By Steven Allen Adams, The Parkersburg News and Sentinel
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A skinny version of the budget bill for the next fiscal year is on the move, with a possible May special session being planned for once issues involving the possible clawback of COVID19 education funds is worked out.
The House of Delegates amended their version of the budget bill – House Bill 4025 – into Senate Bill 200, which was the Senate’s version of the budget, in a 74-16 vote Tuesday afternoon.
The House version of the general revenue budget for fiscal year 2025 beginning in July was just over $5 billion, which is nearly 5% less than the governor’s introduced budget of $5.265 billion and 1.4% more than the Senate budget bill of $4.934 billion.
But unlike past budget bills, the state has a looming possible $465 million that it might be required to spend on education due to not following federal rules regarding COVID-19 dollars for county school systems.
The state is in negotiations for the U.S. Department of Education for the second year in a row over the fiscal year 2023 maintenance of effort (MOE) waiver requirements. The state was required to maintain a certain level of annual education expenditures as a result of accepting more than $1.1 billion through three tranches of COVID-19 education funding via the U.S. Department of Education’s Elementary And Secondary School Emergency Relief Funds (ESSER).
