CHARLESTON — Campus Carry wasn’t the only bill on Wednesday’s House action list. Some other controversial bills died, such as the Tebow bill and Medicaid work requirements.
Some bills found broad support and moved to the Senate, including medical cannabis vertical integration. Here’s a look.
— HB 2709 allows medical cannabis growers, processors and dispensers to operate as a single company. This was a recommendation of the Medical Cannabis Advisory Board, which learned from other states that keeping the operations separate proved uneconomical for the businesses because of the expenses involved. The combining of operations is called vertical integration. As amended Tuesday, the bill allows for 10 growers, 10 processors and 165 dispensaries with no more than 10 dispensary permits to one person. It passed 84-16.
— HB 3105, allowing the Alcohol Beverage Control Administration to call on local law enforcement to enforce liquor laws in private clubs, raised numerous logistical questions on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the Rules Committee parked it on the inactive calendar.
— HB 2941 reinstates the film investment tax credit, which was eliminated last year. It will be administered by the Development Office and provides a credit for an in-state film project incurring a minimum of $50,000 in direct expenditures in the state.
It caps total credits at $10 million per year – unless the film has the name West Virginia in its title or its subject matter. It generated a long debate.
Delegates Jim Butler, R-Mason, and Geoff Foster, R-Putnam, both opposed it, saying it was repealed because the Development Office told them that the former Film Office failed to produce a return on investment for the tax dollars lost.
Delegate Randy Swartzmiller, D-Hancock, said the Steven Spielberg film Super 8 was shot in his district and proved a “shot in the arm” for the community.
When people allege it’s not a return on investment, he said, “Don’t go down that yellow brick road, because you will end up in Oz.”
Delegate Eric Nelson, R-Kanawha, who was Finance chair last year, detailed numerous problems with the program that were raised in a 2018 audit report. The previous cap was $5 million and all of it was rarely used. Each dollar of credit yielded less than $1 in return. Much of the credit and money spent on productions when to out-of-state companies and wages.
Nelson said that, in contrast, money devoted to tourism yields $8 in return for each dollar spent. And this bill requires no audit before granting the credit, as other state programs do.
Delegate Doug Skaff, D-Kanawha, talked about the $500,000 in local taxes Super 8 brought to Hancock, about the people who come to Parkersburg to see Mothman, who stop in Huntington to buy a “We are Marshall” T-shirt. “Diversify our economy. It’s one thing we can all agree to.”
Delegate Shawn Fluharty, D-Ohio, noted that all of our border states have film tax credits.
Lead sponsor Dianna Graves, R-Kanawha, contradicted Nelson about the audit, pointing out the extensive reporting required.
It passed 73-26.
— HB 2966 is the County Budget Flexibility Act. Current law requires counties to set their budgets by March 29 of each year. They aren’t allowed to hold unspent money for future needs.
This bill allows them to establish a sort of rainy day fund called a Future Needs Fund to deposit unspent money for future expenses. Passed 98-1.
— HB 3127, the Tebow bill, allows homeschool and private school students to participate in public school extracurricular activities. They must live within the school’s attendance area. They are counted as half-time students for the state financial aid formula.
Delegate John Doyle, D-Jefferson, said the bill poses a fundamental choice: Are the teams school teams or community teams? If they’re community teams, divorce them from the schools. If they’re school teams, bar non-students.
Delegate Marshall Wilson, R-Berkeley, expanded on Doyle’s question, asking to whom the schools belong. Answering it himself, he said they belong to the community and should serve the entire community.
Supporters said the bill gives private school and homeschool students full access to activities that their family’s tax dollars are paying for. Delegate Tom Bibby, R-Berkeley, said, “Our students who go to private school home school they’re not second-class citizens.”
Delegate Danielle Walker, D-Monongalia, homeschools her sons and said, “I don’t understand how is this equal to a student attending a public school.” The bill has unanswered questions about county board academic standards and student discipline. “I think this is a favoritism bill” and needs more work.
Education vice-chair Mark Dean, R-Mingo, also opposed the bill. As a school principal, he sees problems with control of a non-student and how troubles with the student might cast his school in a bad light.
But Delegate Tom Azinger, R-Wood, cited the example of a Pennsylvania homeschooler who joined his small public school’s football team and improved it. And other states allow this (another delegate put the count at 31). Regarding those who want to exclude homeschoolers, “I think the thinking is very narrow minded.”
While opponents focused on the bill’s apparent lack of clarity, Delegate Tom Fast, R-Fayette, said coaches will have full discretion to discipline a homeschooled team member and principals will have full power over students who enroll in their school activities. For the students, “This is a fairness issue for them.”
Delegate Gary Howell, R-Mineral, talked about America’s unique system that has public, private and home schools and many students have no access to teams or other activities. “You should have the opportunity to play those sports. You should have the opportunity to get that college scholarship based on your sports prowess.”
Majority Whip Paul Espinosa, R-Jefferson, pointed out that this bill, unlike previous Tebow bills, specifies that the students who enroll for activities are considered enrolled students and will be treated as exactly as all other students, and be subject to all school rules and requirements. County school boards will be required to establish the academic competency standards for enrollment, as they do for all other students.
Delegate Sean Hornbuckle, D-Cabell, commented on Espinosa’s point that the state could see 55 different sets of standards for eligibility. “I want to make sure it is equtable.” He’d like to see an interim study on that.
Delegate Joe Ellington, R-Mercer, who succeeded in having the bill discharged from the Education Committee and brought to the floor, talked about his own son who in third grades wasn’t succeeding in language arts and was home schooled for a few years. He coached his son on some community teams and saw an artificial barrier between the public school kids and the homeschool kids.
But some homeschool kids want to be on their public school teams, he said. They shouldn’t be penalized. “It’s about the money,” he said. “The public school system wants all the money.”
There won’t be more than 50 or 100 kids who want to jump through all the bill’s hoops to join a team, he said. That won’t involve much money. “I believe it’s about the kids.”
After an hour of debate, Delegate Larry Kump, R-Berkeley, called the question, meaning he called to end the debate and have the vote, and members supported that.
The bill died 46-52.
— HB 3142 reduces the severance tax on steam coal from 5 percent to 3 percent, phased across two fiscal years. The total estimated cost is $60 million, at $30 million per year.
With a gallery full of blue-shirted miners around him, Delegate Larry Rowe, D-Kanawha, argued against the bill, saying it only helps northern West Virginia, not the struggling south which has metallurgical coal. “It has nothing for the part of West Virginia that needs the help.” And there’s no guarantee the money will trickle down to the miners.
Delegate Tony Paynter, R-Wyoming, worked in the coal industry. “Southern West Virginia has a lot of steam coal,” he said. “I am a resounding yes on this.” That earned a round of applause from the galleries that Hanshaw to cut off because of House rules on decorum.
Delegate Daniel Linville, R-Cabell, pointed to the miners. “We stand here in this great big marble building in our cheap suits, in these cushioned seats, and these men and women sat up there on these hard benches (during the hours of debate), and we have the audacity to say this is going to put the money in some corporate fat cat’s pockets.” The state revenue office said it could save 500 jobs.
Hoping to educate Rowe, Delegate John Kelly, R-Wood, said the severance tax makes West Virginia coal too expensive to compete against coal form other states. This will put the state on a more even footing.
Delegate Evan Hansen, D-Monongalia, questions whether the 2 percent cut will really make West Virginia coal more competitive. Coal plants can’t compete because natural gas is cheaper and wind and solar is getting cheaper, and many nations and businesses are committed to renewables.
Delegate Terri Sypolt, R-Preston, said she’s a coal miner’s daughter, former wife and mother. The industry has supported the state, her county and her family. “Today I want to support the people who have supported us.”
Delegate Vernon Criss, R-Wood, thanked Hansen for stimulating the idea that wind and solar need a severance tax. Hansen responded that wind and solar aren’t actually severed.
After the long debate, the vote was overwhelming, 88-11.
— HB is 3144 North Central Appalachian Coal Severance Tax Rebate Act. It allows a coal company to obtain a severance tax rebate of 35 percent of the cost of new machinery equipment used to sever coal. “The rebate amount is limited to 80 percent of the state portion of the severance taxes attributable to the additional coal produced as a result of the new machinery and equipment.”
It passed 88-9.
— HB 3136 is a controversial bill proposing to establish a 20-hour-per week work or volunteering requirement for able-bodied adult Medicaid recipients. It contains specified exemptions.
Delegate Larry Rowe, D-Kanawha, said that while there’s no official estimate of the bill’s impact, the bill could harm small rural hospitals who will have to treat, without compensation, indigent patients who’ve lost Medicaid.
Delegate Lisa Zukoff, D-Marshall, echoed that, saying the bill has too many unknowns and she has to oppose it.
Seeing that debate on this might drag out, Sypolt moved to have it moved to the foot of the list of bills to be acted on, in order to make way for the coal bills. Members agreed, and then during the recess, Rules moved it to the inactive calendar, apparently assuring its demise.
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