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Can WV Dems Deliver? · Commentary - TJ Meadows

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  Speaker 1: Most of the political buzz around the capitol right now
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  Speaker 1: is focused on Republican supermajorities and the governor's State of
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  Speaker 1: the State address. Democrats, by contrast, are small in number,
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  Speaker 1: just nine members in the House and two in the Senate,
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  Speaker 1: which makes it harder for their priorities to break through.
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  Speaker 1: After a kitchen table tour around the state, Democrats say
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  Speaker 1: they're focused on four things. Utility bills, childcare, healthcare, and housing.
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  Speaker 1: Those are real issues for real West Virginia families. The
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  Speaker 1: tougher question is this, what specifically would Democrats do to
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  Speaker 1: fix them? Take utilities? Running against electric rates is nothing new.
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  Speaker 1: One of the best to ever do it was a
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  Speaker 1: Virginia legislator named Ward Armstrong. He didn't really run against opponents,
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  Speaker 1: he ran against power bills. He was David Utilities or Goliath.
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  Speaker 1: But Armstrong likely understood something very important. There's only so
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  Speaker 1: much you can actually do to lower rates. Ideas like
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  Speaker 1: electing public service commissioners get floated from time to time.
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  Speaker 1: Some states do that now, but there's no clear evidence
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  Speaker 1: it leads to lower bills. Because rate making is governed
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  Speaker 1: by law and regulatory rules, not politics, rate freezes they
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  Speaker 1: usually just delay the pain and risk bigger increases later,
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  Speaker 1: cheaper bills come from more people and more businesses, more
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  Speaker 1: customers sharing fixed costs. That's the reality now. Housing is
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  Speaker 1: the problem of supply or cost. The honest answer is both,
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  Speaker 1: and both are areas where markets tend to do the
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  Speaker 1: heavy lifting. Over time, developers build where the economics work.
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  Speaker 1: More supply eventually helps moderate prices, including rents. The state
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  Speaker 1: is already involved through the West Virginia Housing Development Fund,
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  Speaker 1: a public agency created to help expand affordable housing. Since
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  Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine, it's issued more than four point five
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  Speaker 1: billion in bonds and helped finance more than one hundred
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  Speaker 1: sixty five thousand housing units statewide. Healthcare democrats point to
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  Speaker 1: the Medicaid cliff, where a small raise in income can
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  Speaker 1: be losing coverage altogether. That's largely a federal issue, but
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  Speaker 1: the state may may be able to soften the landing.
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  Speaker 1: Childcare ideas like tri share models deserve attention, but they
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  Speaker 1: also run into political reality West Virginia's strong appetite for
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  Speaker 1: tax cuts and spending restraints. Democrats deserve time to explain
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  Speaker 1: the details, but even with a solid plan, they still
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  Speaker 1: face a Republican supermajority and an election year. So can
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  Speaker 1: Democrats deliver? Ask me on day sixty one