1 — It certainly appears that Marcellus shale regulation will remain a major topic of interest for the next several years. What are the key features that you see that need to be included in West Virginia law to best serve the interests of all the parties involved?



I think there’s several areas that need to be addressed in the Marcellus shale legislation. Obviously, the drilling and what happens with the water that’s used to frack and how that water is disposed of, the environmental concerns out there. We need to look at the transportation issue, dealing with what will be happening with our roads. Some of these wells are on very narrow, rural roads that really cannot stand the weight. We need to look at the whole drilling process in West Virginia. These are things that our Department of Environmental Protection and Secretary (Randy) Huffman are doing now. They worked with all the stakeholders last year and came up with a bill that was introduced by DEP this past session. Obviously, I was very disappointed that neither the DEP’s bill nor the one that was recommended by the interims committee was adopted by the House of Delegates.

 I think it’s just so important that we have the rules on the books, everyone knows the rules we’re going to play by as we go into this new venture called Marcellus drilling in West Virginia. The other part of it obviously is the jobs that can be created by the waste product. Once that’s run through a cracker, I think it can really revitalize our manufacturing jobs in West Virginia and be able to create thousands of them. And it’s a huge investment to put in crackers. My understanding is it’s over a billion dollars to put one of those in. From the amount of gas and the byproduct we have, I think we can probably support two of those in the state of West Virginia.



2 — As the debt for OPEB continues to rise, what steps need to be taken to stem the tide and begin reversing this trend?



I think we’re as close right now as we have been, and obviously the Senate, in particular, has pushed very hard for the last two or three years to try to address the problems. I think it came down to just the funding source this year. The other areas have been basically agreed upon. The House proposed we take a quarter of a billion dollars out of our Rainy Day Fund. I strongly disagree with that. Our Rainy Day Fund is one of those things that are pots of money out there that has really helped the bond rating agencies that upgrade our bond rating to AA-1, which is one step away from their highest ratings, especially with Moody’s.

 I think that what we need to do, and I think what we can do, is the $95 million that has been dedicated to pay off the old fund workers’ compensation liability out there, that fund should be paid off in either 2015 or 2016. I would suggest that we take that money that’s already going to pay that one liability, redirect that money to paying down our OPEB liability in the state of West Virginia.

 I think with the other change recommended in the bill out there, that this will put us on a payout plan that West Virginians can afford to do. It will be very similar to the same things that we did with our unfunded liabilities in workers’ comp and our teachers’ retirement system. Obviously, we’re about 20 years into the 40-year payoff plan for teachers’ retirement. But I think the bond rating agencies are looking at it, that we have made every single payment every year that we said we would do. That’s one of the reasons that we are continuing to get our bond upgrades.



3 — Transportation remains a significant issue, especially in our region. What, specifically, will you do as governor to try to resolve t he funding crisis as it relates to financing new construction and providing for adequate maintenance of our existing roads and bridges?



One of the things that I did this year was veto a $47 million fee increase on the taxpayers in this state. I think there’s a lot of families, a lot of senior citizens, and so forth that are having a tough time out there. And I didn’t think it was the appropriate time to put another $47 million in fees on our taxpayers out there. This spring, we’ll have a very aggressive paving program on our secondary roads. That’s one that has not been put out there for the last several years. But we realized the shape that they’re getting in.

As far as additional money out there, we’re fortunate in West Virginia we’re about $30 million over our estimates so far this year in our state road fund. That’s an additional money that will be able to be used toward especially our secondary roads. Where I have a concern right now is the new construction and replacement, especially our interstate and major thoroughfares in West Virginia. We’ve been very fortunate over the years to have Sen. Byrd, who has been able to earmark hundreds of millions of dollars for various roads and projects. Obviously, we’ll miss him very much on the Washington scene up there. But also the fact that the federal highway trust fund is broke. With the current crisis and Congress up there, I’m not sure that there’s an appetite right now for them to come up with another way of being able to fund our highway trust funds. It would be so much simpler if they were to either put on a federal weight tax or a federal gasoline tax and be able to redistribute that back to the states. Because I can guarantee you that West Virginia will be ready, willing and able to match every single dollar that comes from the federal government.  Right now, until Congress kind of gets their act together and decides which way they’re going, especially with our interstate system, it’s going to be hard for us to continue to build new roads, because we simply can’t afford with 1.8 million people to build those roads without federal help.

 I’m not sure we should raise the state gasoline tax right now. I think if our economy continues to improve, that you will see our highway funds continuing to rise just as we have this year. We’ve been fortunate not only with the amount of gasoline but also the registration fees. We’ve had other fees that are being paid. That’s the reason we’re up $30 million over our estimates this year. So if our economy continues to improve in West Virginia, I think our state road funds will go up. But that’s not to say we should not be looking for down the road an alternative source of funding for our highways system in West Virginia, especially if the federal government does not agree to give us any additional funds as matching funds.



4 — One of former Gov. Joe Manchin’s major platform issues was education reform. While much was discussed, no wide-ranging changes to the way we educate our children have been made in the recent past. What are your plans when it comes to education reform?



One of the problems that we have in West Virginia is our high dropout rate. I think this is completely unacceptable that West Virginia has the highest dropout rate in the country of our high school students. One of the bills that I introduced this year and the Legislature passed was the one to empower local community groups to try to intervene and encourage and mentor those children that are having problems at home, rather than having some statewide or a group run out of the state Department of  Education. This will allow local groups to apply for funds, because it’s my opinion that the local communities, people know best which children are having problems. They know the families that may not be encouraging or getting the children up and getting them off to school the way they should be. This would allow them to do some intervention in order to try to explain the importance of getting a high school education and going on to get additional post-high school education, whether it be a trade school, or community and technical college or four-year institution, and to work with them. We have several successful programs around the state that’s operating now, that’s doing that and showing some results. That’s one thing. We’ve got to keep our kids in school.

We’ve got to continue to monitor at least our 180 days, and I think one of the things we can do is take the ends off both ends, because we have a very diverse state. Some parts of the state get a lot more snow than others and let them be able to adjust their own county calendar.

One of the bills I was very disappointed that I introduced that we did not pass, since we cannot get differential pay in West Virginia, is one that would — and everyone talks about the need for math and science teachers — what this would do is not be differential pay, but it would help. It will pay down a student loan for any students who would locate in a high need area and teach math and science. I still think we need evaluations of teachers, not necessarily all based on the test scores but on the students’ progress to make sure if we get teachers who are not up to par, we can get them up to par, and those that are good teachers, we can make them great teachers by doing an annual evaluation.

I do not think charter schools will work in West Virginia. We have debated that, and that’s one of the reasons I did not re-introduce that bill this year. It’s worked in some places; they’ve been successful. In other places, they have not. And it seems to me it’s been more successful in the more urban areas. West Virginia is more of a rural state.



5 — We are constantly being told, and are witnessing every day, the far-reaching impacts of drug abuse. What will you do as governor to address the epidemic and do you have any specific plans for interdiction efforts?



Absolutely, we do have a drug problem in the state of West Virginia, and I think we’ve got one all across our nation. But in West Virginia, ours seems to be located in pockets. Some areas, it’s prescription drugs. Some areas, it’s the traditional street drugs of cocaine and so forth. Then you’ve got other areas, the meth labs and so forth. Yes, we do have a major problem. Prescription drugs is one of the biggest problems we have in this state. I think how we can better control that is to use technology and have the networks out there. Currently in West Virginia, every prescription that is written goes into the Board of Pharmacy and can be seen out there, if our doctors are prescribing more than what I guess what the normal prescription rate would be for doctors. The problem that we have is we have so many borders around the state and especially the problems we have with the people in Florida not having the reporting mechanism that we have. People can doctor shop there easily to run right across the state line and have another doctor. I’ve been working with other governors and started working with other legislative leaders to be able to get into an interstate compact where a doctor that pulls up a patient’s name can see if they been given, in another state, either Oxycontin or some other powerful drug being issued over there. I also understand, after having a conversation with Gov. Rick Scott, of Florida, that the problems we were having with the drugs coming in from Florida, I understand he has now agreed to maybe have Florida adopt a bill that would require the reporting also.

I think, first of all, if we can get those kind of networks through technology to be able to prevent the doctor shopping and going around shopping for these prescriptions, I think that would help tremendously.

The second thing is, we’ve got two major institutions — Bateman Hospital in Huntington and Sharpe Hospital up in the north-central part of the state. When we have people who need to be hospitalized for drug addiction, I think those hospitals are so crowded that they spend a very short period of time, and then those individuals are released back to their communities. I think we need better coordination with our community mental health centers. That once you get out of one of the state hospitals, that part of your deal, when you get out, is to have that continuing counseling and support back at one our local mental health centers. We’ve got them all around the state. That can happen. I think what’s happening now — we’re turning them loose from the hospital, they’re going back to the same community, same environment they started with. I think it’s so important, that if you don’t have that support, once you get out of one of these institutions, you’re going to fall right back in the drug use you had before.



(Should people getting public assistance be compelled to undergo drug testing?)



I have mixed feelings on that. If they’re tested and found to be positive, then what do you do with them? Do you cut their welfare off? It sounds like a way to clean up some drug abuse that may be going on with welfare recipients. Not sure if you cut them off welfare, then what happens to them? It’s one of those things. I don’t know what you do with them. I know there are certain people, certain individuals, members of the Legislature, that would like to see that. I’m not really sure what we would accomplish. I think, as a society, we don’t want to see people laying on the street because they’re starving to death.



Please highlight the key points of your gubernatorial platform.



Let me just hit on a couple of things. One of the things I’m very proud of is the shape of West Virginia’s finances right now.  I think it’s something that did not happen overnight. It’s taken for the last 20 years to get West Virginia on the right track, where we’re not spending more money than we’re taking in. We’re being responsible. We’re paying down our debts out there, especially our retirement debts, and we’ve put ourselves on self-imposed, 40-year payoff plans, and fortunately, we’ve always insisted that we do pay down what’s required to what the actuaries say we owe out there. We’ve got one of the best-funded Rainy Day Funds in the entire country right now. We’ve been able to make some great strides through our School Building Authority, which we created our Infrastructure Council to continue to improve our infrastructure in West Virginia ,and during the past eight or nine years, while we’ve had the huge surpluses, rather than starting new programs, we have taken that money and put it into paying down our debt. And that’s the reason I think West Virginia is right now considered one of the primary states, a good state, to do business, because of the way we have handled our finances.

I’m very proud of the fact that we were able to land the Macy’s distribution center in the Eastern Panhandle. That’s one that’s been worked on for some time. They looked at 157 sites across the country. It came down to their home state of New York and West Virginia, and because of the financial conditions that they were facing in New York, and what they saw here in West Virginia, they chose us over their home state. And that’s for not expecting to have to pay additional taxes here the way they were in New York.

We haven’t had to increase people’s taxes. Our business taxes are being lowered. Right now, our corporate net is going from 8.5 to 6.5 percent over the next couple years. Our business franchise tax will be eliminated completely by 2015. We’re continuing in a responsible manner to lower our sales tax on food. It took a little nudging on my behalf this year to get the Legislature to drop the sales tax from 3 to 2 percent. I think it’s something we need to continue to phase out in a responsible manner. So, these are good things. My goals are to create a good business climate in West Virginia. I think it’s not up to the government to create jobs. It’s up to the private sector. We should give them a business climate where they can create the jobs out there to help create the wealth in this state. So, my primary goal is to increase jobs and continue to reduce taxes wherever possible.