Time to Try Locality Pay in West Virginia

The West Virginia House of Delegates is advancing a bill that would provide locality pay for state troopers in three counties. The counties are not specified in HB 4473—that would be up to the state police superintendent—but they would likely be Jefferson, Berkeley and Morgan in the Eastern Panhandle. The bill authorizes the superintendent to

Tweaking the Promise

Research by the U.S. Department of Education in 2019 affirmed, once again, what is generally thought to be true—to get a good job, get a good education. As Inside Higher Ed reported on the study, “Adults with a degree after high school are far less likely to be unemployed or underemployed than are their peers

Rampant Unemployment Fraud Prompts Need for Crackdown

Federal and state governments flooded the country with additional unemployment benefits during the worst of the pandemic.  The combined programs paid out nearly $800 billion from March 2020 through July 2021, about five times the amount paid during the Great Recession in 2009. The additional benefits provided essential help to millions of Americans who lost

Former Supreme Court Justice Evan Jenkins is Walking an Ethical Tightrope

  Two weeks ago, Evan Jenkins was serving as a Justice on the West Virginia Supreme Court with over two years left on his term.  This week, he was working as a private attorney trying to convince the Legislature to pass a pro-business bill. That is quite a U-turn. Jenkins resigned from the court as

Justice Goes All In For McKinley, Mooney Has Trump

Typically, political party leaders prefer to stay on the sidelines in Primary Elections. The standard refrain is that they want party members to decide and then they will support the nominee, whoever that is. But that is not the case in the race for the Republican nomination for Congress in West Virginia’s new 2nd Congressional

15-Week Abortion Bill Advances Without Rape, Incest Exceptions

The West Virginia House of Delegates has passed overwhelmingly a bill that would ban most abortions after 15 weeks. The Republican-led House approved HB 4004 81-18.  The bill now goes to the Senate. The bill is copied after a Mississippi law which is under review by the United States Supreme Court. West Virginia currently has a

Demography is Destiny

“In contemporary politics, demography is destiny.” That is a quote from Louis Jacobson, editor at Sabato’s Crystal Ball, senior correspondent for PolitiFact and senior author of the Almanac of American Politics. Jacobson argues that in presidential elections, three variables “are increasingly linked with partisan voting patterns: education level, race and urbanization.” Jacobson used statistical data

Republican Resolution Would Make Local School Board Races More Partisan

House Republicans are advancing a measure in the West Virginia legislature that would make a local school board candidate’s political party more significant in their campaign. House Joint Resolution 106 would give voters the option of removing from the state Constitution “the requirement that elections for local school board members be nonpartisan.” The resolution needs

More States Moving On From Pandemic

West Virginia, like much of the rest of the country, appears to be headed in the right direction on the pandemic. In most areas, the number of cases and hospitalizations are dropping as the omicron variant wanes. Active cases in West Virginia are plummeting, down from over 12,359 last Friday to 7,589 as of Thursday’s

What To Do With WV’s Budget Surplus?

West Virginia is flush with cash. Frequently, the state has operated hand-to-mouth. Money to operate the state went out the door as fast as it came in. Often state government has had to impose mid-year budget freezes to stay out of the red.  But the state’s financial picture has improved over the last several years,

WV Republicans Moving Major Changes to Unemployment System

West Virginia is moving toward significant changes in the state’s unemployment system. The Republican-led Senate has passed legislation that will tie benefits to economic conditions in the state, require more job searching by the unemployed and allow people receiving benefits to work part-time. SB 2 indexes the number of weeks of unemployment to the state’s

The RNC’s Deal With the Devil

Robert Johnson is regarded as one of the greatest delta blues musicians.  As the legend goes, Johnson secured his talent during a meeting with the devil at “the crossroads,” where he agreed to trade his soul. There have always been stories like that; someone makes an unholy deal for an immediate gain that they believe

CRT Controversy Comes to WV

The West Virginia House of Delegates is advancing HB 4011, the Anti-Stereotyping Act.”  The legislation, which has passed the House Education Committee and will be taken up next by the Judiciary Committee, appears innocuous enough at first blush. (Read more here from Brad McElhinny.) The bill requires public schools to disclose on their website or

Officials Fear Worsening Hospital Staffing Shortages With Vaccine Deadline

Hospitals and nursing homes in West Virginia already face staffing shortages, and Governor Jim Justice fears a looming Covid vaccine requirement for employees at those facilities will exacerbate the situation. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has issued a vaccine mandate for employees of health care facilities that provide CMS services which is

Apology or Outrage?

(Editor’s note: An earlier version of the commentary incorrectly spelled Whoopi Goldberg’s first name.) Like many West Virginians, I was upset when singer Bette Midler, angry about Senator Joe Manchin’s objection to the Build Back Better plan, tweeted that our state was “poor, illiterate and strung out.” Ouch! We have challenges of poverty and drug

Nuclear Power’s Comeback

Nuclear power is rarely a front burner issue in the Mountain State. West Virginia has long been a major energy producing state because of abundant supplies of coal and natural gas. However, the possibilities associated with nuclear power have emerged as an issue this legislative session. Monday, the House of Delegates passed SB 4 that

Public Education’s Covid Crisis

Two decades ago, the standard for public education in this country was No Child Left Behind, the federal legislation intended to close achievement gaps among students.  But now, as schools continue to struggle through another year of the pandemic, the unfortunate result is that more children are falling behind. “For public schools, the numbers are

Babydog’s Backside Backfires

West Virginia Governor Jim Justice has a healthy dose of P.T. Barnum in him. The American showman, pitchman and founder of the Barnum & Bailey Circus is credited with saying, “There’s no such thing as bad publicity.” Barnum had the famous circus dwarf “General Tom Thumb.” Justice has Babydog, the family’s English bulldog.   We

Notes From Covid Quarantine

I got Covid. It started with symptoms late last week—congestion mostly—and then a positive test on Friday. At the worst of it, I felt like I had a cold. I took over-the-counter pain relievers a couple of times, slept a lot, kept hydrated, and that was it. Never had to go to the hospital or to the doctor. Pretty mild

‘Bridging’ the Partisan Gap for the Good of the Country

Earlier this month, President Biden announced a major investment in the nation’s infrastructure. States will divide $27.5 billion in new federal aid to repair or replace thousands of bridges across the country. You may not have heard much about that because the focus of the news has been on the Build Back Better plan, election