The West Virginia House of Delegates chamber. (Perry Bennett | West Virginia Legislative Photography)
The West Virginia House of Delegates approved new rules for the chamber on Wednesday, officially ending the longstanding rule of requiring public hearings for bills when they are requested.
Under the newly adopted rules in House Resolution 1, members of the public — as well as experts, lobbyists and anyone else who wants to — will be allowed to testify on bills when they are being considered in committees through an invitation by the committee’s chair or vice chair. Those who cannot make it in person, according to the rules, can submit testimony in writing, which will be distributed to members of the committee.
In lieu of the previous system of public hearings — where lawmakers were not required to attend the hearings, and where speakers were often limited in time — the new rules restructured the entire committee process. Bills will now be considered over two days in committees, with public comments submitted and given on the first day.
Those who advocated for the new rules — namely the supermajority of Republicans who control the House — argued the changes will increase legislative transparency as well as build relationships between lawmakers and members of the public who testify on bills. Lawmakers will have the ability to ask speakers questions on their testimonies and dig deeper into concerns or issues about laws being considered. Those who can’t make it in person, they said, will still be able to submit written comments.
Last week, representatives for several progressive policy organizations made statements decrying the new rules. Doing away with public hearings as they’ve stood in the past, they said, will separate the public from the Legislature and decrease transparency within the process. One of the largest issues they noted with the rules was a lack of minimum notice requirements for committee agendas or meetings to be announced. Under previous rules, public hearings were required to be scheduled with at least 48 hour notice.
Without a notice requirement, the organizations argued, it will be difficult for individuals who don’t already work in the Capitol to attend committee meetings and speak on bills.
On Wednesday, Republican members of the House voted down an amendment to the rules from Del. Evan Hansen, D-Monongalia, that would have added a 48-hour notice requirement.
“There are some aspects of that new rule that I feel like we should fine tune to make it work better for us as legislators and to work better for the public who wants to be involved in our legislative process,” Hansen said. “They feel like it’s important to be heard, and without this amendment, I have a concern that they won’t be.”
Such a requirement, Hansen said, would also help ensure equity in the legislative process giving all members time to review bills and craft potential amendments. Under the new rules, lawmakers must submit any proposed amendments electronically to committee clerks two hours before the posted meeting time for them to be considered.
“As the minority party, if we don’t even know what bills are on the agenda with sufficient time, we don’t know what bills to prepare amendments for,” Hansen said. “In my opinion, that’s a flaw in the system.”
Del. Clay Riley, R-Harrison, urging members to vote down Hansen’s amendment, said that committee chairs would “work to achieve” the goal of giving adequate notice for meetings and agendas.
“However, we are in a limited time. We have 60 days in order to do the work for the people, the citizens of West Virginia, and including [a 48 hour mandated notice] in the rules may impact our ability as a body to service those citizens and to provide the services that are needed,” Riley said.
Another amendment, introduced by Del. John Williams, D-Monongalia, would have allowed minority chairs in committees as well as the committee chairs and vice chairs to invite people to testify on bills.
Those with issues on the proposed rules have said they worry that partisanship could limit who is invited to speak on bills in committees and who is not, as all committees are headed by Republicans.
Williams said that while he trusted certain committee chairs to call on everyone to speak, there are others he doesn’t know as well. Even more concerning, he said, is how the rules could be used in the future when there are completely different chairs.
House Majority Leader Pat McGeehan, R-Hancock, urged the body to vote down Williams’ amendment, saying that committee chairs need “to manage and take ownership of their committee process.”
“Informally, I’ve already extended an invitation to [Democrats] to come to my office. If that’s not being [done fairly], just let me know,” McGeehan said. “I’m not going to put it in the rules, because for certain types of management of the process, our chairs must have discretion to discriminate between what’s right, what’s wrong, what’s proper.”
Those two amendments were among nine introduced on the rules during Wednesday’s floor session. Others would have returned the previous public hearing guidelines to the rules, removed a policy banning signs, banners and posters, among other things, from the House floor and undone sections of the rules enacted in past sessions.
All of the introduced amendments were voted down via voice vote by a majority of House Republicans.
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