dbeard@dominionpost.com
MORGANTOWN – A bill to require the Division of Highways to contract for snow removal on secondary roads in Monongalia and Preston counties barely squeaked out of the House of Delegates on Tuesday.
Across the Capitol in the Senate, a Holocaust education bill and a pharmacist prescription bill saw tweaks with amendments and will advance to third reading for passage on Wednesday.
The roads bill is HB 2960, sponsored by three Mon and two Preston Republicans. It makes the observation, “Snow removal on the secondary roads in Monongalia County and Preston County has not been dependable, providing a hardship on the citizens of West Virginia.”
It calls on the DOH to establish a two-year pilot program to put put requests for proposals to vendors to provide snow removal on Mon and Preston secondary roads.
The DOH will identify the roads to be plowed, the bill says. No contracted vendor is granted any immunity; and if a vendor provides substandard or unsatisfactory service, the DOH can terminate the contract with 30 days’ notice.
Finance chair Vernon Criss, R-Wood, objected to the bill, saying it creates an unfunded mandate by requiring the state to spend money without any federal funds available to bolster it.
The DOH already has the power to contract for services, he said. “Why pick two counties and not the entire state in this bill?”
Lead sponsor David McCormick said the plowing isn’t getting done, and it’s not unfunded – the DOH already has the budget to do it. And it’s just two counties because it’s a pilot. “This program is small on purpose.”
McCormick said the Jan. 19 fatal accident on the Cheat Lake Bridge on I-68 prompted him to introduce the bill. Maryland has a similar program and it works.
He cited one more reason for the bill: low DOH wages for CDL drivers in certain parts of the state. “In our district, they have a terrible manpower shortage. This solves that problem.
The vote was 50-48 with two delegates absent. In the what-if world, two more votes against would have tied the tally and killed the bill.
Mon County’s three Democrats voted for the bill, along with one Kanawha Democrat. The remaining five Democrats, including the one from Marion, voted no.
The bill now goes to the Senate.
Senate bills
SB 54 is the Holocaust bill, lead-sponsored by Sen. Mike Oliverio, R-Monongalia.
It’s one long sentence: “All public schools located within this state shall give age-appropriate instruction on the Holocaust, the systematic, planned annihilation of European Jews and other groups by Nazi Germany, a watershed event in the history of humanity, to be taught in a manner that leads to an investigation of human behavior, and an examination of what it means to be a responsible and respectful person.”
The bill says the instruction may not be given before grade 6.
The language reflects some wrestling last year and this year over some perceived “wokeness” in the original version, including references to “prejudice, racism, and stereotyping” in the original.
Bill co-sponsor Sen. Jack Woodrum, R-Summers, offered a successful floor amendment to add to the beginning of the sentence: “In collaboration with and utilizing guidance from the West Virginia Commission on Holocaust Education …”
The commission told The Dominion Post that the addition was crafted by Delegates Evan Hansen, D-Monongalia, and Mike Pushkin, D-Kanawha, to anchor the bill in existing legislation establishing the commission.
SB 526 is the Pharmacist Prescribing Authority Act, “to authorize pharmacists to practice the full extent of their education and training to prescribe low-risk medications to patients.”
The bill had advanced to third reading on March 17 but was kicked over to the Rules Committee where it was rewritten and advanced again to third reading on Tuesday.
The Rules amendment allows pharmacists to prescribe drugs – except controlled substances – for conditions that do not require a new diagnosis, have a diagnostic test that is waived under federal guidelines as “simple laboratory examinations and procedures that have an insignificant risk of an erroneous result,” or are patient emergencies in the pharmacist’s professional judgment.
It allows the pharmacist to notify, within 72 hours, the patient’s primary care physician of the test results and the drugs prescribed.
Senators also adopted an additional amendment offered by Sen. Patrick Martin, R-Lewis, to limit a prescription supply to 30 days and to require the pharmacist to notify the PCP if more than a 10-day supply is prescribed.
