Nearly a quarter way through the regular legislative session, there’s been a flip atop the House Education Committee.
This comes as state officials are having serious and complicated discussions about school funding support.
At the end of a House Education Committee meeting today, Chairman Joe Ellington announced a new chairman would be taking over, Delegate Joe Statler.
“So I will recognize vice chair Statler for the next chair,” Ellington said, to some apparent confusion by committee members. “He’s going to be the new chair.”
The House of Delegates made the move official in letters addressed to Ellington and Statler.
Ellington, R-Mercer, had served as House Education chairman since 2019. House leaders today announced that he will move into a different role, deputy speaker. Ellington will share that role with Delegate Matthew Rohrbach, who also serves as the House speaker pro tempore.
“Our education team didn’t use the previous session adjournment as a reason to stop working on solutions to the major issues we know our communities across the state are facing, so we didn’t want to disrupt that work going into this session, but it became clear right away that our Committee will keep working hard on their efforts to improve education,” Ellington said.
House Speaker Roger Hanshaw described Ellington, who was first elected in 2010, as a long-respected member of the House.
“Many of us have leaned on him for his counsel, but now in this new role we will be relying on him for even more input and counsel in a wider area of policy,” said Hanshaw, R-Clay.
So Statler, R-Monongalia, will move from the education vice chairman to the lead role on that committee. Delegate Chris Toney, R-Raleigh, will serve as Education Committee vice chairman.