West Virginia State Legislature Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Senate Letter To DHHR Requests Child Welfare Policy Changes

The West Virginia Senate leadership has sent a seven page letter to Department of Health and Human Resources Interim Secretary Dr. Jeffrey Coben that details a number of short, intermediate and long-term policy change suggestions.

Senate President Craig Blair, R-Berkeley, said the initiatives outlined in the letter come from more than two months of research, data collection, counsel, citizen and specialist input. Blair said former DHHR Deputy Secretary Jeremiah Samples, now senior advisor for the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Government and Finance, was a major contributor to the recommended policy changes.

“The more that we talk about this issue, the more people are sending me emails saying ‘this is wrong, that’s wrong, this is what needs to be done,’” Blair said. “We’re data collectors now piecing it all together to try to come up with short and long term solutions.”

For short-term policy changes, the group recommends increasing Child Protective Services (CPS) workers’ regional pay differential to properly compete with Virginia and Maryland in the Eastern Panhandle. Blair said an immediate 20 percent increase is warranted given the CPS crisis conditions there.

“You end up with two and three times the amount of the work that you do in other areas of the state, but your pay is exactly the same,” Blair said. “The cost of the housing, and the taxes associated with that housing can be double what it is, in say, in Webster County.”

Other short-term policy change suggestions call for transparency with child welfare issues, and reallocation of vacant personal service funding to starting salaries for CPS workers. The letter notes that the previous 15 percent increase, as directed by the governor, applied to only existing workers. Another 10-15 percent should be infused statewide and can come from existing personnel service funds at DHHR.

On an intermediate timeline, the letter asks DHHR to develop a CPS position reallocation plan to prevent underservice in certain counties. The letter notes “Total population can serve as a base level factor in allocations based on current number of CPS staff allocations. For counties that have extraordinary needs, a factor would be incorporated to enhance the base of CPS workers in that county. This proposal would not call for any county to receive less than they currently have without DHHR attesting that such a decrease would not impact services in that county. To make up the difference, additional CPS positions would be added to current totals.”

A recommended policy change would address CPS workers’ caseloads and workloads. Blair said streamlining those duties to individuals with the best ability in a specific area would create better child welfare outcomes.

“It’s no different from having a DMV office, you’ve got 10 windows, you’ve only got two people working those windows, and one of those people is infinitely slower than the other,” Blair said. “The person that you have left is working to the point of wanting to quit and not do their job. The only people that suffer are the ones that are out in the lobby waiting and that’s our children in this instance.”

One proposed policy change mandates a child trauma predictive model, trying to stem a problem before it happens.

“Good governments should be able to predict and anticipate, but you need to have that data, that feedback from where you’re at, and then somebody willing to look at it, and deploy solutions and change,” Blair said.

Other policy change recommendations focus on improving mental health accessibility.

The letter notes: “The West Virginia Legislature and Governor have allocated more funding to health and human resources generally, and child welfare specifically, over the past several years than at any point in West Virginia history. West Virginia must fully explore what funding can be redirected from current allocations to develop child acute mental health infrastructure in communities and sustain it. There must be a mixture of capitalization investment and commitment to the mental health infrastructure long term.”

Blair said there will be legislation introduced in the upcoming regular legislative session to address these needs. The letter notes: “West Virginia’s children and families have suffered from critical failures in the agency you now lead. A lot of work has gone into fixing these problems, but we must have outcomes. We are pleased the Administration has joined the Legislature in realizing the status quo cannot continue and we look forward to working collaboratively on solutions moving forward.”

In his response, DHHR Interim Secretary Coben said he is reviewing the suggestions outlined in the letter from Blair and his leadership team.

“I am deeply appreciative of their outreach and the many recommendations included therein, and will respond promptly,” Coben said. “Many of these recommendations are similar to what our team is reviewing and some are in the process of implementation. I look forward to working collaboratively with the West Virginia Legislature on these critically important issues facing our state.”

Outgoing Sen. Stephen Baldwin, D-Greenbrier, responded to the Senate letter with his own letter and a statement. He detailed to Coben the challenge and solution to the CPS staffing crisis in his section of the state.

“CPS vacancy rates in my district have ranged from 40-65 percent over the last couple of years,” Baldwin said. “Currently, we have 6 CPS workers on the job and 6 vacant positions. Summers County has 0 CPS workers.”

Coben responded to Baldwin by promising action.

“Having just received Sen. Stephen Baldwin’s letter, a review will be made followed with a prompt and appropriate response,” Coben said. “Our team has been actively working to address concerns related to the child welfare system and will continue to work collaboratively throughout the state to protect our most vulnerable populations.”

Bulk Of Special Legislative Session Bills Involve Finances

The legislature also set up the framework for individuals and families to contribute to savings accounts that have special tax benefits to help pay for disability-related expenses.

Much of the work done in the special legislative session that ended last week revolved around changes to Congressional, state Senate and House of Delegates maps.

But 32 of the 40 bills passed during the session were special appropriations bills that passed with little to no discussion or debate.

The bulk of the appropriation bills either reallocated money from other budget line items, spent money available to the state through COVID-19 relief bills or drew money from previously unspent budget surpluses.

In total, supplementary appropriations covered more than a half a billion dollars. More than half of that money went to the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources.

Additional legislation included Senate Bill 3027 that established a Medal Of Valor for Emergency Services personnel, firefighters and law enforcement.

W.Va. Lawmakers, Advocates Talk Criminal Justice Reform Ahead Of Session

Over the last few years, members of the West Virginia Legislature have passed a handful of laws aimed at reforming the state’s criminal justice system.

But no one could’ve anticipated the toll that the coronavirus pandemic would have until lawmakers were just adjourning in March 2020. The devastation has not missed state-run correctional facilities, where data shows that more than 3,500 incarcerated people and staff have been infected at one point or another since March.

This year, advocates aren’t only planning to advance the work they’ve accomplished so far, they’re also looking at bills under a new, public health-related light.

“I think everybody realizes that simply incarcerating folks we’re mad at doesn’t always work,” said House Judiciary Chair Moore Capito. “We’ve really tried to make an effort to distinguish how we treat those that we’re mad at versus those that we’re afraid of.”

Jails Still Overcrowded Despite 2020 Bail Reform

Recent efforts include an expungement act in 2019, which paved the way for the governor’s Jobs and Hope program, an effort to connect people in recovery from substance use disorder to job training.

Lawmakers most recently passed a law for bail reform, which tasks magistrates with issuing non-cash bail requirements to people arrested for nonviolent charges. This law also outlines ways that magistrates and county prosecutors can avoid imposing unreasonable bail requirements.

But jail populations are even higher today than they were toward the end of the last legislative session, even after the bail reform law took effect in June.

More than 5,700 people are incarcerated in West Virginia jails, against a system-wide capacity of 4,265 beds.

A little more than 40 percent of the people occupying West Virginia jails Tuesday were still awaiting trial on charges from the state. Sixteen percent of this pre-trial population includes people being held for misdemeanor charges.

Another 261 people were being held pretrial on federal charges.

There was a roughly 2,000-person backlog on Tuesday, of people who have been convicted and are still in jail, waiting to be sent to prison.

Capito says lawmakers are looking at unresolved issues related to the bail reform law, but no updates have been written yet. Some advocates, outside the Legislature, think new data collection laws are key to improved enforcement.

“What we’re hearing is that many magistrates aren’t holding that three-day hearing,” said Quenton King, a policy analyst for the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy and member of the state Criminal Law Reform Coalition. “We want to see, you know, who is not doing that? And what are the results of those where this is happening?”

Health, Wellness In Correctional Facilities

The problem of jail overcrowding has been amplified by the coronavirus pandemic, where too many people means not enough room for social distancing and fewer resources for preventing disease spread. Guidance from the CDC advises courts and local law enforcement agencies to use alternatives to incarceration.

To prevent introducing the virus into some jails and prisons, facilities are no longer offering in-person visitations, which can lead to isolation.

Del. Cody Thompson, D-Randolph, says poor mental health care is an issue he sees compounding problems in correctional facilities.

“I would definitely bet that there will be more legislation put forward to try to reform our system right now, to bring it more into line with the 21st century, more in line with modern practices regarding mental health and rehabilitation,” Thompson said.

He plans to introduce bills for trauma-informed training, and for increasing medical access to incarcerated people. An investigation by Reuters found in December that of the 110 people who died in West Virginia regional jails from 2009 to 2019, a quarter were suicides; more than a third were other medical conditions.

Most recently, a report by the West Virginia ACLU, using data from Reuters, found that just eight percent of those deaths were people convicted of charges. A quarter of the deaths were people who were in custody for unknown reasons. More than half died within their first month of incarceration.

“A death sentence is illegal in the state of West Virginia,” said Del. Danielle Walker, D-Monongalia, who is working on legislation with Thompson. “But because certain policies are not in place, we have had many people die on our watch.”

Walker herself is planning to introduce several more criminal justice reform bills, dealing with data collection and support for families whose loved ones have died behind bars.

Hope For Action In Transitional Housing

Pastor Beverly Sharp, a former corrections employee and member of the Criminal Law Reform Coalition, is hoping lawmakers also will focus on a need for transitional housing, which can serve as a supervised step for people toward the end of their sentences.

“It’s kind of like you have one foot inside jail or prison and one foot in the community,” Sharp said. “So you’re still supervised, you’re still held accountable, but you also have access to people that will help you navigate with, how do you apply for a job? How do you fill out a resume? How do you transfer skills that you learned while you were incarcerated to an application for employment?”

In West Virginia, Sharp said few options exist for re-entry programs, beyond those dealing with substance use disorder and treatment.

Immediately connecting people coming out of incarceration with resources to help with employment, licensing and new technology, she added, can help reduce the odds that people will return to jail.

Something that Sharp says won’t help? Creating any legislation that would increase penalties.

“We already have a system that is in disrepair, that is overcrowded, that’s not able to handle the number of people that are currently incarcerated,” Sharp said.

One of the House Judiciary Committee’s top priorities in criminal justice reform this year is revamping sentencing laws. According to House Judiciary chair Capito, an interim committee has been meeting over the summer to draft a new bill.

Lawmakers officially gavel in the new session Wednesday at noon. So far, leadership plans to meet for all 60 days, but Republicans have shared what they say is an ambitious agenda of priorities for the first few weeks, in case their work is cut short.

Emily Allen is a Report for America corps member.

Former West Virginia Lawmaker And Broadcaster Shirley Love Passes Away

Shirley Love, a state lawmaker and legendary West Virginia broadcaster who reported for five decades in television and radio, died Friday at 87.

Love was born in Oak Hill, West Virginia. In a 2018 biographical statement in The Herald-Dispatch in Huntington, Love listed his education as “Public High School, University of Hard Knocks.” In reality, Love graduated from Collins High School in Oak Hill.

Love initially studied to become a machinist and welder, according to a 1994 article in the Charleston Gazette. But he also had a great voice and often sang in church, so he began working as a broadcaster with WOAY radio.

As a journalist with WOAY, Love covered issues that ranged from mining disasters to high school football games. He was also an announcer for the program “Saturday Nite Wrestlin,” a famed show that West Virginia Public Broadcasting profiled in a 2018 episode of Inside Appalachia.

Following his career in broadcasting, Love went on to a long stint in politics, serving as a Democrat in the state Senate from 1994 until 2008, and in the state House of Delegates from 2016-2018.

Bill Sohonage, chairman of the Fayette County Democratic Executive Committee, said Love was “a legend, a lion and a life force.”

Gov. Jim Justice ordered that U.S. and state flags be flown at half-staff on Monday in honor of Love. “I grew up watching him on TV and listening to his voice,” Justice said in a press release on Friday. “I knew him very well. Cathy and I just want to pass on our thoughts and prayers to a great family and a great West Virginian that we’ve lost.”

U.S. Sen Joe Manchin also recalled Love’s time as a broadcaster, as well as a lawmaker. “After his broadcasting days were over, Shirley then served the great people of Fayette County in the state legislature for over two decades, fighting tirelessly for his constituents in Charleston,” Manchin said.

Editor’s note: A previous version of this story said Shirley Love began working with WOAY in the 1980s. He began working with WOAY in the 1950s.

Dem. Lawmakers Advocate For Regulation And Research Of Water Contaminating Chemicals

Democratic lawmakers Thursday drummed up support for boosting water protections to address a handful of toxic, man-made chemicals.

Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, more broadly known as PFAS chemicals, have been widely used in everything from food packaging to nonstick coatings. The class of chemicals includes C8, or PFOA, the chemical produced and dumped in the Parkersburg area for decades by chemical giant DuPont.

The effect of the chemical and related events were recently brought to the silver screen in the blockbuster film, “Dark Waters” starring Mark Ruffalo and Anne Hathaway.

The “Clean Drinking Water Act of 2020” has now been introduced in both the House of Delegates and Senate.

The bill would create an interagency taskforce to determine the extent of PFAS contamination across West Virginia. If passed, the bill would also require industrial sites that use or have used PFAS chemicals to report and monitor their use to state regulators. It would also require the Department of Environmental Protection to set drinking water standards for a handful of PFAS chemicals.

At a press conference Thursday afternoon at the Capitol, Evan Hansen, (D-Monongalia), sponsor of the House version, H.B. 4542, said it is time West Virginia takes action to address PFAS chemicals.

“They’re not effectively regulated at the state level or the federal level, and they’ve hurt people in West Virginia,” he said. “In an ideal world, the federal EPA would take the lead on this and come up with national standards, but unfortunately they’ve been dragging their feet and that’s forced state after state to matters into their own hands. So, that’s what we’re doing here today.”

Neither bill has been placed on a committee agenda yet, but supportive Democrats argued the legislation is largely aimed at collecting better science and not a heavy burden on industry.

Sen. William Ihlenfeld II (D – Ohio) is the lead sponsor of S.B. 679. He said that adopting strong science-based protections would boost business confidence across West Virginia.

“There’s a false narrative in the building that we can’t have a healthy environment and a strong economy,” he said. “We absolutely can have both and this type of legislation is not overly burdensome — it’s not a heavy lift for industry.”

That is a sentiment echoed by Charleston resident and former small business owner, Nancy Ward. Her shop, Cornucopia, closed in 2015, she said in part due to slumping sales following the 2014 water crisis.

“If you want to keep businesses here you have to keep the people here and you have to keep them healthy,” she said.

Hansen acknowledged that while many lawmakers support the sentiment of protecting water, for some, supporting the bill that places the spotlight on chemical users and producers will be an uphill battle.

West Virginia House of Delegates Member Tony Lewis Dies

West Virginia House Speaker Tim Armstead says Delegate Tony Lewis has died of cancer. The Preston County Republican was 59.

Armstead says in a news release that Lewis died Sunday.

Lewis was elected to the House of Delegates last November. Before that, he served in the West Virginia National Guard for 26 years. He also was an underground coal miner for 18 years.

Armstead says Lewis’ “dedication and work ethic left a lasting impression on all of us who worked with him.”