By Lacie Pierson, Charleston Gazette-Mail
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — All of West Virginia is a tax reform battlefield for Gov. Jim Justice and state Senate majority leaders.
As Justice mounts an offense against a proposed constitutional amendment and a Senate tax reform plan, Senate President Craig Blair, R-Berkeley, and Finance Chairman Eric Tarr, R-Putnam, likewise are countering Justice by calling him out for what they say are mischaracterizations of their plan and challenging him to a public debate on the issue.
Blair and Tarr released their challenge Tuesday morning, a few hours before Justice took to the parking lot of the Kanawha County Courthouse with Revenue Secretary Dave Hardy, who served as a Kanawha County commissioner before working for Justice, to rally support for his tax reform plan and blast the Senate’s plan.
Blair stood in the crowd and listened to Justice, Hardy, Deputy Revenue Secretary Mark Muchow, and Kanawha County Commission President Kent Carper tout the governor’s plan, poke holes in the Senate’s plan, and overall ask West Virginians to vote “no” on Amendment 2…
