Supreme Court public campaign finance bill signed
by admin on 25/03/10 at 7:42 am
The Register-Herald
By Mannix Porterfield
March 24, 2010
— Manchin had proposed such a bill as a pilot project to gauge the success of publicly financed campaigns in West Virginia.
Strictly on a voluntary basis, candidates in a contested primary in 2010 may get $200,000, while those who run without opposition would collect $50,000.
In the general election, candidates who choose to use public financing would be given $350,000 if they have opponents, while those running unopposed would get $35,000.
Originally, the measure included a variety of funding mechanisms, including an increase in fees attorneys pay to file cases in circuit courts, but those were eliminated at the insistence of Senate Finance Chairman Walt Helmick, D-Pocahontas, who opposed any hint of an increase in taxes or fees of any kind in the past session.
Even with that funding source dried up, the bill’s chief advocate, Senate Judiciary Chairman Jeffrey Kessler, D-Marshall, said the bill still contained $3 million to be transferred from the auditor’s purchasing card fund annually, the chief revenue stream for the campaign financing.
“Walt was adamantly opposed to raising any fees this year,” Kessler recalled. “That’s why he took out some of the filing fees that lawyers pay and things like that.
“But I have a commitment from the governor that if there is not sufficient funding he’ll put it in next year or the year before the election. It will at least be a pilot.”
House members had no problems with the Senate version, passing it 78-18 on the final night of the session. In this region, the opposition votes came from Delegates Ray Canterbury, R-Greenbrier, and Mike Porter, R-Mercer.
The tally was much closer in the Senate — 26-7 — and one of the opponents was Majority Leader Truman Chafin, D-Mingo, who opined that anyone seeking a seat on the state’s highest court should raise campaign money personally, not lean on taxpayers to pay the freight.
