by Leann Ray, West Virginia Watch
January 28, 2025
West Virginia’s opening day of the Legislature was earlier this month, but the 60-day session won’t start for a couple more weeks.
And if some proposed changes are approved, things might run a bit differently in the House of Delegates.
The House is changing the structure of its committees, which will slow down the process of passing a bill, according to Del. Kayla Young, D-Kanawha. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. It could stop a bad bill from being rushed. But the problem is that the new approach doesn’t guarantee the public a forum.
Previously there were 20 major and minor committees and each member of the House would sit on several of each. There was no set schedule for these meetings, and their times were announced on the House floor.
Now, the House will have six standing committees, and each of those will have three subcommittees, except for the Finance Committee which will have four specialized subcommittees.
Before this year, bills were put on an agenda for the meeting, lawmakers were able to question the bill, amend it, debate it and vote on it all on the same day in the committee. Then if the bill passed, it moved to the full House floor for consideration.
Starting with this session, a bill will go through a three-day process: 1) hearing, 2) markup and 3) discussion.
Young said on the first day committees will hold hearings and conduct agency reviews, gathering vital information from multiple sources including the bill’s sponsor, subject matter experts, government officials and public testimony.
On day two, members can process and discuss amendments to the bill. And on day three, committee members can debate and consult with attorneys, debate with other members and vote on whether to advance the bill to the full House.
Young said that bills assigned to subcommittees will follow the same three-day process, and that bills that pass both the subcommittee and standing committee will advance to the full House for consideration. Again, time to discuss, debate and contemplate are all good things. But there’s one big change that needs to be considered.
Republicans want to do away with public hearings on the House floor, replacing them with public testimony during day one in the committee meetings.
Currently, a member of the House — or a citizen — may submit a written request for a public hearing on a bill. The committee chair then schedules and announces the hearing. Hearings must be scheduled at least two days after they are announced, and are listed on the Legislature’s website. If no one signs up to speak, the hearing is cancelled.
The committee chair may limit the time of proponents and opponents at hearings, sometimes giving each person as little as 45 seconds to speak, but everyone who signs up and shows up gets to speak.
Under the proposed new structure, only the chair of the committee can call on public officials, public employees and private individuals to speak to the committee during the public hearing portion. It’s unclear how members of the public who want to speak will be chosen. Will everyone get a turn? Will everyone be able to hear them? After all, the committee rooms are much smaller than the House floor. Will there be a fair representation of people both for and against the bills when all of the House committee chairs are Republicans?
Some of the most contentious public hearings in the past few years haven’t been effective in changing legislator’s minds.
In July 2022, 69 people out of 90 spoke out against House Bill 302, a near-total abortion ban that passed the House 69-23, with eight members absent and not voting.
In the 2024 regular session, librarians and teacher union leaders spoke out against House Bill 4654, which would allow teachers and librarians to be prosecuted for providing children with books that contain “obscene materials.” Delegates voted 85 to 12 to pass the bill, but it died during the final night of the session.
While the hearings may not have the results the speakers want — and lawmakers don’t have to show up for them — they do give citizens a chance to speak to their elected officials to express their opposition — and it’s on the record.
The proposed changes do give the public a chance to speak earlier in the bill’s process. This could be both good and bad.
The good — lawmakers will get an idea earlier of how their constituents feel about the bill.
The bad — on the first day the bill is discussed, how will private citizens even be aware of the bill?
Bills are unpredictable. There were many that I thought would be brought up during the 2024 session, but they weren’t even introduced. On the first day the bill is introduced, there’s no telling if it will go anywhere or if that’s the last you’ll ever hear of it.
The new format would give speakers more time to plan to attend a hearing if they have to travel and take off work. They’ll have a chance to answer lawmakers’ questions, which could be very helpful. But if they’re not even invited to speak, that doesn’t matter.
Legislators, you need to remember the public elected you to office, and they deserve a chance to speak to you about laws that will affect them.
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West Virginia Watch is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. West Virginia Watch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Leann Ray for questions: info@westvirginiawatch.com.
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