By Kay Goodwin On June 22, 2015, the state’s Higher Education Policy Commission will consider a request by the Board of Governors of West Virginia University to increase tuition and fees on its in-state students by $670 a year. The proposed hike is just a hair short of ten percent.[Read More…]
Opinion
The Editorial category is a roundup of links to editorials and columns from West Virginia newspapers.
Column: Age-old threats to freedom of speech
“The moment somebody says, ‘Yes, I believe in free speech, but…’ I stop listening,” says Salman Rushdie, who knows something about freedom of expression and its costs. We’ve all heard arguments from what Rushdie calls “the ‘but’ brigade.” “I’m a passionate defender of free speech, but there have to be limits.” “Free speech[Read More…]
The Charleston Gazette: Coalfield distress
From the editorial page of The Charleston Gazette: Researchers at West Virginia University found that coal mines in the northern half of the state are doing well, increasing output by 8 percent per year between 2011 and 2014. But mining in southern counties is an economic tragedy. Southern production fell[Read More…]
Decision highlights need for new appellate court
An editorial from the Charleston Daily Mail CHARLESTON, W.Va. — In 2010, critics of West Virginia’s justice system were calling attention to the fact that this state was the only one in the country that did not grant litigants an automatic right to appeal lower court decisions. The West Virginia Supreme[Read More…]
No boom will follow this bust
An editorial from The Dominion Post MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Historically, there was always the promise of another boom in every bust. But not this time. This time it’s different throughout West Virginia’s coal industry. A week ago, Murray Energy announced more than 1,800 miners at nine locations across the state will be unemployed by late[Read More…]
EPA initiatives’ impact on GDP, power rates critical
An editorial from The Intelligencer/Wheeling News-Register WHEELING, W.Va. — Obama’s climate change initiatives have tended to focus on the devastation they already are wreaking to the beleaguered coal industry. That may well play right into the president’s hands, politically. It is comparatively difficult to gain much support in Congress, not[Read More…]
PSC apparently fails to look out for consumers
An editorial from The Register-Herald BECKLEY, W.Va. — The approval this week of a massive rate hike for customers of Appalachian Power took us — and a lot of other ratepayers — by surprise. The utility’s president, Charles Patton, says the new higher rates for his company push West Virginia “more[Read More…]
Hard choices are needed to close road funding gap
An editorial from The Journal MARTINSBURG, W.Va. — West Virginians did not need the national research group’s study released earlier this month to tell us we have some of the worst roads in the country. Many of us are reminded of that every time we go to work. For nearly three[Read More…]
U.S. energy policy makes no sense
A column by Mike Myer, executive editor of The Intelligencer/Wheeling News-Register WHEELING, W.Va. — How crazy is U.S. energy policy? Try this: More than one-fourth of the oil we use in this country comes from other nations. We import nearly twice as much as we did in 1973-74, when the Arab[Read More…]
Sick-leave payouts should follow the rules
An editorial from The Herald-Dispatch HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Huntington City Council member Scott Caserta sparked a firestorm last week when he asked Cabell County’s prosecutor to investigate whether a payout of nearly $34,000 to a former city police chief for accrued sick time violated a city ordinance. Within two days,[Read More…]