My Platform
Benefits from statewide settlements for Opioids and Big Tabacco that lack oversight and never reach our county
The opioid crisis hit West Virginia hard. We lost more people per capita to opioid overdoses than any other state. Jefferson County was hit hard too. In 2025 the Perdue Pharma and Sackler settlement for West Virginia was up to $55 million. West Virginia has secured over $1 billion total including money from other manufacturers like Johnson and Johnson, CVS, and Walgreens.
These settlement funds are supposed to be distributed to the 55 counties of our state by a private foundation called West Virginia First. WV First is supposed to distribute 72.5% of the settlement money to fund treatment, recovery and prevention programs, while 24.5% goes to the cities and counties.
This money was supposed to be aimed at addressing the crisis throughout the state, but has Jefferson County receive any of that money? No.
The governor appointed five members of the board and then the state was divided up into six regions, each choosing a representative. We are part of Region 2, represented by Timothy Czaja, who has much experience with addiction treatment. He understands the needs of the regions, and money has been given to Berkely County. Why not us?
These funds are intended to be used for addiction treatment and recovery, but we’re not seeing them. We have applied for it, too. Why aren’t our people being helped? Why aren’t we seeing the healthcare jobs and facilities meant to take care of our people?
If elected, I will work to bring these funds to our county. With it we will see jobs, healing, and better care.
Locality pay for our teachers and other public servants
In the state of West Virginia public servants, including teachers, are all paid based on the same formula regardless of where they live. All state tax money goes into the same pot, and even though we live in a higher income area and pay more taxes, our teachers get the same as those in low-income areas. On the surface this appears to be fair – low-income counties don’t get hurt by being unable to pay their teachers – but in practice it’s much more complicated.
In practice teachers in counties where the cost of living is low can live reasonably well, buy a house, and cover their bills. A teacher in Jefferson or Berkely County, however, receiving the same salary needs a second job or a spouse with a better income to cover these expenses. A teacher in Jefferson County who drives over the border into Loudoun County, Virginia or Frederick County, Maryland can expect a 40% increase in salary for doing the same job.
Why must our teachers make such sacrifices? Many do not. I spoke to one woman who lives in District 100 and teaches in Loudoun County. When I asked why she doesn’t teach here, she told me she would love to teach here but it would require her to take a $40,000 / year pay cut. How can we expect to attract good teachers, if we refuse to pay them properly?
So, what’s the solution?
The solution must be that we leave the base salary alone, or raise it, as all teachers need better pay. Then we use our own tax money to pay our teachers a supplement. We already do that with the school levy. Voters choose to send money from our taxes to pay our teachers. The problem is that the state has put a 1% cap on that levy, so it’s never enough. I propose that we change that. All counties in West Virginia should have the authority to decide how much to tax themselves and how much to help their public servants.
Why do we care so much?
Only 21% of the population of Jefferson County is under 18 years old, which means many of us don’t have children. Why do we care if the schools are well funded and the teachers earning enough to live here? Beyond the fact that the teachers are hardworking, dedicated people who deserve to be paid enough to get by, paying teachers properly helps improve schools and better schools attract people with good incomes to our county. This increases our tax basis and property values. It makes it easier for us to pay for services that we all depend on. Good schools lift communities.
Bottom line: We care about our children, our teachers, and our communities.
Secondary road repair, maintenance, and improvements
About 25 years ago, the state of West Virginia offered to take over the maintenance of the roads in our subdivisions. Many in our district, including Shannondale agreed to this. It seemed like a good deal at the time, but the thing is, the state agreed to maintain the roads as they were, but not to make any improvements.
A quarter century later, our infrastructure is not adequate for our growing communities. Many roads are too narrow, they are rutted and full of potholes, and important service vehicles like school busses, trash pick-up, Amazon trucks, and emergency services cannot get to our homes.
Our county is not the only one in West Virginia with such problems. The entire state is full of secondary roads that are falling apart. You could say it’s worse here, because unlike other parts of the state, our population is growing. But it is bad everywhere and that is important, because that means that delegates from across the state need to address the problem in their regions too. It means that if we fight for it, we can get the votes to fix this problem.
In 2017 $2.8 billion Roads to Prosperity program and the Secondary Roads Initiative was funded by a $1.6 billion bond authorized by voters and by consumer sales tax on vehicles and taxes on gasoline. While 1,231 of the intended 1,320 Roads to Prosperity projects have been completed the funding has been exhausted. And none of the roads in Shanondale or our other subdivision have been improved.
In addition to federal funds, West Virginia has a budget surplus. It’s time to turn those extra dollars to our projects and fix our roads.
Local control of big projects that impact our water, roads, and clean air
West Virginia’s government is more centralized that any other state. It’s top down and we get little say in what happens locally.
Data Centers: Last year, the legislature voted into law a measure that stripped us of our local control over data center projects.
House Bill 2014 – one of Governor Morrisey’s top priorities – created a microgrid program to encourage data centers to come to our beautiful state. One is planned right here in Jefferson County. Local laws that protect our water, our roads, our farmland, and our historic places are overruled by this bill.
We are already suffering a lower-than-average water table due to drought conditions. I have heard of three wells going dry in Bakerton alone. What happens when these people decide to build a datacenter that uses all our local electricity, pollutes our air,
creates noise and light pollution, and sucks up even more water until our wells are dry? Our farms generate a major part of our county’s wealth. What happens when there isn’t enough water for them? West Virginia already has the highest utility rates in the country. What happens when these data centers drive our electric bills even higher?
There have been outcries in each of the four counties where data centers are proposed and I think we can get HB-2014 repealed or at least amended to allow more local control.
If we regain local control, as I propose we do, we can demand that any company coming into our county follow our local laws. Our local authorities should be able to make requirements that any data center generates all the electricity it requires without impacting our electric bills; that it generates only green energy such as solar or wind power so it doesn’t impact our air or water quality; that it comply with local noise ordnances; and after the initial drawdown recycles all its water so it doesn’t lower our water table.
With local control we can say no when they try to take land that is precious to us such as historical treasures, critical wildlife, proximity to schools, or precious farmland. We need to be able to say no project shall encroach within 1000 feet of any of these things.
Local control doesn’t mean we can’t accept big projects, if we want them, but it allows us to accept them under our terms. Terms that Jefferson County agrees to.
Water Bottling Plants like Mountain Pure
Mountain Pure is proposing a water bottling plant in Jefferson County that would almost certainly lower our water table, hurt our farms, and cause irreparable damage to historic sites. It would allow 150 trucks to go through our towns and damage our roads, as if they weren’t already in bad enough shape.
The County Commission turned them down. They pointed to numerous local ordinances that prevented their plant, and still they persisted. They tried to sue the County Commission and lost. Now they’re appealing to the state supreme court. They should not have the right to steam roll their way into our lands and take what is ours. We need local control.
High power electric lines
Power lines that cross our county and ruin property values, but bring no benefit to the people living here, have been at issue as long as I can remember. Big companies look at our state and see only dollars signs without recognizing that there are people who live here. High power electric lines have been said to cause health risks. They certainly bring reduced property values. A woman from our district asked me what we can do to stop a power company from placing such a tower in her backyard. We can demand a stop. We can demand a return to local control of our resources and our land.
Utility Rates
Year after year, West Virginians have the lowest median family incomes in the US, yet we often have the highest utility burden. There are lots of reasons for this.
· We use more because we cannot afford energy efficient appliances, upgrades in home insulation, and we have a rough climate – hot as the deep south in summer and as cold as Boston in winter. Programs to aid our lowest income citizens in making improvements is a first step.
· Water bills average $121 – well above the national average of $49. Jefferson County is growing. With new people moving in at a high rate, we must invest in water, sewer, and grid infrastructure. Who pays for all this? Current users. Shouldn’t the companies building all these new houses pay the cost to the county of accommodating them? The don’t share their profits with us.
· Rate hikes. West Virginia’s continued reliance on coal means our electricity costs more than it would if we used green energy like solar, wind, or hydro power. There is a great nostalgia for the coal industry here. Coal towns built this state, started our history of unions, and brought prosperity to some. We take pride in that and don’t want to forget it. But coal mining and its associated jobs employ less than 12,000 people in our state. That’s 0.6% of our population. And the other 99.4% of us pay for this in higher electric bills, higher health costs, horrible environmental impacts, and loss of our beautiful scenic mountains that
could bring in tourist dollars instead. While West Virginia may not be ready to dispose of the existing coal mines, we should not authorize new ones. And we should not authorize rate hikes to our taxpayers to improve expiring mines or coal fired electric plants.
Gun Safety
Guns are a part of West Virginia culture, and I would never attempt to take them away from law abiding citizens. My daughter is a deer hunter, as was my mother in her younger years. My grandfather taught me to shoot a .22 when I was 12. I get it.
That said gun safety is a problem in our county. I moved here 25 years ago with two young children. Every single year that they were in school in Jefferson County someone they knew got shot. The man across the street from us got drunk and shot his father. A toddler shot his brother accidentally. A teacher committed suicide. This doesn’t have to happen. It’s tragic.
Because of this, I am very much in favor of gun safety. You may have seen me handing out gun locks at events in Shepherdstown. Those same gun locks are available free at the police station. Get them. Use them.
Remote gun storage is another great safety measure. If you only use your gun for fun at the shooting range, store it there. If you have guests coming to visit who don’t like guns, store yours at the police station. Gun owners are 25 times more likely to be killed by a gun than non-gun owners. If you don’t wish to have your gun stored remotely, keep yourself and your loved ones safe by keeping guns locked in a gun safe or at least with a gun lock.
Gun safety classes are available, and I am in favor of creating more of them.
Let’s be safe, West Virginia.
Foster Care
To say that foster care in West Virginia is a total failure is unfair to the many people who are striving to do their best for children while working under unreal conditions. I applaud them for all their efforts.
To say that foster care in West Virginia is working well is also false. There are about 6000 kids in foster care in this state, the highest rate in this country. Thousands of reports of abuse and neglect come in annually and there is no place to put the children. Many are housed in hotels, by themselves; some are in Air B & B’s; hundreds with mental health issues are sent to other states because we lack the facilities to treat them.
This is a bi-partisan issue. Sixteen bills were put forth to touch on different aspects of the problem. This is something that I think every legislator cares about.
But sixteen different bills have not gotten far enough in solving the myriads of problems with the system. I believe we need a commission to study what works in other states and we need to create a comprehensive plan that takes the best parts of their systems to complete a functional one of our own.
We need to work on prevention of abuse and neglect first and foremost. And we need to work on healing the children who we have taken into state care. Certainly, putting a neglected child in a hotel by his or herself isn’t going to make that child feel cared for. Sending that child to another state, far from any friends or familiar surroundings isn’t a solution either. We must be careful we don’t do more harm than good.
Immigration
Immigrants make up less than two percent of the population of West Virginia, less than any other state in the nation, even Alaska has more immigrants.
Immigration is a federal issue. I believe immigration laws need to be fairly enforced, but as a state legislator I will not have any authority to influence immigration law
Seniors
About twenty percent of West Virginia’s population is over 65. We consistently rank in among the top three oldest populations in the country. Since we also consistently have one of the highest poverty rates in the country, and our seniors are generally on fixed incomes, it makes sense to focus on their special needs.