CHARLESTON, W.Va. — WorkForce West Virginia has until 5 p.m. Friday to respond to a subpoena from Senate President Bill Cole (R-Mercer, 6) and House Speaker Tim Armstead (R-Kanawha, 40) for documents dealing with the new prevailing wage methodology but the agency says it has already supplied the information.
The specific claim is that WorkForce West Virginia failed to provide the Joint Legislative Committee on Government and Finance with a total of 50 e-mails and other documents related to “outside interests” involved in influencing the development of the prevailing wage calculation methods.
It’s a step that Senate Majority Leader Mitch Carmichael (R-Jackson, 04) said was not being taken lightly.
“We’re not going to run this government as it has been in the past,” Carmichael said on Tuesday’s MetroNews “Talkline.” “When agencies or entities obscure information from us and do not give the people’s representatives, the Legislature, the information that was utilized to create difference scenarios, we are going to demand it.”
On Tuesday, along with the subpoena, Cole and Armstead also sent a letter to Russell Fry, acting executive director of WorkForce West Virginia, expressing their disappointment with the agency because previous document requests were not fully fulfilled, in their view.
The June 10 request was for “access to any and all documents or communications of every agency or department of the state involved in the investigation and preparation of the methodology presented today by WorkForce West Virginia for determination of the prevailing hourly rate of wages.”
WorkForce spokesperson Chelsea Ruby issued a statement late Tuesday.
“It is clear that the agency has complied with the statute, and WorkForce West Virginia will continue to comply with the law,” Ruby said.
The agency denied withholding any documents.
When the Joint Committee on Government and Finance requested documents related to development of the methodology used to calculate the prevailing wage, WorkForce West Virginia supplied thousands of pages of documents and e-mails,” Ruby said, adding the agency would re-review the emails after the issuance of the subpoena.
Republicans still believe there’s something missing.
“The entities that want to artificially inflate that prevailing wage exercised, we feel, influence on WorkForce West Virginia,” said Carmichael of alleged submissions from interest groups. Providing such information during the process is not illegal. “I’m not saying that’s wrong at all, but I’m just saying we have a right to know that,” he said.
Currently, there is no prevailing wage in West Virginia. The previous wage expired July 1. Lawmakers refused to delay the original wage deadline for WorkForce West Virginia amid claims that wage determinations were not being done in accordance with the terms of S.B. 361 which became law earlier this year.
The law, supporters argued, required consideration of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data. Last month, WorkForce sent out surveys to more than 5,200 contractors and other businesses.
“Unfortunately, it now appears WorkForce West Virginia has decided to ignore the Legislature’s clear directive and to instead impose a new survey which was not contemplated by the Legislature,” Armstead said in a statement.
“It is important that we know why this course was followed and that we have access to all of the information considered by WorkForce West Virginia in developing what we believe to be a flawed process.”
Cole agreed. “It’s incredibly troubling to me that this agency has chosen to be less than forthright in fulfilling our legal request for information, and because of this action, I have grave concerns about the objectivity and legitimacy of their work,” he said.
With the new law, calculations of the prevailing wage were moved from the state Division of Labor to WorkForce West Virginia with input from economists at both West Virginia University and Marshall University.
More than 30 other states have prevailing wage laws.