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 need to be included in West Virginia law in order to best serve the interests of all the parties involved?



I take a little bit different view of Marcellus shale regulations as opposed to some of the competitors in the race. My view is what West Virginia does way too often is mess up a good opportunity. This is an opportunity, the Marcellus shale, for tremendous economic development, and there’s all this clamoring for additional regulation and so forth in that area. We have good regulations in place. Our issue is that we do not have a sufficient number of inspectors to go out and monitor the well sites and the material that is coming from the well and so forth. If we fund the additional inspectors to the degree that will provide enough inspectors to go out and do their work, then I think we have the regulations in place. I haven’t seen anything to the contrary. It is imperative that we protect our water resources and ensure that our surface owners are protected from undue harm to our land and so forth. We have those regulations in place, so to the extent that I have heard some of my fellow delegates talking about moratoriums on Marcellus shale until we can get additional regulations. I don’t feel that’s needed. I think we need to encourage this development and move forward and let West Virginia prosper with this great economic opportunity.



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

From an OPEB perspective, the Legislature started to deal with that. We put study groups in place and so forth, but we need to address the benefit side of this prior to imposing any additional taxes on the citizens of West Virginia, which is the plan in the Democrat majorities — to put additional taxes. We cannot as a people, as a state, as a society, afford to fund retirement packages and health care benefits for those who are 55 years old. We need to absolutely address that. My way of doing that wouldn’t be to affect current retirees, but for those in their 30s, perhaps even in their early 40s, we need to lay out a plan to say you need to plan your retirements in such a way to know that you will not be able to retire when you are 55. We will continue to work to draw full retirement and get your health care benefits. Right now, we are at $8 billion liability in that because previous Legislature didn’t have the responsibility and foresight to set aside money. They just promised benefits without setting aside the funding for it. It’s actuarially $8 billion in the hole, and I think we need to address the liability side of this prior to the revenue side.



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



The infrastructure in our state is in the worst condition, from a road perspective, than I’ve ever seen it. Old-timers have told me it’s the worst that they’ve seen it. We have, in my view, a couple of ways to address this. It has to do with the cost structure of preparing and monitoring and addressing our roads situation. We have a prevailing wage structure here in West Virginia that is calculated on a scale that is not even comparable to a bid project. If we would look at reducing our cost, basically get more for our money. Let’s face it, we had a $200 million surplus this year in our state budget, and I think we need to put that money in road repair and maintenance. That’s my view on it. Frankly, if there’s anything I would leave with the Beckley Register-Herald, it’s the fact that I am not going to increase the size of this state’s government. I’m not going to increase taxes to address any issue here. I’m going to use the budget we have, re-prioritize, and to the extent we have any surpluses, they are going into infrastructure projects. That’s what the long-term benefits will accrue to in West Virginia. That’s how we’ll keep our roads in place. Some people ask, “Will our gas taxes go to that, our fuel taxes?”

We’re already among the highest in the nation. Certainly higher than surrounding states, so no additional gas taxes.



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?



The education reform package that now Sen. Manchin put forth was a complete failure when it hit the Legislature. I was supportive of many of those initiatives. I am a supporter of charter school options. I am supporter of school voucher options. I want to return control of the schools to the local county boards of education. In my view, the state is an impediment to progress and achievement in the local counties. I think no one knows better what is best for their school systems than people in those local communities. I absolutely believe we should provide rankings, grades, achievement mechanisms so that parents can evaluate the performance of their school systems. But, to the extent that we return that control to the local counties, we will be better served, we’ll have a more efficient education system. Frankly, in West Virginia we spend among the highest in the nation on per capita students, per student expenditures. We’re not getting the results for that. I think we need to evaluate teachers on an annual basis, we need to get the unions out of the classrooms and allow teachers to teach and get the state government to return control from the state department of education to the local counties. I think that, in and of itself, will improve school performance here in West Virginia.



5 — We are constantly 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?



I’ve got a great solution for this. This is going to — and I’m going to put this out on my YouTube videos — this is my solution: I will propose and already have proposed and authored legislation to provide random drug testing for public welfare recipients. I’m not picking on the poor by doing this. I’m setting up a mechanism to assist us from this crisis of drugs in our state. There are solutions of three- or four-fold on this. The first is that we need jobs and opportunity here. I think these problems proliferate more commonly in areas that are economically depressed. So, to the extent that we don’t have the jobs, the hope and the opportunities where people can see a brighter future, they’re directed into these derogatory practices. The second thing is that to the extent that people that go to work have to be drug tested. Anybody that has a job has go in and get a drug test to do it. For those who are obtaining public assistance, and there are certainly many needed cases where that is required, we want to help those people, but they should also be subjected to a random drug test. It’s random, so it’s not that expensive to the state. The benefits of doing that will absolutely accrue to the people of West Virginia. We will interdict on those who have addiction and put them in counseling programs, but I think overnight, this program will do more to alleviate this drug problem than any other proposal I’ve heard from an other candidate. Absolutely, drug test those on public assistance.



Please highlight the key points of your gubernatorial platform.



From the perspective of a candidate in West Virginia, I have been in the Legislature fighting for the Republican, free-market, capitalistic reforms that I think are needed and required to put West Virginia on the path to prosperity. I have a record of doing that. The others can say they will come into the process and “I would do this, I would do that,” but the issue with me is that I have done it. I have taken the arrows for having done it.

Different unions groups, because I stood for certain values in West Virginia that I know will put our state on the path to prosperity. When I came into the Legislature, when Gov. Manchin was talking about selling all of the bonds... He was going to sell all of the bonds, invest the money in the stock market and pay off all of our debt. Can you imagine if we had done that? We’d be bankrupt as a state. I was one of the few legislators that said no to that.

Fortunately, the people of West Virginia said no to that. I was instrumental in putting forth the medical malpractice reforms that keeps our doctors in state. I was instrumental in supporting — and I introduced it long before Gov. Manchin did — privatizing workers’ compensation. Along those lines of free market reforms that I want to promote business here in West Virginia that will get the government out of our lives and invigorate and energize the private sector economy in West Virginia, that for so long as been picked on by the public sector, that I know that will turn West Virginia around.

 I have a very specific plan to do that, and it revolves around taxes. Our corporate net income tax in West Virginia is 40 percent higher than surrounding states. The business franchise tax that we have that no one else has, and a tax on business inventory and equipment — that is crazy. Nobody else has even contemplated that.

Those are the taxes West Virginia businesses face when they walk into here, and it drives businesses out. Those things we will absolutely address. The other thing is the courts system. We need a right to appeal here in West Virginia. Whether we do it through an intermediate court, or a judiciary that has absolute rules that require appeals, we have to give businesses and individuals the knowledge that, if they get an adverse ruling in circuit court, they have at least the opportunity to appeal that.

A big business will not put its balance sheet on the line in a court by a partisan elected judge, which is the element of my plank in the court system to make our judicial election nonpartisan. Finally, I want to do a complete overhaul and review of our regulatory process in West Virginia. When the Legislature says they don’t increase taxes, that may be true, but your fees, which are a quasi-tax, have gone up dramatically. So, we have too many cooks in the kitchen in regard to our regulatory process. That plank of tax reform, civil justice reform and regulatory reform will energize this state and our business community and put us on a path to growth and prosperity.

 I think that’s what we need. It’s what we have not had for too long in West Virginia, and I think I’m the person that can deliver that message and bring it to not only West Virginians, but to America and the broader worldwide community to make West Virginia a place where people want to come and do business — wild, wild, wonderful West Virginia.