she didn’t have those recommendations on file.

What was also bizarre about this grant was that West Virginia has plenty of trade schools already, including in the Northern Panhandle. They could have encouraged those schools to apply for grants that would have benefitted state residents—and students at those colleges; instead they threw millions of dollars across the state border so that maybe, one day in the future, some of it might return to them. It made no sense at all. Unless water was just the vehicle this college used to get a generous taxpayer-funded donation for their anti-abortion activism.

That’s why the American Humanist Association, with help from lawyers at the ACLU of West Virginia, sued the WDA earlier this year.

In the lawsuit, filed in the Circuit Court of Kanawha County, the AHA said its members in West Virginia, like so many others in the state, needed access to clean water:

Tens of thousands of West Virginians wonder each day where they will get clean water, as it does not run out of the taps in their homes. The Defendant in this case, the West Virginia Water Development Authority, is tasked with providing financial assistance to communities to improve and protect water quality, protect public health, and encourage economic growth. The case at hand arises from the Defendants’ abdication of that duty, when it instead provided five million dollars of West Virginian tax-payer money to the College of St. Joseph the Worker, an out-of-state Catholic school. In so doing, the Defendants in this case violated the Guarantee of Freedom of Religion codified in the West Virginia Constitution, and the Plaintiff respectfully seeks the intervention of this Court.

The crux of the AHA’s argument was that this grant violated the part of the state’s constitution dealing with the Establishment Clause. Article III, Section 15 is very clear that state funds cannot go towards the promotion of religion. (It’s actually more specific than the similar clause in the U.S. Constitution, because it says no privilege or advantage can be conferred onto any religious group and that no taxes can support a church or ministry.)

The lawsuit noted that the Economic Enhancement Grant Fund (which fell under the WDA’s grant program and could be applied to projects that went beyond just water infrastructure) was funded in part by the taxpayers in West Virginia. If a taxpayer-funded grant went to a Catholic school to help it achieve its faith-based goals, as this one clearly did, it was violating the state constitution. Furthermore, the document said, the WDA did this “intentionally, knowingly, willfully, wantonly, maliciously, and in reckless disregard of the Constitutional rights of West Virginians.”

“We’re proud to take a stand on behalf of our members in West Virginia, because no one should have to pay taxes to fund someone else’s religion,” AHA Executive Director Fish Stark said. “Humanists believe deeply in the freedom of conscience, and this attempt to force West Virginia taxpayers to fund religious activity is an offense against the Constitution and common sense. As a former West Virginia resident, I believe ‘Mountaineers Are Always Free’ means your faith is your business—no one else, and certainly not the government, has the right to push it on you.”

One other interesting twist to all this? According to the West Virginia Record, the case was assigned to Circuit Judge Richard D. Lindsay, who had just been elected in November. From 2018 to 2022, Lindsay was one of the only Democrats in the State Senate (he lost in his re-election bid). All that’s to say he was the sort of person who might take church/state separation seriously though there was no real track record in that area just yet.

Back in July, the judge issued a bench ruling saying that the West Virginia Constitution prohibited the use of public funds to support religious education and advocacy. (Yes!) He gave the Water Development Authority 30 days to prove it was adhering to the Constitution in that regard, something that seemed downright impossible.

But that wasn’t necessarily a victory at the time. The judge said that the $1,650,000 intended to expand Catholic education and the $1,000,000 for conservative advocacy were not okay because those directly promoted religion, in defiance of the state’s constitution. The rest of the grant, however—the money that was meant to go toward a “construction and real estate development company” and a second campus in West Virginia—might be legal if the WDA could show those were about water infrastructure as opposed to promoting Catholic education. That meant the Catholic school could still, theoretically, come out with quite a bit of money if they and the state could show that the cash would go towards the WDA’s goals and not the Catholic school’s overall mission.

Well, the judge has just issued his final ruling and it’s so much worse than what I thought would be the worst-case scenario.

In essence, Judge Lindsay says the school has assured everyone they won’t spend any grant money advancing their religious mission or doing any religious advocacy... Therefore, he’s letting them keep all $5,000,000.

Seriously.

Defendants [the Water Development Authority] produced to this Court an amended invoice from the College stating that the grant will be used only for the purposes of “real estate acquisition, site development, construction, infrastructure improvements, and supplies and equipment for workforce training and all necessary appurtenances thereto in compliance with the WVWDA grant agreement.” Further, a letter from Michael Sullivan, president of the College, is produced wherein on behalf of the College, he acknowledges and agrees that the “grant may not be spent on religious advocacy of any kind... nor can the College spend the grant on teacher or instructor salaries, or anything not listed in the Grant Agreement.”

Therefore, and because no portion of the grant will be used or expended for the previously determined unconstitutional purposes of religious specific student education, enrollment and advocacy, but instead will only be used in satisfaction of the Grant Agreement, no question of constitutional law or infirmity remains. As was held by our US Supreme Court in Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, as long as a state approved grant is used for non-religious purposes and is a benefit available to the public, said grant is constitutional. To find otherwise would violate a grant applicant’s right to the Free Exercise of its religion.

The letter from the college (included in the ruling as an appendix) feels like it’s a joke. Sullivan says he knows the school is only allowed to “spend money on facilities, materials, and other physical items ‘necessary’ to fully fit out or prepare those facilities and materials” and so that’s what he plans to do.

What about the advocacy? He just says they won’t do that. They’ll stick to this bare-minimum description:

That single paragraph at the top is worth $5 million.

The Project consists of the acquisition, construction and equipping of multiple education facilities for the in-class and on-site training of the five major construction trades of HVAC, carpentry, masonry, electrical and plumbing (including areas for tools and equipment storage), materials for training, and all necessary appurtenances thereto.

So… constructing a new campus that benefits the school? Sure, why not. (The Catholic Church loves real estate.) And those final three words could justify a host of additional expenses that could also be covered by the grant.

This feels like nothing more than people shuffling around a giant pool of money. They won’t spend $1 million of the grant money on anti-abortion advocacy anymore, but the grant can be used for other purposes, which will free up $1 million in their budget… which they can then use for anti-abortion advocacy.

What does any of this do to directly impact development projects in West Virginia? WHO THE HELL KNOWS?! NOTHING MATTERS ANYMORE.

The original grant application should have been rejected the moment it was sent in. Instead, the school got a do-over, promised it would do things by the book, signed onto a completely different (and purposely vague) application, and got everything they wanted.

It’s maddening to think about especially while the college is celebrating like it won the lottery.

“This is a win for the Ohio Valley,” College of St. Joseph the Worker President Jacob Imam said. “This is a win for West Virginia. This is a win for building something beautiful again in a town that needs help.”

The idea that a Catholic college in Ohio building another campus in West Virginia counts as a “win” is ridiculous when you realize how much of that money could have gone directly to WV infrastructure projects if a more responsible organization received the grant instead.

And while none of this is the fault of the American Humanist Association, I wish their press release expressed the same level of frustration that I was feeling reading through the judge’s decision. (When I first saw the headline—”After Court declares that grant to Ohio religious school was unconstitutional, no funds to be spent on religious education”—I thought the school wasn’t getting any of the money. Instead, the AHA implies it’s good news because the school’s getting all the money but not using it for religious purposes.)

They write that the Court declared the “original grant unconstitutional”—true, but that no longer matters—and that the Water Development Agency agreed that “public funds will be spent only on economic development and not on religious education or advocacy”… even though the school can now just dip into different parts of its budget to do that since they have $5 million of unearned cash coming their way.

The AHA also notes that the school now promises to confer a degree in philosophy when they previously said all students would graduate with a “Bachelor of Arts in Catholic Studies.” But that means they can now claim on paper that not everything they do is about advancing Catholicism… which theoretically allows them to use the $5 million to bring in students to their Catholic school. (In fact, a lawyer for the Water Development Authority told the court the whole Catholic Studies degree thing was irrelevant because “anyone, regardless of faith background,” could attend the college.)

It’s hard to spin any of this as a victory. And, to be clear, the AHA is not declaring a victory of any kind. But they say they are “satisfied” because, at least on paper, church/state separation is now being followed... which is true… but come on.

“We’re satisfied that the court found the original grant unconstitutional and maintained that state funds cannot be spent on religious instruction or sectarian advocacy in the future, even if the funding restrictions could have cut deeper. This was always an affront to West Virginian taxpayers, which is why we took action when our members saw this blatant violation of church- state separation happening in their community,” AHA Executive Director Fish Stark said. “We continue to question the wisdom of offering any subsidies to a religious school that could easily have its building costs footed by the Catholic Church – one of the world’s wealthiest religious entities – while West Virginia families still struggle to access clean water and other basic needs.”

That last part is really what this case is all about. West Virginia is a state with lousy infrastructure. They had the opportunity to use millions of dollars to fix whatever they could… and officials there decided to give $5 million to a Catholic school in Ohio that isn’t promising to do a damn thing to help fix sewers or stormwater systems in their neighboring state. They’re in this to help themselves. And maybe some of that education will trickle down to help others in the state but that’s not guaranteed.

West Virginia’s leaders are squandering the very resources meant to help their own citizens. Even if a court now says the grant is legal, none of it makes any logical sense.

The judge rubber-stamped this bait-and-switch after the school rewrote its own terms and it feels very much like complicity in a shell game that deprioritizes public health. It’s a failure of governance and oversight, and it lays bare how hollow the state’s constitutional protections are when a court is willing to accept empty promises over concrete accountability.

The Water Development Authority betrayed its mission, the governor’s office looked the other way, and now a judge has blessed the whole charade under the flimsiest of assurances. This isn’t just a misallocation of funds; it’s a moral failure. And it ultimately hurts the people of West Virginia while benefitting a Catholic institution that has plenty of money to go around.

The stated mission of St. Joseph the Worker “is to serve the Church.” That’s their priority. Not to serve the people of West Virginia. Regardless of their current promises, that alone should have prevented them from receiving taxpayer dollars meant to help everybody.

(Portions of this article were published earlier)

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