A measure to reject a new rule that would require all bills to have statements regarding job impacts went through lengthy floor debate before being approved by the West Virginia House of Delegates this morning.

House Resolution 8 – introduced by Del. Patrick Lane, R-Kanawha – would amend the rules of the House, requiring legislation to include a jobs impact statement, which would show whether legislation has a positive or negative impact on jobs in the state. The House Rules Committee moved the measure to the House floor, recommending it be rejected.

Legislation in the House already requires fiscal notes to show the cost of bills to the state budget. The West Virginia State Senate is considering similar legislation in Senate Bill 82, sponsored by Sens. Evan Jenkins, D-Cabell; Michael Oliverio, D-Monongalia; and Ron Stollings, D-Boone.

“Jobs are number one; we all know that,” said Lane. “We all campaign on jobs and we all talk about jobs. We all introduce bills that are intended to create jobs in West Virginia. The problem is we don’t know for sure when we’re looking at a piece of legislation whether or not it’s going to have a positive jobs impact or a negative jobs impact. It just seems to me that we ought to have that information.”

According to the most recent data from WorkForce West Virginia, the state’s unemployment rate rose to 8.6 percent in December 2009, leaving approximately 67,400 people out of work.

“In West Virginia we’re behind the national economy; we’re still losing jobs every month,” explained Lane. “We’ve got to help those people that are in quicksand. We owe it to those families…We in this body cannot afford to bury our heads in the sand and say ‘I don’t want to know the impact of this bill on jobs.’”

“This is just information, it’s not passing a bill,” added Del. Jonathan Miller, R-Berkeley. “It has nothing to do with conservative or liberal philosophy. It’s simply information for us to gather to make a better decision. I know from visiting other legislatures they do this. The Maryland Legislature, in particular, is one that does this. I’m just curious why this body would reject this rule change?”

House Democrats rose in favor of passing the motion to reject the rule, citing concerns about the cost of formulating the statements, the time it would waste when trying to pass legislation, and the possible growth of government it would cause.

“We introduce 2,000 bills a year,” said Del. Mike Ross, D-Randolph. “I don’t know how many (bills) would require this…but it would be a big waste of money.”

“We have a requirement for a fiscal note because we have a constitutional responsibility to balance our budget,” added Del. John Doyle, D-Jefferson. “While I agree with (Miller) that we have a moral responsibility to create jobs, we have no constitutional duty to do so.”

Doyle expressed concerns about what other groups may insist upon notes or statements, including statements on environmental and health care impacts. The delegate also called for the creation of a legislative budget office in order to better scrutinize bills without relying on the Governor’s Office to provide notes and statements.

“We have no business passing the buck to the executive branch for every damned decision we make here, but that’s what we’re doing when we ask them for a note on everything,” explained Doyle. “I think we should restructure our operations to the point where we have something like the Congressional Budget Office so we can find out what the numbers really are rather than asking the executive branch.”

Del. Daryl Cowles, R-Morgan, accused the Democrats of being against the rule in order to try to hide the positive impacts that Republican legislation may or may not have. Del. Virginia Mahan, D-Summers, retorted that by supporting the rule the Republicans were supporting the growth of government – a move that could be considered hypocritical.

“I feel this bill will add a huge, dense layer of government,” said Mahan. “I can’t even comprehend what the cost would be. It’s preposterous to me, and I don’t mean any insult by that, but preposterous that we’d be discussing adding this much government and this much cost of government from that party that appears to be more interested in less government and less cost.”

The rule was rejected 66 to 30.

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