School Finance Committee to Meet to Discuss Education Funding

April 22, 2019

CHARLESTON, W.Va. – The West Virginia Board of Education’s (WVBE) committee on school finance and funding will meet at 10 a.m. on April 23 to continue discussions surrounding education funding. In addition to a diverse group of stakeholders, the committee will also include three representatives from the West Virginia Senate and three representatives from the West Virginia House of Delegates.

“Following discussions with the President of the Senate and Speaker of the House, we decided it would be beneficial to include representatives from the legislature to participate on the finance committee as we work to consider the funding formula and outline ideas for improving education in West Virginia,” said Tom Campbell, chair of the committee. “I want to express my appreciation to President Carmichael and Speaker Hanshaw for selecting members for this committee. This is the first time in memory that legislators have sat on a Board committee and this is symbolic of future working relationships.”

New committee members include Senators Craig Blair (R-Berkeley), Roman Prezioso (D-Marion) and Patricia Rucker (R-Jefferson) and Delegates Jason Barrett (D-Berkeley), Danny Hamrick (R-Harrison) and Eric Householder (R-Berkeley).

The committee’s focus has been to advocate for schools and teachers to receive the necessary resources to do their jobs effectively. The committee has considered issues such as teacher pay, retirement and benefits and the school funding formula.

“We aligned on recommendations several months ago, but felt it was important to reconvene the committee ahead of the special legislative session to continue these valuable discussions,” Campbell said.

In addition to legislators, the committee also includes WVBE members Scott Rotruck, Nancy White and Jim Wilson, representatives from the West Virginia Association of School Administrators (WVASA), the American Federation of Teachers (AFT-WV), the West Virginia Education Association (WVEA), the West Virginia School Board Association, the WV School Service Personnel Association, an elementary school principal, a high school principal and the West Virginia Department of Education’s Office of School Finance.

The committee will meet at 10 a.m. on April 23, 2019 in Capitol Building 6, Room 353 (Board Conference Room), 1900 Kanawha Boulevard, East, Charleston, West Virginia.  A live audio stream of the meeting will be available by visiting http://wvde.state.wv.us/boe/live.html.