House Finance Committee Moves Budget Bill To Floor

The House of Delegates Finance Committee today moved its version of the 2026 state budget out of committee to the floor. 

Both the House and Senate Finance committees have met throughout the 2025 sessions with agencies hearing budget proposals. The two chambers have historically alternated presenting a budget, and this year it is the House’s turn to produce a budget document. Once it has passed the House, it will then go to the Senate for further amendments. The sides will ultimately reach a budget compromise. 

The House budget is “very dissimilar” to the governor’s introduced budget, according to the finance committee budget presentation. Before the session began, Gov. Patrick Morrisey reported the state was approximately $400 million in the red, but legislators immediately pushed back on that assertion. 

The House’s version has a total general revenue budget of more than $5.1 billion. That is almost two hundred million dollars less than the governor’s proposed budget. 

One area of savings comes from the mergers of the Commerce and Economic Development departments, as well as with Tourism and Arts, Culture and History departments. West Virginia Public Broadcasting is part of Arts Culture and History. 

The state’s total budget including special revenue, the state road fund and money from the federal government for expenses like Medicaid is $19,236,401,737.

The House Finance committee also created a bill that strips more than $155 million out of the governor’s civil contingency fund and moves it to the budget surplus. That bill also heads to the House floor.