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Yahoo
11-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
WV House approves another budget bill for FY 2026 after compromise with Senate
House Finance Chair Vernon Criss, R-Wood, presents the House's most recent budget proposal in the chamber on Thursday, April 10, 2025, in Charleston, (Perry Bennett | West Virginia Legislative Photography) The West Virginia House on Thursday approved another version of the state budget for fiscal year 2026, this one representing a 'compromise' between the state Senate's version — which largely reflected Gov. Patrick Morrisey's proposals — and a very different one previously proposed by the House. The new proposed state budget totals about $5.317 billion in base revenue spending, a $5 million decrease from the budget proposed by Morrisey at the beginning of the session. If the House's passage of House Bill 2026 is accepted by the Senate, the proposed budget will become law. With four members absent and not voting, the House approved HB 2026 78-18, with 10 Republicans joining eight of the chamber's nine Democrats in voting against it. Del. John Williams, D-Monongalia, was the only Democrat to vote in support of the budget. The current proposed budget includes about $210 million in supplemental funding, which will be appropriated to listed line items if this fiscal year ends with enough revenue to spend. Those line items, in order of priority, include: $125 million to the Division of Highways, $75 million to the Economic Development Project Fund, $10 million to the Water Development Authority and $250,000 to the Cabell County Commission for Lily's Place, a nonprofit focused on supporting babies born with neonatal abstinence syndrome. The proposal also transfers about $33.6 million from general revenue to the state Personal Income Tax Reserve Fund. That money, said House Finance Chair Vernon Criss, R-Wood, can be allocated by the Legislature at any time. 'We have total access to those dollars at any time as a reserve fund,' Criss said. '… We're just parking that money there so that at some time [in the future, when] we'll have to start doing supplemental [appropriations] to keep the government going, that's one of the places we can draw money down.' The Personal Income Tax Reserve Fund currently has about $460 million. Of that, only $60 million is statutorily required to stay in the fund. Del. Kayla Young, D-Kanawha, expressed frustration at transferring money to the Personal Income Tax Reserve Fund given its current funding levels in the face of other programming needs. In the proposed budget, child care is only receiving about $8 million — which Criss said reflected Morrisey's proposed funding level. Years ago, Young said, that line item was funded at $17 million and the need has not decreased. 'We're adding … $33 million to a fund that has $460 million in it already, and we can't fund child care at the same amount that we did 10 years ago?' Young said. 'I don't get it.' The most recent version of the budget also includes returning $15 million in funding to West Virginia University that the House previously cut. It also reflects fewer cuts to state agencies with consistent job vacancies. Initially, the House proposed a 2% cut to vacant positions that was expected to yield about $8 million in savings. But Criss said those cuts were difficult because of how some positions were categorized in the state budget. This budget includes a roughly 1% cut in force — only to already vacant positions — totaling about $6 million in savings. Some changes in this version of the budget compared to funding levels from 2025 include an increase to the employer-paid share of the Public Employee Insurance Agency, a $100 million increase to foster care and adoption line items, a funding increase for the state Division of Corrections and a cut to Jobs & Hope. Jobs & Hope is a program started by Gov. Jim Justice to help train and support people in recovery who are transitioning into the workforce. Criss said the cuts to the program reflected a proposal from Morrisey's initial budget, which had the specific line item for the program collapsed into a larger line item. 'When the governor presented his budget, he collapsed a lot of those lines, and then he had to open up those line items again because he wanted the ability to move money around, and it's not his job to do that,' Criss said. 'It is our job to determine how those line items are spent.' Last year, Criss said, the Jobs & Hope program — originally dubbed 'Jim's Dream' by Justice — was funded at $6.2 million. Now, it's down to about $3.5 million. 'So we believe that's where he made his cuts, and we took the Senate's position [in the compromise],' Criss said. Del. Mike Pushkin, D-Kanawha, said it was disappointing to see a lack of funding for what he believes is a successful program for people in recovery, no matter his dislike for both the current and former governors. 'A good idea is a good idea. This is something that worked and I hate to see it cut in half like this,' Pushkin said. 'It's not a whole lot of money in regards to the entire budget. I hate to see it go away like this because of an administration change and it was somebody else's idea … when something works, you should keep doing it no matter who's dream it was.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
26-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
House of Delegates sends Mon-Preston road plowing bill to Senate
Mar. 25—dbeard @ MORGANTOWN — A bill to require the Division of Highways to contract for snow removal on secondary roads in Monongalia and Preston counties barely squeaked out of the House of Delegates on Tuesday. Across the Capitol in the Senate, a Holocaust education bill and a pharmacist prescription bill saw tweaks with amendments and will advance to third reading for passage on Wednesday. The roads bill is HB 2960, sponsored by three Mon and two Preston Republicans. It makes the observation, "Snow removal on the secondary roads in Monongalia County and Preston County has not been dependable, providing a hardship on the citizens of West Virginia." It calls on the DOH to establish a two-year pilot program to put put requests for proposals to vendors to provide snow removal on Mon and Preston secondary roads. The DOH will identify the roads to be plowed, the bill says. No contracted vendor is granted any immunity ; and if a vendor provides substandard or unsatisfactory service, the DOH can terminate the contract with 30 days' notice. Finance chair Vernon Criss, R-Wood, objected to the bill, saying it creates an unfunded mandate by requiring the state to spend money without any federal funds available to bolster it. The DOH already has the power to contract for services, he said. "Why pick two counties and not the entire state in this bill ?" Lead sponsor David McCormick said the plowing isn't getting done, and it's not unfunded — the DOH already has the budget to do it. And it's just two counties because it's a pilot. "This program is small on purpose." McCormick said the Jan. 19 fatal accident on the Cheat Lake Bridge on I-68 prompted him to introduce the bill. Maryland has a similar program and it works. He cited one more reason for the bill: low DOH wages for CDL drivers in certain parts of the state. "In our district, they have a terrible manpower shortage. This solves that problem. The vote was 50-48 with two delegates absent. In the what-if world, two more votes against would have tied the tally and killed the bill. Mon County's three Democrats voted for the bill, along with one Kanawha Democrat. The remaining five Democrats, including the one from Marion, voted no. The bill now goes to the Senate. Senate bills SB 54 is the Holocaust bill, lead-sponsored by Sen. Mike Oliverio, R-Monongalia. It's one long sentence: "All public schools located within this state shall give age-appropriate instruction on the Holocaust, the systematic, planned annihilation of European Jews and other groups by Nazi Germany, a watershed event in the history of humanity, to be taught in a manner that leads to an investigation of human behavior, and an examination of what it means to be a responsible and respectful person." The bill says the instruction may not be given before grade 6. The language reflects some wrestling last year and this year over some perceived "wokeness " in the original version, including references to "prejudice, racism, and stereotyping " in the original. Bill co-sponsor Sen. Jack Woodrum, R-Summers, offered a successful floor amendment to add to the beginning of the sentence: "In collaboration with and utilizing guidance from the West Virginia Commission on Holocaust Education ..." The commission told The Dominion Post that the addition was crafted by Delegates Evan Hansen, D-Monongalia, and Mike Pushkin, D-Kanawha, to anchor the bill in existing legislation establishing the commission. SB 526 is the Pharmacist Prescribing Authority Act, "to authorize pharmacists to practice the full extent of their education and training to prescribe low-risk medications to patients." The bill had advanced to third reading on March 17 but was kicked over to the Rules Committee where it was rewritten and advanced again to third reading on Tuesday. The Rules amendment allows pharmacists to prescribe drugs — except controlled substances — for conditions that do not require a new diagnosis, have a diagnostic test that is waived under federal guidelines as "simple laboratory examinations and procedures that have an insignificant risk of an erroneous result, " or are patient emergencies in the pharmacist's professional judgment. It allows the pharmacist to notify, within 72 hours, the patient's primary care physician of the test results and the drugs prescribed. Senators also adopted an additional amendment offered by Sen. Patrick Martin, R-Lewis, to limit a prescription supply to 30 days and to require the pharmacist to notify the PCP if more than a 10-day supply is prescribed.
