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‘WV Can’t Wait’ Candidates Against Corporate Campaign Contributions File For Office

The area outside the West Virginia House of Delegates chamber was filled Saturday morning with t-shirts and buttons from various election campaigns throughout the state. Several people wore red bandanas, symbolic of the West Virginia miner strikes and the state’s rich labor history.

At the front of the room, behind the House doors, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stephen Smith and several others running for office this year shared their movement’s progressive platform.

Smith is at the forefront of WV Can’t Wait, a political movement that features more than 70 candidates poised to race in elections all over the state. Those in the group have signed a pledge, promising not to accept corporate donations in their campaigns.

Not all of the candidates who have signed the pledge have also signed the platform Smith shared Saturday.

Many of those candidates were in Charleston Saturday morning to officially file with the Secretary of State’s office for office.

WV Can’t Wait candidates filed for office with the Secretary of State on Jan. 18, 2020.

“We know that politicians don’t write history. Movements do,” Smith told rally attendees. “Politicians didn’t lead the mine wars. Politicians did not leave the teachers and school service personnel strike that happened, right here!”

Smith delivered his speech with several other candidates from the movement Saturday morning.

Brittney Barlett, a Buckhannon-area teacher running for the House of Delegates, promised to support teachers by raising their wages to match that of other states, and establishing curriculum that avoids too many standardized tests and “lets teachers teach.”

Rosemary Ketchum from Wheeling is running for City Council. She told rally attendees she wants to “expose sweetheart deals” that support large, out-of-state corporations over small, local businesses.

Tina Russell, who’s running for the House of Delegates in Mercer County, said she’ll establish a worker’s bill of rights, including paid family leave and collective bargaining for all state employees.

The entire presentation bounced around issues that have been in established politicians’ and Gov. Jim Justice’s recent addresses — economic development, population loss and substance use.

Smith himself elaborated on working class issues.

“Our workers are producing more than ever. West Virginians have never generated so much wealth, but that wealth does not stay here,” Smith said in his address. “The profits of our people working overtime heads out state and into the populous of executives.”

Candidates have until Saturday, Jan. 25, 2020 at midnight to file with the Secretary of State’s office for the upcoming election cycle.

The West Virginia primary election for party nominations and nonpartisan elections is May 12, 2020.

The general election is Nov. 3, 2020.

Correction: Brittney Barlett is a candidate for the West Virginia House of Delegates. An earlier version of this article misspelled her name.

Emily Allen is a Report for America corps member.

W.Va. House Judiciary Committee Sends Ombudsman Bill Onward After Discussing Legal, Staffing Issues

Lawmakers highlighted both a potential conflict of interest and staffing concerns in a bill establishing responsibilities for a newly created and appointed foster care ombudsman.

The ombudsman position was established by House Bill 2010 last session, to advocate for the rights of foster children and foster parents in disputes with other entities involved in the child welfare and foster care process.

House Bill 4094, which the Judiciary Committee advanced to the House floor Friday morning, elaborates more on the expected work of the ombudsman. It places the position in the West Virginia Office of the Inspector General and allows the West Virginia Attorney General’s office to provide legal counsel when requested.

Former Child Protection Services worker and certified foster parent Pamela Woodman-Kaehler was appointed to the role in October by Department of Health and Human Resources Cabinet Secretary Bill Crouch.

Woodman-Kaehler told the House Judiciary Committee on Friday her job as ombudsman is to “drive public agency accountability,” by reviewing complaints regarding West Virginia’s child welfare agencies, social service agencies, its managed care organization and even the DHHR. The department oversees the Bureau for Children and Families, which oversees much of the foster care process.

Del. Brandon Steele, R-Raleigh, said connecting Woodman-Kaehler’s office to the Attorney General’s for legal counsel might create a potential conflict of interest.

“The Attorney General is the statutory attorney for the Department of Health and Human Resources,” Steele said. “Part of her [Woodman-Kaehler’s] primary responsibility is to investigate complaints against the DHHR. … So, you have one part of the attorney general’s office fighting against another part of the attorney general’s office, and it is truly a conflict of interest.”

Steele proposed an amendment allowing Woodman-Kaehler to seek outside counsel in such a situation. That amendment failed 6-17.

“It occurs all the time in several different branches of office,” Del. Barbara Fleischauer, D-Monongalia, said. “The attorney general’s office is very familiar with the different ways to protect, and they have the authority … to hire outside counsel if they need to.”

Involving outside legal counsel might add an additional financial burden to Woodman-Kaehler’s office, Fleischauer added, as Woodman-Kaehler tries to determine how much the state should invest into her role to ensure it’s an effective position.

Press Secretary Curtis Johnson for the attorney general said his office is in the process of reviewing the matter and he’s unable to comment further at this time.

Ombudsman Still Uncertain About Staffing Needs

In other comments to the committee, Woodman-Kaehler said after reviewing several ombudsman programs for child welfare in other states, she can foresee needing more staff as soon as possible.

Woodman-Kaehler told lawmakers she envisions her office a “dedicated public servant team,” with her as the lead ombudsman, an associate ombudsman working beneath her, various field agents throughout the state, decent software for case management and clerical staff.

“I think it’s becoming evident in this legislation that this is far more than any one person, however motivated, could do” Woodman-Kaehler said.

For the time being, Woodman-Kaehler is the only person staffing her office. She told the committee she recently filed an improvement plan requesting $457,000 for a pair of clerical positions and four regional employees.

“I can tell you I am already receiving complaints in my office, and as we all know I have not yet quite gone public,” Woodman-Kaehler said.

She predicts this and other changes to West Virginia’s foster care system — including a recent transition to a managed care model and sweeping reforms recommended Thursday by members of the House Health and Human Resources committee — will bring a “flood of demand” to her office.

“There’s so much we don’t know. It’s difficult to project. I’m doing the best I can,” Woodman-Kaehler said.

Emily Allen is a Report for America corps member.

Judiciary Committee Will Recommend Electronic Absentee Voting Bill For People With Disabilities

Members of the Joint Judiciary Committees voted Monday to recommend a bill to their respective chambers, allowing voters with certain physical disabilities to cast absentee ballots electronically.

Currently, West Virginia allows voters with qualifying impairments to cast paper mail-in votes, as long as they’re on a special absentee voting list maintained by the West Virginia Secretary of State’s office.

But, according to Jeremiah Underhill, legal director for the group Disability Rights of West Virginia, navigating a piece of paper can be an impediment for someone who has a serious hand or visual impairment.

“Voting is a fundamental right that is preserved in the U.S. Constitution,” Underhill told the committee. “Everyone is afforded a legal opportunity to vote.”

And, said Donald Kersey, general counsel to the West Virginia Secretary of State, everyone has a constitutional right to vote privately. That’s something West Virginia’s existing system for casting ballots may be violating.

“If you’re a voter with a disability that prevents you from seeing [or] from using your hands, you don’t have any other way to vote right now in West Virginia, except by getting help from someone, you have to have someone mark the ballot for you,” he said.

Kersey told lawmakers on Monday that counties must draw their ballot orders by Feb. 18, meaning the sooner legislators pass this bill, the better.

“It’s something we need to do now,” he said. “It’s the right thing to do, it’s the legally required thing to do.”
He added if the state doesn’t address the issue now, it eventually will have to by the legal order of a court.

Some states have already dealt with this, including the Maryland Board of Elections in 2016 and the Ohio Secretary of State’s office in 2017. In both situations, a federal judge agreed paper ballot voting systems discriminate against those with disabilities.

According to Kersey, a law firm in D.C. is making plans for similar legal action in West Virginia if the Legislature doesn’t make its own plans this session.

Federal and local governments are required by the Americans with Disabilities Act to ensure voters with disabilities have a full and equal opportunity to vote. Because the voters mentioned is this bill are such a small subsect of West Virginia’s disability community, the Secretary of State’s office said it does not have numbers on how many voters this bill might ultimately affect. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, from 2013 to 2017 14.4 percent of the state’s population under 65 has a disability.

West Virginia will not pay any costs in 2020 associated with this electronic ballot technology, Kersey said. Instead, he said Tusk-Montgomery Philanthropies offered to cover the equipment for the upcoming election. The same group funded a mobile voting pilot in West Virginia last year.

After 2020, the bill gives counties the chance to decide what kind of technology they want to use and pay for. All the bill requires is that there be some kind of electronic method of ballot delivery for eligible voters with qualifying disabilities.

In addressing concerns of possible voter fraud, Kersey said that with electronic ballots, voters will still have to register with personal information, offer their state-issued IDs for verification and do video facial recognition before casting an electronic ballot.

Committee staffer Sarah Canterbury said the bill, as currently drafted, doesn’t include mental disabilities or any physical disability where it’s still possible to vote by paper ballot.

She additionally pointed out Monday the state is only required to make a reasonable effort not to discriminate, exempting legislators from committing to extremely costly or burdensome efforts.

“As more technological options become available, we can improve,” Canterbury told the committee. “But I think this is the best we can do, for this time.”

According to Kersey, the bill will be made available online once it has sponsors. During the Judiciary Committee meeting on Monday, senators and delegates agreed to sponsor the bill in their respective chambers.