Reality Check: Legislature Continues to Ignore Critical Issues

By Gary Zuckett, WV CAG Co-Director 

We’ve been writing for weeks now on how the 2025 legislative session is ‘off the rails’ when dealing with issues that matter to West Virginians. So far, 13 bills have made it to the governor’s desk, but none address critical issues affecting people’s lives. One bans Ranked Choice Voting, which no one is using here. Another bans a list of artificial food dyes. While this is likely good for our health, it doesn’t do anything for food security in West Virginia, which has a nearly 17% poverty rate, the fifth highest in the country. See what I mean?

The new law making all the headlines and that took delegates and senators away from their daily floor sessions to attend a hastily convened official bill signing by the governor is SB 456. This legislation enshrines a bizarre definition of male and female into state code and claims to ensure the safety of single-sex spaces. At least the Senate was able to amend it to make sure it can’t be interpreted to allow the inspection of a child’s genitals. 

Reality Check

While reading last Sunday’s edition of The Parkersburg News & Sentinel, a conservative newspaper, their main editorial entitled “Economy: Driving away workers will not help the state.” It calls out this current legislature for ignoring the critical needs of both large and small businesses for more workers. It describes this as “… a multi-layered problem that won’t be solved by wasting time with bizarre political sycophantry, and destructive and backward socio-cultural pursuits.” Well said! So it’s not just progressives that are seeing the priorities of this current super-majority as ‘off the rails,’ hmmm…

Thankful for the Green!

This issue reports on the People’s Public Hearing we organized in conjunction with this year’s E-Day. E-Day is an annual event where environmental groups from across the state come together to share and advocate for (and against) bills grinding through the legislative session. WV Citizen Action was one of the original founders of the WV Environmental Council (the main host of E-Day), and we were in the mix to help plan and set up this 35th-anniversary event. We are grateful for all the green energy at the State Capitol on Monday, March 17.

We’re also grateful for the green energy that you, our members, are sending online and through the mail! There is not enough space to thank you all individually, but please know your support is appreciated. THANK YOU! A friendly reminder to the rest of you: Please renew your membership and/or make an additional donation now! Our lobby team thanks you, too!