Today we learned that Charleston Mayor Danny Jones is proposing a tax reform package to pay for upgrades to the Charleston Civic Center. The tax reform package includes both tax reductions and the adoption of a city sales tax. The tax reductions include eliminating the Business and Occupation (B&O) tax on manufacturing and reducing the…
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Last week, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Tina Rosenburg had an op-ed in the New York Times on how countries can avoid the resource curse. While the brunt of the article focused on how unstable countries are vulnerable to building a shared prosperity from their rich natural resources, Rosenburg highlighted Alaska and its permanent fund as…
The governor's FY 2014 budget was released this week. We'll have our full analysis of the budget next week, but for now, here's a preview: Revenues are expected to be down, with the General Revenue Fund projected to bring in $4.140 billion, a $9 million decrease from FY 2013. And while the Lottery Fund is…
On Wednesday, the governor gave his annual State of the State address. From a policy point of view, Governor Tomblin made several pronouncements regarding education, child well-being, prison reform and substance abuse that deserve high praise. However, the governor also left me scratching my head regarding his proposal to deal with the state's budget gap…
Today, nearly one in three young children (under age 6) in West Virginia lives in poverty. For a family of four that means living on a income of about $20,000 a year in 2012. Child poverty is a persistent and growing problem in West Virginia. That's why it's so important that State Senate Majority Leader…
(Continued from Part 6 - published 1/22/2013) Raising real property taxes or the sales tax aren't the only ways to offset the losses from eliminating the personal property tax in West Virginia. For example, last year's H.B. 4473 called for using the proceeds from the proposed future fund to reduce the personal property tax burden on businesses. Advocates for the…
As many people may know, West Virginia ranks very high in home ownership among the 50 states. In fact, according to the latest Assets & Opportunities Scorecard released by the Corporation for Economic Development, West Virginia had the 3rd highest rate of home ownership in the nation in 2011 at 72.3 percent. While home ownership…
Over the past few weeks, Ted and I have looked at education in West Virginia, both as a reaction to the governor's education audit, and the likelihood that education reform will be a major topic in the upcoming legislative session. First I broke down West Virginia's education spending, and found that with a few exceptions,…
Today's Charleston Gazette noted that the State Advisory Council of Students is planning to petition Governor Tomblin over proposed budget cuts to the state's higher education system. The students are concerned that any state cuts would result in higher tuition, making college less affordable for many students, and pushing more students into debt. However, even…