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Every day in West Virginia, thousands of low-income families rely on public child care assistance. In 2011, the West Virginia Child Care Program – which is funded primarily through the federal Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and state matching funds – provided financial assistance to more than 24,000 children whose parents…

Last week, Gov. Jim Justice stood on a stage with balloons, banners and giant scissors to celebrate what his team hailed as a historic revenue announcement. The announcement? State revenues hit a complicated trigger formula which will automatically reduce the personal income tax by about $80 million — resulting in an estimated extra 85 cents…

As the Gazette reported on Wednesday, the WV Department of Highways is pushing a bill to study the feasibility of replacing or supplementing the motor fuel tax with a vehicle miles traveled (VMT)  tax to help address the declining State Road Fund revenue which is partly due to more fuel efficient vehicles. The VMT tax…

Overview Read the full brief here. West Virginia’s state constitution requires that, “the Legislature shall provide, by general law, for a thorough and efficient system of free schools.”  But due to a confluence of factors, including a growing Hope Scholarship voucher program, declining state revenues due to sweeping tax cuts, and the end of federal…

Earlier this week the House Finance committee passed SB 841, hastily drafted legislation that would make major changes to the state’s unemployment insurance system to the detriment of the state’s workers. These changes include cutting the number of weeks of unemployment benefits available to the state’s unemployed workers, reducing overall benefits for many workers, and increasing…

After five years of flat budgets, lawmakers returned to Charleston for the 2024 legislative session with many important spending priorities to address major needs. Members of the Republican majority have said they want to provide pay raises for public employees and raise starting salaries in sectors with vacancies, increase provider reimbursement rates, and address child care affordability and provider sustainability. Meanwhile,…

For Immediate Release: January 19, 2024 Contact: Kelly Allen, (304)-612-4180 Charleston, WV – The West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy (WVCBP), an independent research and advocacy organization working to advance public policies that increase opportunity and eliminate inequities for children and families, announces that it will be serving as the KIDS COUNT® partner for the state of West…

For Immediate Release: February 25, 2021Contact: Dana Kuhnline, (304) 825 3262 Links to report and summaries: New PERI report (Link)ReImagine Appalachia summary of new PERI report (Link)Infographic summary of report findings Link to Zoom event recording:  Facebook Live Charleston, WV - The Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) released a report today showing that the ReImagine Appalachia (RA) blueprint could create…

Yesterday, Governor Jim Justice unveiled his long-awaited proposal to reduce the state personal income tax. As currently structured, it would raise West Virginia’s sales tax to 7.9 percent, making it the highest state sales tax in the country, and effectively making our combined state and local sales tax rate 8.4 percent, higher than that of any of our surrounding…

WVCBP executive director Kelly Allen recently met with the Dominion Post Editorial Board to explain how the Justice administration has set the state up for budgetary crisis in the coming years. You can read an excerpt from the Dominion Post's editorial below: Unlike many other states, the governor of West Virginia has the constitutional power to set…