W.Va. Senate amends teacher pay raise to include locality bump, House challenges amendment

CHARLESTON, W.Va . (WSAZ) - On Friday, the West Virginia Senate voted to amend a bill that would give an average three percent pay raise to teachers, school personnel, and state police officers.

The amendment would add a locality-based raise on top of the 3 percent. Counties with a higher living cost will receive a higher pay bump in 2027, up to 20 percent, in addition to the 3 percent that all will receive next year.

All state employees will be receiving a 3 percent raise. The three groups of workers in the bill are required to have their raises go through the legislature as their salaries are a part of state code.

Saturday morning, the last day of the legislative session, the House rejected the locality-based pay amendment. The bill had already passed the House without the amendment before the Senate added it.

Senators and delegates must agree on a final version of the bill before it can head to Governor Morrisey’s desk, and they have until Saturday at midnight to do so.

When the locality-based raise was first brought up in the Senate Finance Committee, it received some pushback from senators concerned their districts would not benefit from it.

“I really want to vote for the pay raise, but it’s hard to vote for that when the bulk of my district is getting nothing,” Sen. Rupie Phillips (R-Logan) said in the Committee hearing Wednesday, “This is going to be a Debbie Downer for the counties getting zero.”

The bill was presented on the Senate floor on Friday with an amendment to the original amendment, which would give all counties at least a one percent raise. After debate, the amendment was adopted, and the bill was passed unanimously.

Dale Lee, co-President of the state’s teacher’s union Education WV, told WSAZ Friday that he understands some counties have a higher living costs than others, and that he is looking forward to continuing to work on the locality-based raise language.

“We have to address salaries of all of our educators and all of our people while recognizing those needs in the specific areas,” he said. “Because I want to make sure that we’re doing something that’s fair and equitable to everyone. And then we’re addressing the needs of all of our West Virginia educators.”

Sen. Amy Grady (R-Mason), also a public elementary school teacher, said the measure is also an attempt to keep teachers from moving across state lines.

“Part of the problem that we see is areas like our Northern Panhandle, we’re losing teachers because they can drive 20 minutes across the border and make $25,000 more,” Grady told WSAZ Friday evening. “You know, and that’s crazy. So, we’re trying to take into consideration the cost of living in different areas and how it’s higher.

“In the beginning, we had one [amendment] where some counties were missing out,” she continued. “So, we changed this morning really quickly, several of us met together to try to make sure every county at least got something.”

Once a county gets an increase, their pay can’t decrease, even the county’s median income and cost of living do.