Tag: Government

West Virginia School Division Seeks OD Antidote Drug

In another sign of West Virginia's drug epidemic, a school division in the state's Northern Panhandle wants to stock a drug to resuscitate students who…

In another sign of West Virginia’s drug epidemic, a school division in the state’s Northern Panhandle wants to stock a drug to resuscitate students who are overdosing.

The move is by the Brooke County schools. The county school board is seeking a waiver of state policy to allow the county to keep naloxone in its two middle schools and one high school.

Lead school nurse Carol Cipoletti tells the Charleston Gazette-Mail the waiver would allow school nurses to administer the drug. It can quickly return breathing to people suffering from overdoses on prescription pills or heroin.

The West Virginia Legislature passed legislation this year to let police, firefighters and others to give naloxone to people overdosing on heroin or prescription pain pills.

Navy Ship to be Named After W.Va. Medal of Honor Marine

  The U.S. Navy has announced it will name a ship after Hershel “Woody” Williams, a West Virginia World War II veteran and Congressional Medal of Honor recipient.

Multiple media outlets report that the Navy made the announcement Tuesday, months after Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W. Va., wrote a letter urging them to name a ship after Williams.

Williams says that the ship in question will be an expeditionary sea base. U.S. Navy Secretary Ray Mabus called Williams Tuesday morning to tell him the news.

Williams was born in 1923 near Fairmont, W.Va. He enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1923 and was assigned to the 3rd Marine Division. He earned the Medal of Honor in 1945 for his actions in the Battle of Iwo Jima, as well as a Purple Heart.

Massey Miner: UBB Had ‘Code of Silence’

Stanley “Goose” Stewart worked as an underground miner for Massey Energy at the Upper Big Branch mine for 15 years and in all of those years, Stewart said production came first, no matter what the conditions were underground.

“There was an element of fear, intimidation and propaganda working there,” Stewart said in Charleston federal court Tuesday. “We knew if we didn’t [produce], we would be fired, or they would harass you until you quit.”

Stewart was called by the U.S. Attorney’s Office to testify in the trial of former Massey CEO Don Blankenship. 

Blankenship is charged with conspiring to violate federal mine safety standards and lying to securities officials and investors after the Upper Big Branch mine disaster in 2010 that killed 29 men.

In his raspy, southern West Virginia accent, Stewart painted a picture for jurors of a mine with excessive amounts of coal dust and little to no air flow that, according to him, was never properly rock dusted, a mine practice that helps prevent explosions.

“Why did you engage in unsafe conduct?” U.S. Attorney Booth Goodwin asked him during direct examination.

“I had to. The pressure was to produce coal at any cost,” he replied.

Stewart described for the jurors a “code of silence” between miners working at Upper Big Branch, miners who didn’t report the unsafe conditions and cleaned up sites quickly when they were given advanced notice that a safety inspector was on site.

The veteran miner said he reported issues once to a state inspector he considered a friend, trusting the inspector would keep his compliant anonymous so it “wouldn’t get back to the company.” Under federal law, miners are afforded a guarantee of anonymity when reporting issues to safety inspectors, but that was something Stewart admitted he did not know at the time.

Prosecutors walked Stewart through a 2008 agreement he signed with Performance Coal, a Massey subsidiary, giving him a raise in exchange for a guaranteed minimum of three years of work at the company. That agreement, however, did not prevent the company from firing miners for any reason and mandated miners repay their full salary increase should they be fired or leave the company before the end of their three years.

On cross examination, defense attorneys attempted to depict Stewart as an opportunist, working with the United Mine Workers of America to book a speaking engagement after the UBB accident, testifying before Congress, conducting media interviews and speaking with a CBS News representative during Tuesday’s lunch break.

When asked by prosecutors why he had been so outspoken in the wake of the mine disaster, Stewart broke down on the stand.

“I felt like the truth needed to be told,” he said. “I wanted the truth to be told, that they had a code of silence there. They (the miners) felt afraid to speak up and I wanted the truth to be known.”

On April 5, 2010, the day of the explosion, Stewart was 300 feet underground at UBB on his way to begin his evening work shift; however, Stewart did not talk about his whereabouts during his sworn testimony. 

Lawmakers Struggle with Right Course of Action for Tax Reform

As part of a continuing effort exploring possible changes to the state tax code, members of the Joint Select

Committee on Tax Reform held a day-long public hearing at the capitol Tuesday. The hearing allowed West Virginia citizens to share their suggestions for ways to improve the state’s tax structure, and while at least a dozen citizens showed, few lawmakers filled the seats to listen. That, however, didn’t stop members of the public from openly sharing what they think are the right steps for West Virginia.

From eliminating certain taxes to increasing others – the Joint Select Committee on Tax Reform heard it all.

Many speakers at Tuesday’s public hearing brought up issues with the state’s severance tax, property tax, and income tax credit – giving their own ideas to either lessen the pull or to increase revenue.

Some mentioned the benefits of increasing the tax on tobacco, saying it would help to decrease the amount of West Virginia smokers while also bringing in more money at the same time.

Speakers asked lawmakers to remember the children who come from families making minimum wage and live paycheck to paycheck.

Senator Mike Hall, a Republican from Putnam County, shares the chairmanship with Delegate Eric Nelson, a Republican from Kanawha County.

Hall says the tax reform committees in both houses will have a lot to think about.

“We heard a wide array of comments,” Hall noted, “We heard about the income tax credit, which we were aware we would, but we also heard from the coal association, business community, saying there are certain taxes here that really hurt us, and though it will be difficult to deal with those quickly, because there are multi-millions of dollars of revenue, it’s important for us to hear that.”

Hall says the looming question this session will be how to adequately manage reforming the tax structure in a low budget year.

“Revenues are down, can we live with them, there’ll be a lot of pressure from people to raise this or raise that to cover costs, but, right now, so we’re in a mode of seeing where can we operate, the revenues are low, and so it’ll be very hard to talk about tax policy in this climate in the legislative session, but I think at the end of the day, when the committee’s done, we’ll have a few things to propose and some major principles to look at and say going forward as things would permit that we would like to see our tax code be changed in a manner that would be more beneficial to our economy.”

Tax reform is likely to be at the forefront of the 2016 session, and legislators know they face a contentious battle ahead.

Marshall Names Gilbert New President

The Marshall University Board of Governors today named Mississippi State University Provost Jerome A. “Jerry” Gilbert the 37th president of Marshall University. Gilbert will assume the presidency in January.

Earlier this month, the Presidential Search Committee announced Gilbert as one of three finalists for the position following a national search. All three candidates participated in open forums last week with students, faculty, staff and members of the community, and the decision to hire Gilbert was made yesterday by the Board of Governors in executive session.

Gilbert’s appointment and contract will require final approval from the West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission.

A Mississippi native with a background in biomedical engineering, Gilbert has served since 2010 as provost and executive vice president of Mississippi State. Prior to that, he was the university’s associate provost and associate vice president for academic affairs for six years. He has held various administrative and faculty positions at Mississippi State, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University.

He has a bachelor’s degree in biological engineering from Mississippi State and a doctorate in biomedical engineering from Duke University. An event is being planned to introduce Gilbert to the community.  

Fayette Commission Sues Over School Plans Rejection

The West Virginia School Building Authority is being sued over its rejection of a school consolidation plan in Fayette County.

Fayette County Prosecutor and county attorney Larry Harrah said Tuesday that the nonprofit Charleston law firm Mountain State Justice filed the lawsuit in Kanawha County Circuit Court on behalf of the Fayette County Commission.

The School Building Authority voted Sept. 28 to deny the county’s request for funding to combine Fayetteville, Meadow Bridge, Midland Trail and Oak Hill high schools into a new school. The authority cited a lack of local support.

County officials say the authority violated the state’s open meetings law by discussing and taking action outside its posted consent agenda.

The SBA didn’t immediately return an email seeking comment on the lawsuit.

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